Brexit Watch

@Natasha Whittam wrote:

@okocha wrote:
 You are Boris Johnson facing tricky questions. Do you:
a. refuse to do the interview
b. ban the journalists
c. shut down parliament
d. jet off on holiday
e. hide in a fridge
f. all of the above

A & B.

Do I win a prize?

Of course....as long as I can choose what prize it should be

@okocha wrote:

@Natasha Whittam wrote:

@okocha wrote:Woah!! This is a serious and sinister move, threatening democracy and reminiscent of similar moves by countries which are grotesquely state-controlled:

 "Today's "i" newspaper leads on the banning yesterday of its political editor and journalists from a number of other news organisations  from a Downing Street briefing.
[size=13]The paper says shutting out certain publications damages the bedrock of a free media, which exists to help hold the government to account.
The Mirror  - another excluded newspaper - describes the move as tin-pot tyranny.Downing Street must never be allowed to dictate what you read, hear and see, it says, or democracy is undermined."[/size]

Ha ha, your anti-government posts are becoming more desperate by the day.

And by the way, will you please learn to cut and paste.

I wouldn't be anti-government if they would act in ways which are beneficial to our country and to you yourself, Nat, but to ban the i and the Independent, for example, is seriously worrying.
 I presume that your unpleasant rants suggest you believe in freedom of speech? 

What I wrote is cut and pasted exactly as it is written in the BBC online summary of today's news headlines, but I'll learn to adapt the way it translates onto the Nuts pages if you will learn to be a bit more discerning and sensiblly grown-up about threats to our way of life, rather than play to the crowd so inanely.

The Independent should be safe as it's still owned by Murdoch who is starting to get his payoff for Brexit - consolidated yesterday by the Tory Government undermining the BBC's licence fee income.

The "i" however is owned by Lord Rothermere who also owns the Mail - a group which is now being punished since they stopped their more extreme pro-Brexit rantings and lies when Paul Dacre was replaced as editor 18 months ago.

Presumably these measures to undermine Murdoch's competition are amongst the things Boris was told to do when he sent Odey round to Downing St - but I doubt we'll ever be able to confirm it. 

It will be interesting to see how far the commercial payoffs will go.

You lot are going round and round in circles so fast and so often, that I'm just waiting for you all to disappear up your own rhetoric 

Utterly ridiculous!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55887043

@Norpig wrote:Utterly ridiculous!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55887043

Brexiteer response 1 - it's the EU's fault, they are punishing us for leaving.

Brexiteer response 2 - it's the Remainers' fault, they should have warned us this would happen.

Funny how nothing is ever the consequence of these muppets voting for brexit.

I’m sure “getting rid of EU red tape” was one of the myths peddled to get idiots to vote to leave. 
At least we can grow bananas any shape we want now

I see that you are again calling brexiteers idiots XM.

Actually I think I called them muppets.

I concede that my phrasing is ambiguous. I mean those brexiteers who blame everybody but themselves for the consequences of their actions.

@Norpig wrote:Utterly ridiculous!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55887043

I read that article as Brexit created a job.

Although £40k a year to fill out paperwork seems generous.

Seems to me that Samways were struggling to make a profit when we were in the EU. Maybe a few government subsidies might help.

Accounts are bang up to date though. That's a lot more than can be said for most of the companies mentioned on Vince Watch.

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/04449949/filing-history

Brexit was sold on a series of half-truths, outright lies and delusional fantasies about how we'd be much better off outside the EU. Unfortunately the majority of the public swallowed it all and even now as the reality begins to bite some don't want to let go of their belief that we've somehow regained our 'sovereignty' as if we'd ever lost it in the first place.

We are the first country in history to deliberately make it harder for ourselves to trade with foreign countries and to deliberately throw away access to all sorts of information we need to ensure our own national security. We've thrown away our position as a 'bridge' between the EU and US and we've also tossed away a huge chunk of our businesses particularly in the financial markets.

What I personally fear is that once the co-vid pandemic is over we'll see the true consequences of Brexit in all their ugly glory. While I respect the result of the referendum I am absolutely certain that five years from now those who voted for it will realise they have deep cause to regret that. Personally I am afraid that our children and grandchildren will pay for our short sightedness.

@luckyPeterpiper wrote:Brexit was sold on a series of half-truths, outright lies and delusional fantasies about how we'd be much better off outside the EU. Unfortunately the majority of the public swallowed it all and even now as the reality begins to bite some don't want to let go of their belief that we've somehow regained our 'sovereignty' as if we'd ever lost it in the first place.

We are the first country in history to deliberately make it harder for ourselves to trade with foreign countries and to deliberately throw away access to all sorts of information we need to ensure our own national security. We've thrown away our position as a 'bridge' between the EU and US and we've also tossed away a huge chunk of our businesses particularly in the financial markets.

What I personally fear is that once the co-vid pandemic is over we'll see the true consequences of Brexit in all their ugly glory. While I respect the result of the referendum I am absolutely certain that five years from now those who voted for it will realise they have deep cause to regret that. Personally I am afraid that our children and grandchildren will pay for our short sightedness.

I agree with pretty much all you say. However I doubt whether a lot of the people who voted for brexit will ever admit they were wrong. They will blame all the problems on the EU or even ludicrously on those of us who voted remain. As we all know some people just aren't prepared to admit they are wrong.

@gloswhite wrote:I see that you are again calling brexiteers idiots XM.

It was me but you are extrapolating. What I said was the lie was told to get idiots to vote for Brexit which many did. That doesn’t mean that everyone who voted to leave did so for this particular reason - in reality people voted for loads of different reasons - ergo I’m not suggesting all Brexiteers are idiots.

@wanderlust wrote:
It was me but you are extrapolating. What I said was the lie was told to get idiots to vote for Brexit which many did. That doesn’t mean that everyone who voted to leave did so for this particular reason - in reality people voted for loads of different reasons - ergo I’m not suggesting all Brexiteers are idiots.

Reminds of that time Will Self said "all racists voted for leave" and that idiot brexiteer Mark Francois was stupid enough to think that meant Self was saying every leave voter was racist.

@xmiles wrote:

Reminds of that time Will Self said "all racists voted for leave" and that idiot brexiteer Mark Francois was stupid enough to think that meant Self was saying every leave voter was racist.

All cabbages are vegetables but not all vegetables are cabbages as they say....

And we Brexiteers are not all as green as we are cabbage looking. 

@gloswhite wrote:And we Brexiteers are not all as green as we are cabbage looking. 

I wonder how many people in Vulnerable Groups 1-4 would already have had their first Covid vaccinations,  if we had remained in the EU?

Probably exactly the same.

@xmiles wrote:Probably exactly the same.

How do you work that out?

Why do you think it would be any different?

Because the wankers are weeks behind us, and Macron is saying its because they are doing it as one, as Europeans. (Germany is considering buying Russian vaccines). The French people want  a vaccine of their own, but their research and distribution hasn't worked out, partly because because of bad administration as much as anything.
My wife and I both had ours today 

Other EU countries are behind us but that has nothing to do with brexit. Even if we had remained in the EU under the rules of the the European Medicines Agency we would still have been able to take decisions around vaccines exactly as we have done.

Those brexiteers just can't stop lying can they.

@xmiles wrote:Other EU countries are behind us but that has nothing to do with brexit. Even if we had remained in the EU under the rules of the the European Medicines Agency we would still have been able to take decisions around vaccines exactly as we have done.

Those brexiteers just can't stop lying can they.

It's down to EU inefficiency that they are so far behind.

@gloswhite wrote:Because the wankers are weeks behind us, and Macron is saying its because they are doing it as one, as Europeans. (Germany is considering buying Russian vaccines). The French people want  a vaccine of their own, but their research and distribution hasn't worked out, partly because because of bad administration as much as anything.
My wife and I both had ours today 

Glad you have both had your jabs,  my wife and I are having ours on Tuesday.

@Cajunboy wrote:
It's down to EU inefficiency that they are so far behind.

I am not disputing that. Your original question was "I wonder how many people in Vulnerable Groups 1-4 would already have had their first Covid vaccinations, if we had remained in the EU?" to which the answer is exactly the same number.

I think it’s a good strategy if the vaccine actually works but with the assorted ongoing mutations there is still the possibility that the current vaccines - which were ushered through the approval process by our government for political reasons - may not be sufficient in the long run and the next generation of vaccines or the stem cell/genome research outcomes may provide a better option.

Obviously we’ll know in the fullness of time, but if it does turn out to be the case, the government will have blown all our resources on a white elephant.

Like the folk who piled their money into the canal system just before trains came along.

@wanderlust wrote:I think it’s a good strategy if the vaccine actually works but with the assorted ongoing mutations there is still the possibility that the current vaccines - which were ushered through the approval process by our government for political reasons - may not be sufficient in the long run and the next generation of vaccines or the stem cell/genome research outcomes may provide a better option.

Obviously we’ll know in the fullness of time, but if it does turn out to be the case, the government will have blown all our resources on a white elephant.

Like the folk who piled their money into the canal system just before trains came along.

...and shortly after I posted this there was an article on the BBC news citing a study that indicates the AZ vaccine offers minimal protection against the SA variant - although it’s hoped it will still ameliorate the worst of the effect.

CEBR has finally published it’s assessment of the impact of Brexit on the financial sector which states London will lose at least £9.5 billion a year for the foreseeable future, business closures due to the new red tape continue to rise etc etc but what gets me is that some folk are surprised.
The JD Sports boss says it’s “worse than expected” so will be moving 1000 jobs to the continent and chief submissive gimp Lord Frost himself says it’s “bumpier than expected” as if it’s all going to come good eventually I.e. when the brexiteers are no longer around to take the blame when it doesn’t.
What on earth did they actually think was going to happen? That we’d be better off without our main trading partner?