13 ms·

This puts Labour in a very difficult position. The bill will, of course, carry. But this will expose the wide gulf between the Labour leadership and its traditi

by hbex5 10y ago

This puts Labour in a very difficult position. The bill will, of course, carry. But this will expose the wide gulf between the Labour leadership and its traditional white working class base (who were overwhelmingly leave) as it tries to straddle two stools and fails. I expect the Prime Minister is quietly allowing herself a wry smile as she realises what a powerful weapon to beat the opposition with she has been handed by the court. Be under no illusions, although the bill will pass, this could do serious damage to the opposition in the process, as Labour MPs decide whether to vote against their hearts and frustrate the democratic will of their constituents or prefer to ensure their career prospects. Around 70% of Labour MPs are in seats where leave was a majority, but most Labour MPs are urban liberal types who want to remain and will be viewed as traitors by the Twitterati and Guardian set if they side with their constituents. I really don't envy Jeremy Corbyn.

seanhandley 10y ago
I'm not sure sure it'll be an overwhelming majority - this is a great opportunity for constituents to write to their MPs to appeal for them to vote in favour of staying in the union. There was a lot of remorse, particularly when the NHS promises turned out to be lies.
- grabcocque 10y ago
  TBF there's been zero polling evidence for this. This is just wishful thinking.
  - seanhandley 10y ago
    Tell that to The Economist http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-chart-6 http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-c...
- djmobley 10y ago
  > There was a lot of remorse, particularly when the NHS promises turned out to be lies. Poll after poll has shown people who voted leave are happy. People who voted remain are unhappy.
  - seanhandley 10y ago
    Tell that to The Economist http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-chart-6 http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-c...
    - djmobley 10y ago
      Why have you linked me to an article which states ~90% of leave voters do not regret their vote?
  - mattcoles 10y ago
    Could that possibly be because people are happy when their side 'wins'? And conversely are unhappy when they 'lose'.
- richmarr 10y ago
  >... write to their MPs By all means try, but writing to your MP to ask them to put their career on the line by angering Brexit voters & party leadership is a tough sell. My MP (Stephen Hammond) has made it very clear that he'd rather toe the party line despite opposing Brexit. I don't mean to disparage, I just think letters are a lost cause. Perhaps there are alternative approaches?
  - adamjc 10y ago
    This is true for almost every MP in the UK. The whip system heavily discourages voting against the party, regardless of what the constituents would prefer. The best you'll see are MPs 'abstaining' (i.e. not showing up).
- PJDK 10y ago
  The NHS promise is a funny one to latch onto. We've not left the EU yet so how can the promise be broken? Now you might think it's likely to be broken in a couple of years (and you're probably right) but still. Not that anyone making the "promise" had any authority to do so.
  - DanBC 10y ago
    > We've not left the EU yet so how can the promise be broken? Because all of the people making the claim backtracked the day after the result.
    - PJDK 10y ago
      I think what they said was "we can't actually commit to this because we're not the government". Given the sum isn't actually massive and NHS spending is likely to increase anyhow it may very well turn out to have happened anyway a year or two after Brexit.
      - DanBC 10y ago
        NHS spending has decreased, and it's likely to keep decreasing. That's what sustainability and transformation plans are - cuts to provision of service. In recent years we've seen a reduction of 1 in 16 acute beds, and 1 in 5 MH beds. This would be ok if we'd seen an increase in funding for community services or for care services, but they've been cut too.
        PJDK 10y ago
        Sorry but that's just not true. https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/nhs-budget https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/nhs-... The specific cuts you mention may have happened, but money going in in real terms has increased. How much is the "right" amount to spend on health care is probably for a different thread.
        DanBC 10y ago
letsgettats 10y ago
I think Labour's position has already been decided https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/19/corbyn-to-impose-three-line-whip-on-labour-mps-to-trigger-article-50 https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/19/corbyn-to-i...
markprovan 10y ago
Let's be honest, Labour stopped being a proper opposition a good while ago.
dogma1138 10y ago
The house of commons represents many more people than those who have voting rights in the referendum. Residents are also the constituents for MP's.
satysin 10y ago
Correct. This is a win/win for May IMHO. Any MP who votes down the deal will be committing political suicide if they are in a leave constituency (which they most likely are outside of London). Brexit will happen no matter.
- Daviey 10y ago
  It wasn't just London that voted remain [0]. I hope MP's will vote based on the indication that their constitutes voiced. [0] https://vis4.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/brexit-map-1-1371x1200.png https://vis4.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/brexit-map-...
Paul_S 10y ago
It genuinely saddens me that a strategic decision like brexit was triggered and decided on based on local politics and grievances.
- nailer 10y ago
  I posted to HN about Brexit's effects on tech before the vote and most people here said they'd rather not read about politics, then promptly flagged the article. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11952724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11952724
- davidgerard 10y ago
  All politics is local. All Theresa May's actions since getting the leadership have been on the basis that she will always choose being Prime Minister of a smoking crater over not being Prime Minister of not a smoking crater.
  - Paul_S 10y ago
    This is chilling and explains a lot of problems in politics. Does game theory have any ideas about this?
    - matt4077 10y ago
      There isn't much theory to it: you have to design systems that align people's personal interests with the interests of the people/entities they're representing. That's usually easier in the business world where structures are malleable. But more often than not, well-intentioned policies are often subverted until they only create a superficial appearance of fairness (i.e. bankers' bonuses, too-big=to-fail). In politics, there is nothing you can do but hope for the decency and analytic ability of the population, and the press to provide the context for accurately judging daily politics.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
arethuza 10y ago
Actually all evidence of the campaign suggest that Corbyn and advisors were pretty strongly in favour of Brexit but couldn't be open about it - they pretty much had the 1970s view of the EEC/EU as a "capitalist plot". See: "All Out War" by Tim Shipman: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01I9AEIPU/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01I9AEIPU/ref=dp-kindle-redirec... [Edit: Absolutely fantastic book - it doesn't take sides at all and is pretty damming about everyone involved with the possible exception of Dominic Cummings (who had a blog article here on HN a few days ago)]
- grabcocque 10y ago
  I've heard lots of good things about this book. Thanks!
  - arethuza 10y ago
    I've just about finished the Audible version - which is excellent as the narrator manages a subtle impersonation of the various voices. Worth noting that it is laugh out loud funny at some points as well, which I wasn't expecting. Edit: To think that for a single text about a tweet we'd probably have a different PM....
- SixSigma 10y ago
  Corbyn was a leading part of Tony Benn's Labour Leadership campaign team. One of Benn's campaign promises was "out of the EU on day one". I think that's why he was quiet on the subject during the Brexit campaign and took a lot of flak from the Remain camp for "not doing enough", i.e. he's Brexit ideologically but knows it is political suicide from his liberal backers.
youngtaff 10y ago
Let's face it Corbyn is probably the worst Labour leader since Michael Foot
- ue_ 10y ago
  I really wish the "far left" parties were more popular. Unfortunately labour seems to want less focus on class issues and more on silly tax issues and identity politics. Really wish Corbyn could pull labour through to a proper leftist party.
  - ZeroGravitas 10y ago
    In what way is "class" not identity politics? Is it just identity politics that you identify with?
caf 10y ago
But doesn't the opposite equally apply to Conservative MPs that represent well-heeled urban constituencies that voted Remain? I would have thought this represented a golden opportunity for a London-based "euro party" to form on the basis of challenging at the next election all MPs in that general region that vote for the enabling legislation.
- Ntrails 10y ago
  It's very easy to say "I don't agree but we must abide by the results of the referendum", it's much harder to say "Sod the referendum, I'm voting for what I think is right for the country".
return0 10y ago
Nobody envies Corbyn like he does himself. I thought the guy was a closeted pro-brexiter anyway.
Chris2048 10y ago
> white working class also known as working class given that just under 90% of the country is white. Do non-white working class vote differently?
pjc50 10y ago
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-voted-and-why/ http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-... : "Nearly two thirds of Labour and SNP voters (63% and 64%), seven in ten Liberal Democrats and three quarters of Greens, voted to remain." There are a lot of people who paid their £3 to vote for Corbyn without realising that he was a Leaver (and spectacularly incoherent on policy in general). A lot of people in this thread seem to think the PM has benefited from this decision, which seems strange given that she was on the other side of the litigation! It's potentially explosive for the Conservative party as well. Many MPs were for Remain, and most importantly a large part of the traditional business/corporate backers depend on single market access, financial passporting, etc. (I note in passing that if a Labour government had dropped the pound by 20% and threatened to expel much of the finance industry from the City, the Tory press would be screaming at them and demanding heads.) No, the problem is that nobody really knows what happens after the button is pressed, only that it might be extremely bad. So nobody wants to press it. Look at Gove and Johnson turning down the opportunity to be PM! Look at how many senior Leave people have simply .. lost interest in the process. Farage has gone off to be a radio host: https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/politics/1147470/nigel-farage-start-new-job-political-analyst-fox-news/ https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/politics/1147470/n...

by hbex5 10y ago

seanhandley 10y ago

I'm not sure sure it'll be an overwhelming majority - this is a great opportunity for constituents to write to their MPs to appeal for them to vote in favour of staying in the union. There was a lot of remorse, particularly when the NHS promises turned out to be lies.

grabcocque 10y ago
TBF there's been zero polling evidence for this. This is just wishful thinking.
- seanhandley 10y ago
  Tell that to The Economist http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-chart-6 http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-c...
djmobley 10y ago
> There was a lot of remorse, particularly when the NHS promises turned out to be lies. Poll after poll has shown people who voted leave are happy. People who voted remain are unhappy.
- seanhandley 10y ago
  Tell that to The Economist http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-chart-6 http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2016/10/daily-c...
  - djmobley 10y ago
    Why have you linked me to an article which states ~90% of leave voters do not regret their vote?
- mattcoles 10y ago
  Could that possibly be because people are happy when their side 'wins'? And conversely are unhappy when they 'lose'.
richmarr 10y ago
>... write to their MPs By all means try, but writing to your MP to ask them to put their career on the line by angering Brexit voters & party leadership is a tough sell. My MP (Stephen Hammond) has made it very clear that he'd rather toe the party line despite opposing Brexit. I don't mean to disparage, I just think letters are a lost cause. Perhaps there are alternative approaches?
- adamjc 10y ago
  This is true for almost every MP in the UK. The whip system heavily discourages voting against the party, regardless of what the constituents would prefer. The best you'll see are MPs 'abstaining' (i.e. not showing up).
PJDK 10y ago
The NHS promise is a funny one to latch onto. We've not left the EU yet so how can the promise be broken? Now you might think it's likely to be broken in a couple of years (and you're probably right) but still. Not that anyone making the "promise" had any authority to do so.
- DanBC 10y ago
  > We've not left the EU yet so how can the promise be broken? Because all of the people making the claim backtracked the day after the result.
  - PJDK 10y ago
    I think what they said was "we can't actually commit to this because we're not the government". Given the sum isn't actually massive and NHS spending is likely to increase anyhow it may very well turn out to have happened anyway a year or two after Brexit.
    - DanBC 10y ago
      NHS spending has decreased, and it's likely to keep decreasing. That's what sustainability and transformation plans are - cuts to provision of service. In recent years we've seen a reduction of 1 in 16 acute beds, and 1 in 5 MH beds. This would be ok if we'd seen an increase in funding for community services or for care services, but they've been cut too.
      - PJDK 10y ago
        Sorry but that's just not true. https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/nhs-budget https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/nhs-... The specific cuts you mention may have happened, but money going in in real terms has increased. How much is the "right" amount to spend on health care is probably for a different thread.
        DanBC 10y ago

letsgettats 10y ago

I think Labour's position has already been decided https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/19/corbyn-to-impose-three-line-whip-on-labour-mps-to-trigger-article-50 https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/19/corbyn-to-i...

markprovan 10y ago

Let's be honest, Labour stopped being a proper opposition a good while ago.

dogma1138 10y ago

The house of commons represents many more people than those who have voting rights in the referendum. Residents are also the constituents for MP's.

satysin 10y ago

Correct. This is a win/win for May IMHO. Any MP who votes down the deal will be committing political suicide if they are in a leave constituency (which they most likely are outside of London). Brexit will happen no matter.

Daviey 10y ago
It wasn't just London that voted remain [0]. I hope MP's will vote based on the indication that their constitutes voiced. [0] https://vis4.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/brexit-map-1-1371x1200.png https://vis4.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/brexit-map-...

Paul_S 10y ago

It genuinely saddens me that a strategic decision like brexit was triggered and decided on based on local politics and grievances.

nailer 10y ago
I posted to HN about Brexit's effects on tech before the vote and most people here said they'd rather not read about politics, then promptly flagged the article. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11952724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11952724
davidgerard 10y ago
All politics is local. All Theresa May's actions since getting the leadership have been on the basis that she will always choose being Prime Minister of a smoking crater over not being Prime Minister of not a smoking crater.
- Paul_S 10y ago
  This is chilling and explains a lot of problems in politics. Does game theory have any ideas about this?
  - matt4077 10y ago
    There isn't much theory to it: you have to design systems that align people's personal interests with the interests of the people/entities they're representing. That's usually easier in the business world where structures are malleable. But more often than not, well-intentioned policies are often subverted until they only create a superficial appearance of fairness (i.e. bankers' bonuses, too-big=to-fail). In politics, there is nothing you can do but hope for the decency and analytic ability of the population, and the press to provide the context for accurately judging daily politics.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

arethuza 10y ago

Actually all evidence of the campaign suggest that Corbyn and advisors were pretty strongly in favour of Brexit but couldn't be open about it - they pretty much had the 1970s view of the EEC/EU as a "capitalist plot". See: "All Out War" by Tim Shipman: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01I9AEIPU/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01I9AEIPU/ref=dp-kindle-redirec... [Edit: Absolutely fantastic book - it doesn't take sides at all and is pretty damming about everyone involved with the possible exception of Dominic Cummings (who had a blog article here on HN a few days ago)]

grabcocque 10y ago
I've heard lots of good things about this book. Thanks!
- arethuza 10y ago
  I've just about finished the Audible version - which is excellent as the narrator manages a subtle impersonation of the various voices. Worth noting that it is laugh out loud funny at some points as well, which I wasn't expecting. Edit: To think that for a single text about a tweet we'd probably have a different PM....
SixSigma 10y ago
Corbyn was a leading part of Tony Benn's Labour Leadership campaign team. One of Benn's campaign promises was "out of the EU on day one". I think that's why he was quiet on the subject during the Brexit campaign and took a lot of flak from the Remain camp for "not doing enough", i.e. he's Brexit ideologically but knows it is political suicide from his liberal backers.

youngtaff 10y ago

Let's face it Corbyn is probably the worst Labour leader since Michael Foot

ue_ 10y ago
I really wish the "far left" parties were more popular. Unfortunately labour seems to want less focus on class issues and more on silly tax issues and identity politics. Really wish Corbyn could pull labour through to a proper leftist party.
- ZeroGravitas 10y ago
  In what way is "class" not identity politics? Is it just identity politics that you identify with?

caf 10y ago

But doesn't the opposite equally apply to Conservative MPs that represent well-heeled urban constituencies that voted Remain? I would have thought this represented a golden opportunity for a London-based "euro party" to form on the basis of challenging at the next election all MPs in that general region that vote for the enabling legislation.

Ntrails 10y ago
It's very easy to say "I don't agree but we must abide by the results of the referendum", it's much harder to say "Sod the referendum, I'm voting for what I think is right for the country".

return0 10y ago

Nobody envies Corbyn like he does himself. I thought the guy was a closeted pro-brexiter anyway.

Chris2048 10y ago

> white working class also known as working class given that just under 90% of the country is white. Do non-white working class vote differently?

pjc50 10y ago

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-voted-and-why/ http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-... : "Nearly two thirds of Labour and SNP voters (63% and 64%), seven in ten Liberal Democrats and three quarters of Greens, voted to remain." There are a lot of people who paid their £3 to vote for Corbyn without realising that he was a Leaver (and spectacularly incoherent on policy in general). A lot of people in this thread seem to think the PM has benefited from this decision, which seems strange given that she was on the other side of the litigation! It's potentially explosive for the Conservative party as well. Many MPs were for Remain, and most importantly a large part of the traditional business/corporate backers depend on single market access, financial passporting, etc. (I note in passing that if a Labour government had dropped the pound by 20% and threatened to expel much of the finance industry from the City, the Tory press would be screaming at them and demanding heads.) No, the problem is that nobody really knows what happens after the button is pressed, only that it might be extremely bad. So nobody wants to press it. Look at Gove and Johnson turning down the opportunity to be PM! Look at how many senior Leave people have simply .. lost interest in the process. Farage has gone off to be a radio host: https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/politics/1147470/nigel-farage-start-new-job-political-analyst-fox-news/ https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/politics/1147470/n...