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The current BBC headline is "Brexit: MPs reject Theresa May's deal by 149 votes", which is a better summary of the situation. For a variety of reasons (legal,

by pmyteh 8y ago

The current BBC headline is "Brexit: MPs reject Theresa May's deal by 149 votes", which is a better summary of the situation. For a variety of reasons (legal, procedural, and political) MPs can't simply resolve to reject Brexit, and didn't do so today. What they can do is reject the exit deal that May has negotiated. Some of them have voted to do this because they want a 'softer' Brexit with a closer ongoing relationship with the EU, or no Brexit at all. Others because they think the deal is insufficiently 'hard', as it envisages some kind of ongoing relationship and they'd rather see a clean break and then deal with the consequences. The upshot is that we leave at the end of the month with no deal unless something happens, there's currently no majority in Parliament for any of the options, and we look like international idiots.

nkkollaw 8y ago
Do you personally think that the UK will actually end up leaving the EU in 10 days? If yes, what are the chances of that happening?
- nicoburns 8y ago
  It's not impossible, but probably not. I'd give it maybe a 10% chance. There's a clear majority of MP's who don't want a No Deal scenario. Most likely there will be a postponement of some kind, but probably a short one. What happens at the end of that period is entirely unclear at this point. Leaving without a deal is still a distinct possibility, but probably not the most likely one. I'd give about even odds to some kind of deal being wrangled, and there being another referendum. Of course, even another referendum doesn't necessarily resolve things. The vote is likely to be close again.
  - nkkollaw 8y ago
    You mean there's only 10% chance than the UK will leave the EU? That's pretty low!
    - AnimalMuppet 8y ago
      No, there's only a 10% chance that the UK will leave in 10 days, with no deal. At least, that's how I read nicoburns' answer.
      - nicoburns 8y ago
        Yep, that's what I meant. Overall chances of leaving the EU I'd put at 50%. Which is really another way of saying I have no clue.
  - mrec 8y ago
    > The vote is likely to be close again That depends very much what the question is. The vast majority of those pushing for a 2nd ref want it to be a choice between May's WA and Remain. In which case the majority of Leave voters boycott (because there'd be no Leave option as most people understand it) and Remain wins by a landslide. National support for the WA is down in the noise. Personally, I think that if you're going to do that you may as well just skip the referendum entirely, declare that the whole thing's cancelled and save everyone a lot of bother.
    - nicoburns 8y ago
      > Personally, I think that if you're going to do that you may as well just skip the referendum entirely, declare that the whole thing's cancelled and save everyone a lot of bother. I think it's significantly more democratic to have another vote. Most people thought remain would win the first one, but they didn't. If leave won again, we'd definitely definitely have to leave. > there'd be no Leave option as most people understand it I question that there is such a shared understanding of what leave means. Leavers seem pretty split between hard and soft options.
      - mrec 8y ago
        I think a recent poll showed only 12% thought the WA respected the referendum result. Another showed 44% - not a majority but a significant (and rapidly rising) plurality - supporting no-deal. Both were polling the general population, not just leavers. That obviously doesn't mean that all leavers agree, but enough of them do that a WA-vs-Remain re-ref would be a foregone conclusion.
      - andrenth 8y ago
        It’s much more democratic to respect the original vote, no?
        nicoburns 8y ago
        How? If people have changed their minds due to how the Brexit negotiations have proceeded, then it is democratic to seek and respect that new opinion? If they haven't, then they can make that clear too. It would only be undemocratic if there was coercion to vote a certain way in the second referendum. But I don't see that happening.
  - jfindley 8y ago
    There's a lot of politicians who have been very happy criticising every "what do we do now" proposal, without having any constructive alternatives. Even a general election wouldn't really help, as it would force MPs to say what they DO actually want, which the majority of them have been avoiding as far as possible. On a topic this controversial, MPs love being allowed to vote "no" to everything, but hate being forced to commit to anything constructive - anything they say will be unpopular with some of their constituency, and likely lose them votes. It will be very interesting to see what happens as their ability to criticise without offering alternatives gets closer to being taken away. This is particularly true of Brexit, as significant numbers of both major parties voted for and against it, so neither party can avoid angering lots of people who would normally vote for them no matter what they do.
- air7 8y ago
  It's just insane that that is a valid question.
- pmyteh 8y ago
  I hope not; in addition to negotiating an exit deal, there's also a stack of legislative changes that need to be made before exit (deal or otherwise) which are stacked up and waiting. It's nearly impossible to see how that can be done even partially adequately at this point, so any exit would very likely be (1) with no deal (May's won't fly and there's no chance of negotiating another one this month) and (2) totally ill-prepared. My guess is an overwhelming (but utterly non-binding) rejection of 'no deal' by Parliament tomorrow, followed by a large majority on Thursday asking for a short-term extension of Article 50 to try to sort something out, followed by the EU saying "a year or nothing", followed by public disagreements, followed by an agreement for an extension of between two months and a year. Nobody actually wants a chaotic exit except a few financiers, and we're doing enough damage to ourselves that I doubt the EU wants to enforce a punishment beating at a cost to their own member states' economies. As for the final outcome, I'd guess: * No deal (10%) * May's deal (10%) * New (softer) deal (40%) * Second referendum (40%), with any option possible after that from no Brexit at all to the public saying 'sod you all' and demanding a no deal exit. But anything's possible at this point; we're off the map and predictions on the process I was much more confident on have already been wrong.
  - mehrdadn 8y ago
    Is a second referendum really that likely? I feel like the way they're treating it it's a 5% likelihood.
    - nicoburns 8y ago
      What option do you think is more likely? Any leave option has the Irish border question to sort (unless we remain in the customs union I suppose), which is pretty intractable, and already causing low-level violence to start up again in Ireland from what I hear. And surely we won't choose to stay without a referendum.
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        I don't keep up with British politics much so this is me just taking wild guesses from nowhere but I feel like either they'll delay the exit or they'll exit without a deal. If there is another referendum I just can't see it happening the March 29 deadline.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> For a variety of reasons (legal, procedural, and political) MPs can't simply resolve to reject Brexit, There is no legal reason why ministers cannot reject Brexit; given the role of Parliament in the UK system of government, there is very little that ministers could be legally prevented from deciding, since the current (at whatever time it is you are asking the question) Parliament itself is generally the ultimate authority on what is allowed, so much so that it cannot be bound even by past Parliaments. There are, as you note, political constraints, particularly the problem of there being no majority for any option.
- dumael 8y ago
  > There is no legal reason why ministers cannot reject Brexit; There is, for a revocation of article 50 notice to be legal, Parliament has to pass a motion directing the Government to do so[1]. [1] https://ukandeu.ac.uk/revoking-article-50-after-the-ecjs-ruling/ https://ukandeu.ac.uk/revoking-article-50-after-the-ecjs-rul...
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > There is, for a revocation of article 50 notice to be legal, Parliament has to pass a motion directing the Government to do so[1]. We're talking here about what MPs can reject or not, and the fact that Parliament must direct the government before the government doing it is legal is not a legal barrier to MPs taking action on it (the form of which action would be an Act of Parliament directing the government.)
- rwmj 8y ago
  The government controls the timetable, so there's a serious procedural obstacle.
simook 8y ago
Welcome to the club! I'm not sure if it's a good club to begin with, but at least the USA isn't alone with its current political status.
_rpd 8y ago
This 6 minute video by CGP Grey explains the different possible relationships with the EU available to the UK, and why the UK has so far rejected all of them ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZ0xISi40E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZ0xISi40E
- DuskStar 8y ago
  I particularly liked his followup on the border options available [0]. They all have issues, with the general choices being "Northern Ireland doesn't actually Brexit", "the UK doesn't actually Brexit" and "Northern Ireland has troubles [1] again, because the UK just broke the Good Friday Agreement [2]". That situation's not looking great. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement
  - benmmurphy 8y ago
    It kind of glosses over that part of the problem is the EU is pushing for a hard border between the South and the North and the UK doesn't actually want this. The EU has much more to worry about from a porous border than the UK. But it is all kind of irrelevant because the EU has no way of enforcing a border that neither the South or the North want. If the UK stays in some form of relationship they will try to threaten the UK into putting up a border, but if the UK exits hard then they are going to be in the ridiculous position of threatening the Republic of Ireland to put up a wall. What the North and the South want to do is fundamentally at odds with how the EU works and unless the EU gives the UK a free trade deal which is something the UK would be happy to have it's going to cause lots of problems for the EU. It's kind of weird that the video ignores that the border is a problem for the EU the same way it is a problem for the UK. There is a fundamental symmetry. From the UK perspective I think a lot of people don't care if the porous border undermines trade policy (also, considering how the EU is talking about treating us post-brexit a porous border is going to be seen as a feature rather than a bug) because the Irish issue is more important. However, EU doesn't care as much about the Irish issue and cares more about stuff undermining its perfect union.

by pmyteh 8y ago

nkkollaw 8y ago

Do you personally think that the UK will actually end up leaving the EU in 10 days? If yes, what are the chances of that happening?

nicoburns 8y ago
It's not impossible, but probably not. I'd give it maybe a 10% chance. There's a clear majority of MP's who don't want a No Deal scenario. Most likely there will be a postponement of some kind, but probably a short one. What happens at the end of that period is entirely unclear at this point. Leaving without a deal is still a distinct possibility, but probably not the most likely one. I'd give about even odds to some kind of deal being wrangled, and there being another referendum. Of course, even another referendum doesn't necessarily resolve things. The vote is likely to be close again.
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  You mean there's only 10% chance than the UK will leave the EU? That's pretty low!
  - AnimalMuppet 8y ago
    No, there's only a 10% chance that the UK will leave in 10 days, with no deal. At least, that's how I read nicoburns' answer.
    - nicoburns 8y ago
      Yep, that's what I meant. Overall chances of leaving the EU I'd put at 50%. Which is really another way of saying I have no clue.
- mrec 8y ago
  > The vote is likely to be close again That depends very much what the question is. The vast majority of those pushing for a 2nd ref want it to be a choice between May's WA and Remain. In which case the majority of Leave voters boycott (because there'd be no Leave option as most people understand it) and Remain wins by a landslide. National support for the WA is down in the noise. Personally, I think that if you're going to do that you may as well just skip the referendum entirely, declare that the whole thing's cancelled and save everyone a lot of bother.
  - nicoburns 8y ago
    > Personally, I think that if you're going to do that you may as well just skip the referendum entirely, declare that the whole thing's cancelled and save everyone a lot of bother. I think it's significantly more democratic to have another vote. Most people thought remain would win the first one, but they didn't. If leave won again, we'd definitely definitely have to leave. > there'd be no Leave option as most people understand it I question that there is such a shared understanding of what leave means. Leavers seem pretty split between hard and soft options.
    - mrec 8y ago
      I think a recent poll showed only 12% thought the WA respected the referendum result. Another showed 44% - not a majority but a significant (and rapidly rising) plurality - supporting no-deal. Both were polling the general population, not just leavers. That obviously doesn't mean that all leavers agree, but enough of them do that a WA-vs-Remain re-ref would be a foregone conclusion.
    - andrenth 8y ago
      It’s much more democratic to respect the original vote, no?
      - nicoburns 8y ago
        How? If people have changed their minds due to how the Brexit negotiations have proceeded, then it is democratic to seek and respect that new opinion? If they haven't, then they can make that clear too. It would only be undemocratic if there was coercion to vote a certain way in the second referendum. But I don't see that happening.
- jfindley 8y ago
  There's a lot of politicians who have been very happy criticising every "what do we do now" proposal, without having any constructive alternatives. Even a general election wouldn't really help, as it would force MPs to say what they DO actually want, which the majority of them have been avoiding as far as possible. On a topic this controversial, MPs love being allowed to vote "no" to everything, but hate being forced to commit to anything constructive - anything they say will be unpopular with some of their constituency, and likely lose them votes. It will be very interesting to see what happens as their ability to criticise without offering alternatives gets closer to being taken away. This is particularly true of Brexit, as significant numbers of both major parties voted for and against it, so neither party can avoid angering lots of people who would normally vote for them no matter what they do.
air7 8y ago
It's just insane that that is a valid question.
pmyteh 8y ago
I hope not; in addition to negotiating an exit deal, there's also a stack of legislative changes that need to be made before exit (deal or otherwise) which are stacked up and waiting. It's nearly impossible to see how that can be done even partially adequately at this point, so any exit would very likely be (1) with no deal (May's won't fly and there's no chance of negotiating another one this month) and (2) totally ill-prepared. My guess is an overwhelming (but utterly non-binding) rejection of 'no deal' by Parliament tomorrow, followed by a large majority on Thursday asking for a short-term extension of Article 50 to try to sort something out, followed by the EU saying "a year or nothing", followed by public disagreements, followed by an agreement for an extension of between two months and a year. Nobody actually wants a chaotic exit except a few financiers, and we're doing enough damage to ourselves that I doubt the EU wants to enforce a punishment beating at a cost to their own member states' economies. As for the final outcome, I'd guess: * No deal (10%) * May's deal (10%) * New (softer) deal (40%) * Second referendum (40%), with any option possible after that from no Brexit at all to the public saying 'sod you all' and demanding a no deal exit. But anything's possible at this point; we're off the map and predictions on the process I was much more confident on have already been wrong.
- mehrdadn 8y ago
  Is a second referendum really that likely? I feel like the way they're treating it it's a 5% likelihood.
  - nicoburns 8y ago
    What option do you think is more likely? Any leave option has the Irish border question to sort (unless we remain in the customs union I suppose), which is pretty intractable, and already causing low-level violence to start up again in Ireland from what I hear. And surely we won't choose to stay without a referendum.
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      I don't keep up with British politics much so this is me just taking wild guesses from nowhere but I feel like either they'll delay the exit or they'll exit without a deal. If there is another referendum I just can't see it happening the March 29 deadline.

dragonwriter 8y ago

> For a variety of reasons (legal, procedural, and political) MPs can't simply resolve to reject Brexit, There is no legal reason why ministers cannot reject Brexit; given the role of Parliament in the UK system of government, there is very little that ministers could be legally prevented from deciding, since the current (at whatever time it is you are asking the question) Parliament itself is generally the ultimate authority on what is allowed, so much so that it cannot be bound even by past Parliaments. There are, as you note, political constraints, particularly the problem of there being no majority for any option.

dumael 8y ago
> There is no legal reason why ministers cannot reject Brexit; There is, for a revocation of article 50 notice to be legal, Parliament has to pass a motion directing the Government to do so[1]. [1] https://ukandeu.ac.uk/revoking-article-50-after-the-ecjs-ruling/ https://ukandeu.ac.uk/revoking-article-50-after-the-ecjs-rul...
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > There is, for a revocation of article 50 notice to be legal, Parliament has to pass a motion directing the Government to do so[1]. We're talking here about what MPs can reject or not, and the fact that Parliament must direct the government before the government doing it is legal is not a legal barrier to MPs taking action on it (the form of which action would be an Act of Parliament directing the government.)
rwmj 8y ago
The government controls the timetable, so there's a serious procedural obstacle.

simook 8y ago

Welcome to the club! I'm not sure if it's a good club to begin with, but at least the USA isn't alone with its current political status.

_rpd 8y ago

This 6 minute video by CGP Grey explains the different possible relationships with the EU available to the UK, and why the UK has so far rejected all of them ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZ0xISi40E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agZ0xISi40E

DuskStar 8y ago
I particularly liked his followup on the border options available [0]. They all have issues, with the general choices being "Northern Ireland doesn't actually Brexit", "the UK doesn't actually Brexit" and "Northern Ireland has troubles [1] again, because the UK just broke the Good Friday Agreement [2]". That situation's not looking great. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement
- benmmurphy 8y ago
  It kind of glosses over that part of the problem is the EU is pushing for a hard border between the South and the North and the UK doesn't actually want this. The EU has much more to worry about from a porous border than the UK. But it is all kind of irrelevant because the EU has no way of enforcing a border that neither the South or the North want. If the UK stays in some form of relationship they will try to threaten the UK into putting up a border, but if the UK exits hard then they are going to be in the ridiculous position of threatening the Republic of Ireland to put up a wall. What the North and the South want to do is fundamentally at odds with how the EU works and unless the EU gives the UK a free trade deal which is something the UK would be happy to have it's going to cause lots of problems for the EU. It's kind of weird that the video ignores that the border is a problem for the EU the same way it is a problem for the UK. There is a fundamental symmetry. From the UK perspective I think a lot of people don't care if the porous border undermines trade policy (also, considering how the EU is talking about treating us post-brexit a porous border is going to be seen as a feature rather than a bug) because the Irish issue is more important. However, EU doesn't care as much about the Irish issue and cares more about stuff undermining its perfect union.