Be Excellent To Each Other

And today, Nigel Farage is backing a second referendum.

What what? What?

More to put a final nail in the coffin of those whinging remoaners than for any "final say on the form of the deal" reasons.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-42649214

Isn't he still an MEP?

I continue to find this fact utterly fucking mind-boggling.

Easy money innit.

BBC: £350m Brexit claim was 'too low', says Boris Johnson

Oh, please kindly go on an extended trade mission to Siberia.

The government's new analysis of the impact of Brexit says the UK would be worse off outside the European Union under every scenario modelled, BuzzFeed News can reveal.

The assessment, which is titled “EU Exit Analysis – Cross Whitehall Briefing” and dated January 2018, looked at three of the most plausible Brexit scenarios based on existing EU arrangements.

Under a comprehensive free trade agreement with the EU, UK growth would be 5% lower over the next 15 years compared to current forecasts, according to the analysis.

The "no deal" scenario, which would see the UK revert to World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules, would reduce growth by 8% over that period. The softest Brexit option of continued single-market access through membership of the European Economic Area would, in the longer term, still lower growth by 2%.

These calculations do not take into account any short-term hits to the economy from Brexit, such as the cost of adjusting the economy to new customs arrangements.

The assessment seen by BuzzFeed News is being kept tightly guarded inside government. It was prepared by officials across Whitehall for the Department for Exiting the European Union (DExEU), and is reportedly being presented to key ministers in one-to-one meetings this week ahead of discussion at the Brexit cabinet subcommittee next week.

Asked why the prime minister was not making the analysis public, a DExEU source told BuzzFeed News: "Because it's embarrassing."

Well. This is awkward for everyone.

Paul Masterton (East Renfrewshire) (Con)

The British people are, in the main, not ideological but practical and pragmatic. They simply want Brexit to work. Will the Minister assure me that the Government’s policy will be dictated not by fringe groups, either in this place or outside it, but by the national interest?

Mr Walker (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union)
  
Yes.

What's frustrating is that this is the ideal opportunity for Mr Corbyn to demonstrate to his critics at he isn't a dogmatic ideologue and can turn round and say 'this is great in theory, but as it can't work without harming people, let's not do this', and yet he's still ruling out even just staying in the single market/customs union.

The referendum then, should not be treated as the final word, she said, but as a straw vote. “Sure, say we want to leave, but you can only in the end say we are going to leave when we know what it means. Otherwise,” she said, “it’s just wanking in the dark."

The result was 52-48 on a very blunt question. No plan for leaving was ever put forward: people were voting blind. Mrs May could, when she became prime minister, have recognised the massive splits in the country and sought a compromise plan that probably would have satisfied nobody but at least showed a willingness to bring people together, for example leaving the EU but staying in the EEA. Some benefits of membership, some of leaving (eg, not in the Union per se), but more in line with the outcome.

Instead, for reasons of keeping the Conservatives together, she opted for a hardest possible Brexit. It isn't unreasonable to think that such decisions should be made after an examination of all the options, especially when your main criticism of the opposition is they do things out of ideology, not evidence. I also don't think it's wise for Parliament to let the government proceed without a full understanding of the implications and options. It's very concerning when ministers are afraid to show their workings or justify their positions: they should be able to argue for their position based on the merits of the hard Brexit itself, rather having to resort to vague language or muttering about the 'will of the people' (and it's somewhat nauseating to hear Tories rely on the views of Jean-Jacques Rousseau!).

Getting Irish passports for my kids, they can get these no issues as my wife holds one.

Unless you travel with the kids without your wife. Be prepared to answer a lot of questions.

When we flew back from New York, the missus was questioned because her ticket was in her maiden name, but her passport was in her married name. It was our honeymoon.

What do you mean that she "opted for the hardest possible Brexit"?

As far as I can tell (which is not really very far) she seems to be just bungling her way through from one disaster to the next with no clear plan and hoping that the outcome will be some sort of a fudge.

What happens with current EU passports after we leave though? Mine was renewed last year so is good to 2027. Will I get EU movement for this time or will I have any restrictions that come with our exit in 2019?

Getting Irish passports for my kids, they can get these no issues as my wife holds one.

When we flew back from New York, the missus was questioned because her ticket was in her maiden name, but her passport was in her married name. It was our honeymoon.

I'm all for mitigating the disaster that they have wrought but a country is more than an economy and when I think it through I'm coming to believe that outright avoiding Brexit altogether would more damaging than going ahead. The divisions and hatred that these fucking clowns brought to the surface with their idiotic referendum would just get so much worse.

We get to join the slow queue and enjoy the benefits of being a free nation whilst waiting for hours with the rest of the world.



I need to finish off gathering documents. Getting a notarised copy of my mother's passport and one of mine is the main delay for me at the moment. But it shouldn't be necessary and I'm disgusted that nobody in Parliament or the media (outside of the odd James O'Brien rant) seem to realise that losing the rights to travel, live, work, love, and study freely across the continent is a massive reduction of our freedom.

Don’t ever do this, everyone else. These days she wouldn’t have gotten on the plane. There’s no “we’re on our honeymoon” pass for having mismatched passenger data.

We get to join the slow queue and enjoy the benefits of being a free nation whilst waiting for hours with the rest of the world.



I need to finish off gathering documents. Getting a notarised copy of my mother's passport and one of mine is the main delay for me at the moment. But it shouldn't be necessary and I'm disgusted that nobody in Parliament or the media (outside of the odd James O'Brien rant) seem to realise that losing the rights to travel, live, work, love, and study freely across the continent is a massive reduction of our freedom.

Side note, the US border patrol guy was awesome. The perfect guy to be greeting new arrivals.

The worst border control experience I ever had was Canada. I got the proper third degree, questioning ever place I planned to visit and why I hadn't booked a package tour.

Pretty sure the IRA count.

Because I'm an idiot I jokily said, 'Oh just a bomb we've made'.
The chap laughed but then gave me a friendly telling off saying that we could get in trouble for that, and I shouldn't say it again.
Then he let us carry on through boarding and wished us a pleasant flight.

(We'd actually been in it the day before, they had a ST:TNG pinball ... I can't even bear to think of what happened to them.)