Political relations between UK-EU

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Rascal said:
It is a sad state of affairs that so many people were duped in the debate. They were lied to and they were exploited.

Posters will not remember this i am sure, but before the referendum i posted that holding a referendum on the issue was poor politics. I am not a fan of referendums at all and I feared at the time that many good decent people through no fault of their own would be lied to and duped into believing utter nonsense.

I consider myself fairly well educated and i didn't understand the complexity of the debate, there is no shame in admitting that because I have met very few people who did understand the complexities of the debate. As a result the debate did not become about facts it became about feelings. People grasp feelings better than fact and the likes of Farage exploited people's feelings and it became emotional. A sure fire way to win is convince people that there emotions and feelings are correct and that the facts are wrong. This was not one sided though, the remain side of the debate also employed those tactics and used emotion and feelings but they were hindered because of peoples association with their country rather than a political and economic Union.

It was why I became so disillusioned with the remain camp, they offered status quo feelings rather a vision of what could be achieved and change wins over status quo.

I say this as somebody who once i had become educated enough, although not nearly well enough to vote on the day, became convinced leave was the correct thing to do given my political beliefs. Leave would not have won though based on my political beliefs it had to use the tactics it did to win.
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Same here regarding a referendum on this subject. Complete idiocy.
 
Rascal said:
It is a sad state of affairs that so many people were duped in the debate. They were lied to and they were exploited.

Posters will not remember this i am sure, but before the referendum i posted that holding a referendum on the issue was poor politics. I am not a fan of referendums at all and I feared at the time that many good decent people through no fault of their own would be lied to and duped into believing utter nonsense.

I consider myself fairly well educated and i didn't understand the complexity of the debate, there is no shame in admitting that because I have met very few people who did understand the complexities of the debate. As a result the debate did not become about facts it became about feelings. People grasp feelings better than fact and the likes of Farage exploited people's feelings and it became emotional. A sure fire way to win is convince people that there emotions and feelings are correct and that the facts are wrong. This was not one sided though, the remain side of the debate also employed those tactics and used emotion and feelings but they were hindered because of peoples association with their country rather than a political and economic Union.

It was why I became so disillusioned with the remain camp, they offered status quo feelings rather a vision of what could be achieved and change wins over status quo.

I say this as somebody who once i had become educated enough, although not nearly well enough to vote on the day, became convinced leave was the correct thing to do given my political beliefs. Leave would not have won though based on my political beliefs it had to use the tactics it did to win.
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Referendums are fine but they need to be advisory only. Let the result put the pressure on the government, or the one after, to act according with reference to the nation's wishes. Acting on such a close result was idiocy.

The idea of asking people to vote on a single issue is welcome, though, as it makes it a lot simpler for people to become engaged in the topic and feel part of politics in general.
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
Referendums are fine but they need to be advisory only. Let the result put the pressure on the government, or the one after, to act according to the nation's wishes. Acting on such a close result was idiocy.
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so you have a referendum. Either you enact the result or you don't, in which case the referendum is pointless. The only point of having one is to enact the result of it.
 
PannickAtTheDisco said:
so you have a referendum. Either you enact the result or you don't, in which case the referendum is pointless. The only point of having one is to enact the result of it.
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No, that's the definition of a binary referendum, but there are at least three states to a non-binary referendum - Definite Yes, Definite No and Undetermined Result (although many will argue the boundaries between each). Whilst it may appear pointless, the final state would give the government and political parties the demographic information to amend their policies or narratives, so it is still the people advising the politicians, which is what a referendum is for.
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
No, that's the definition of a binary referendum, but there are at least three states to a non-binary referendum - Definite Yes, Definite No and Undetermined Result (although many will argue the boundaries between each). Whilst it may appear pointless, the final state would give the government and political parties the demographic information to amend their policies or narratives, so it is still the people advising the politicians, which is what a referendum is for.
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so we end up with Malcolm in the Middle then? "yes, no, maybe. I don't know, can you repeat the question?"
 
PannickAtTheDisco said:
so you have a referendum. Either you enact the result or you don't, in which case the referendum is pointless. The only point of having one is to enact the result of it.
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I just think if you are to hold a referendum, you have to the correct constitutional procedures in place before hand. Unfortunately Cameron's arrogance in thinking he would win comfortably meant he never put those constitutional procedures in place. Its going over old ground anyway as the result stands and was enacted upon in the end, but the bitter after taste of the effects of Cameron's decision will last a long time. We have to remember that the calling of the referendum was not done to solve issues within the country, it was done to solve issues within the Tory party and quell the rise of the UKIP as the Tories and Cameron feared losing power far more than they feared losing a referendum.
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
No, that's the definition of a binary referendum, but there are at least three states to a non-binary referendum - Definite Yes, Definite No and Undetermined Result (although many will argue the boundaries between each). Whilst it may appear pointless, the final state would give the government and political parties the demographic information to amend their policies or narratives, so it is still the people advising the politicians, which is what a referendum "is" for.
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Replace the "is" with "should be" and I would agree.

We elect representatives to Parliament to speak on our behalf, it was dereliction of duty to hold a referendum. If the referendum was advising the MPs we elected and then they made the final decision as per their job description as representatives of the electorate then it may have stopped some of the rancour, maybe not all though.

I am against referendums though because where do they end, do we have a referendum on the name of my street, the binman's uniform, the size of the Wagon Wheels.
 
Rascal said:
I just think if you are to hold a referendum, you have to the correct constitutional procedures in place before hand. Unfortunately Cameron's arrogance in thinking he would win comfortably meant he never put those constitutional procedures in place. Its going over old ground anyway as the result stands and was enacted upon in the end, but the bitter after taste of the effects of Cameron's decision will last a long time. We have to remember that the calling of the referendum was not done to solve issues within the country, it was done to solve issues within the Tory party and quell the rise of the UKIP as the Tories and Cameron feared losing power far more than they feared losing a referendum.
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of course. For once, I don't disagree with a word of your post.
 
Rascal said:
Replace the "is" with "should be" and I would agree.

We elect representatives to Parliament to speak on our behalf, it was dereliction of duty to hold a referendum. If the referendum was advising the MPs we elected and then they made the final decision as per their job description as representatives of the electorate then it may have stopped some of the rancour, maybe not all though.

I am against referendums though because where do they end, do we have a referendum on the name of my street, the binman's uniform, the size of the Wagon Wheels.
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Having lots of referendums in quick succession does lose their impact, I agree. This one came on the back of the Scottish Indy, electoral reform and, for us in GM, Vehicle Charging zones (or whatever it was called). It does need to be an infrequent choice, but I still think it gives people the chance to get involved moreso than a GE, so can be a positive process as per other countries.
 
Interesting - for the past week for so I have been hearing ad's for Frankfurt am Main, It stresses how most people there speak English so doing business there/opening a branch there/relocating there can advantage the listeners business.

One other Brexit Benefit that basically involves moving jobs or business into the EU making sure post Brexit the EU thrives and prospers
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
Referendums are fine but they need to be advisory only. Let the result put the pressure on the government, or the one after, to act according with reference to the nation's wishes. Acting on such a close result was idiocy.

The idea of asking people to vote on a single issue is welcome, though, as it makes it a lot simpler for people to become engaged in the topic and feel part of politics in general.
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It was advisory!
 
Rascal said:
I just think if you are to hold a referendum, you have to the correct constitutional procedures in place before hand. Unfortunately Cameron's arrogance in thinking he would win comfortably meant he never put those constitutional procedures in place. Its going over old ground anyway as the result stands and was enacted upon in the end, but the bitter after taste of the effects of Cameron's decision will last a long time. We have to remember that the calling of the referendum was not done to solve issues within the country, it was done to solve issues within the Tory party and quell the rise of the UKIP as the Tories and Cameron feared losing power far more than they feared losing a referendum.
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Putting constitutional procedures in place would have been derided by the leave liars as more Project Fear.
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
Fair point, I should have said "clearly advisory with no obligation" or some such.
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In a world where firms like Cinch and Cazoo can provide a car and if you don't like it after a month you can get your money back you would think that they would have been able to write something into the wording to the effect that it was advisory with no obligation.......

I know - Politicians are no longer allowed to make claims without them first being fact checked.....something tells me they wouldn't agree to that because they wouldn't be able to tell obvious lies like this

 
Vic said:
Putting constitutional procedures in place would have been derided by the leave liars as more Project Fear.
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If it had been done as part of the original Referendum Bill, I I don't believe they would, because they were happy to have secured the referendum at that time.

What they said afterwards would have been no importance as they could have been accused of having their cake and eating it.
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
Referendums are fine but they need to be advisory only. Let the result put the pressure on the government, or the one after, to act according with reference to the nation's wishes. Acting on such a close result was idiocy.

The idea of asking people to vote on a single issue is welcome, though, as it makes it a lot simpler for people to become engaged in the topic and feel part of politics in general.
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How the hell are you supposed to ‘feel a part’ when you basically Just said you can have a referendum but call it advisory.
What that means is we can pretend we care but retain the right to tell you your wrong If you want something we don’t
Might as well not have one.
Don’t see this nonsense in North Korea and China!
 
Tb1981 said:
How the hell are you supposed to ‘feel a part’ when you basically Just said you can have a referendum but call it advisory.
What that means is we can pretend we care but retain the right to tell you your wrong If you want something we don’t
Might as well not have one.
Don’t see this nonsense in North Korea and China!
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Some people don't get involved in general politics but do get into the discussion of single topics that might be the subject of a referendum if it's important to them, that's what I meant as feeling a part of. If a result is very close then it's unwise to act on in a referendum to me, you are entitled to your own opinion, of course.
 
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