Opinions on Brexit

[nw1]

We took a step in the direction of democracy.
In a true democracy, elected empowered and accountable MPs possess powers to introduce legislation before Parliament to "better our lot".
This cannot be said of the EU Parliament, the bureaucrats of the EU Commission decide upon the legislation, not the MEPs, a Parliament where the elected representatives lack such powers cannot be a true democracy

Of course, for some of us, first past the post is not true democracy. And majority governments are certainly not true democracy - opposition parties have little or no scope to shape policy. Government bills just get passed, and passed, and passed again with a majority government, and the opposition is a lame duck with no power.

By 2024, the Tories will have been in power 32 years out of 45. 71% of the time. And have the Tories ever come even remotely close to 71% of the vote? They've never achieved 45%, let alone 71%, in that period. Any system which has a single party in power more than 70% of the time is seriously broken, unless that party really does command the support of an overwhelming majority of the population.

 

[Noddy]

Of course, Brexit passed on a simple majority, so arguably Rejoin should pass on a simple majority.

If 60%+ was required in the last referendum, it would never have happened. And certainly not 60% in favour of Brexit over a number of years

No, what I’m saying is that if we, as remainers, are going to start talking about seriously campaigning to rejoin, there needs to be a significant time period (20-30 years) and/or a significant and sustained lead in polls (eg 60%). The vote should be the accepted norm for a nationwide referendum (currently 50%+1, although personally I am deeply uncomfortable with this being the accepted norm as well but that’s a different issue).

 

[nw1]

No, what I’m saying is that if we, as remainers, are going to start talking about seriously campaigning to rejoin, there needs to be a significant time period (20-30 years) and/or a significant and sustained lead in polls (eg 60%). The vote should be the accepted norm for a nationwide referendum (currently 50%+1, although personally I am deeply uncomfortable with this being the accepted norm as well but that’s a different issue).

If it's "and/or" that's a bit more hopeful.

Though to be honest I don't think we even need full rejoin. Just a return to the pre-EU, 1973-92 normal.

 

[RT4038]

The Leavers did tell some blatant lies, IIRC. For example, I seem to remember there was a claim that there would be no change in rights for EU citizens living here before 2016. If I did indeed remember that correctly, that was a bare-faced lie and enough, in my view, to void the entire referendum result.

I think you would have some difficulty getting traction with the the UK electorate to be interested in this view.

And the fact that EU citizens were denied the vote shows how unfair, and biased, the referendum was. The people most affected by a Leave outcome were the people denied the vote.

Er, no. The referendum was for British Citizens to decide whether their country was going to remain in the EU or not. What other EU citizens thought was not going to be considered - after all, in the event of a leave vote, if they wished to continue living in the EU they could move back to their own country. If they were domiciled in the UK they could have acquired British nationality and voted accordingly. If they didn't do this, they got a good deal. Of course it was unfair and biased against them, but then it would have been unfair to UK citizens wanting the country to leave for the citizens of other countries to have swung the vote - after all, UK citizens non-naturalised didn't get the vote in other countries of the EU.

If it's "and/or" that's a bit more hopeful.

Though to be honest I don't think we even need full rejoin. Just a return to the pre-EU, 1973-92 normal.

Much as I may agree with you, unfortunately, I don't think the EU will be open to this yet, ( because they want the control).

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 Jan 2023 ==

By 2024, the Tories will have been in power 32 years out of 45. 71% of the time. And have the Tories ever come even remotely close to 71% of the vote? They've never achieved 45%, let alone 71%, in that period. Any system which has a single party in power more than 70% of the time is seriously broken, unless that party really does command the support of an overwhelming majority of the population.

But democracy doesn't work like that. Should an extremist party, getting 20% of the vote, be in power for 20% of the time?

 

[43096]

Of course, for some of us, first past the post is not true democracy. And majority governments are certainly not true democracy - opposition parties have little or no scope to shape policy. Government bills just get passed, and passed, and passed again with a majority government, and the opposition is a lame duck with no power.

By 2024, the Tories will have been in power 32 years out of 45. 71% of the time. And have the Tories ever come even remotely close to 71% of the vote? They've never achieved 45%, let alone 71%, in that period. Any system which has a single party in power more than 70% of the time is seriously broken, unless that party really does command the support of an overwhelming majority of the population.

You're just mixing statistics there that have no relevance to each other. I'd suggest the more important point of the 32 years out of 45 is that it shows what an utterly ineffective opposition Labour has been for most of the last half century. Much of the time it has been unelectable and their most successful leader (Blair) in terms of winning elections is derided by a significant part of the party (which in itself tells a story).

 

[nw1]

But democracy doesn't work like that. Should an extremist party, getting 20% of the vote, be in power for 20% of the time?

I see what you're saying but I was arguing against the previous poster mostly, by demonstrating that the current UK system isn't really true democracy. Only the use of some kind of PR, and coalitions rather than majority governments, genuinely represent the will of the people.

 

[Yew]

You're just mixing statistics there that have no relevance to each other. I'd suggest the more important point of the 32 years out of 45 is that it shows what an utterly ineffective opposition Labour has been for most of the last half century. Much of the time it has been unelectable and their most successful leader (Blair) in terms of winning elections is derided by a significant part of the party (which in itself tells a story).

How many of those elections did the conservative party gain a majority of the overall votes?

 

[Bevan Price]

I was another "narrowly decided to vote remain". There were things I disliked about EU, especially them having unelected commissioners who often behaved like control freaks, trying to standardise almost everything. However, I thought that the disadvantages of leaving just carried the balance in my decision, e.g. more travel difficulties across borders, and possible future import tariffs. And the problems we have now will just be tiny compared to what would happen if Ms. Sturgeon ever gets her way with an independent Scotland inside EU.

 

[Doppelganger]

Er, no. The referendum was for British Citizens to decide whether their country was going to remain in the EU or not.

Only, that's not quite how it worked is it?

Any British citizen who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years was not allowed to vote. A large proportion of those people live in the EU and so I would argue it was immoral to disenfranchise those who would be affected the most, and affected they certainly were. Their government essentially abandoned them and it was EU member states who picked up the slack in many cases.

Many Brits residing in the EU feel betrayed and know exactly where the blame should be directed.

 

[Giugiaro]

Is any input allowed from an external source?

Brexit has had three adverse effects on my relationship with the UK so far.

1 - A week after the referendum results were known, the School of Arts and Media of the University of Salford unilaterally cancelled my student exchange program, after being accepted in April.
Whether this was a direct result of the referendum or not, no one knows but the School of Arts and Media.
The constant back and forth between the School, the University of Salford, my University and me leads me to believe it had.
@Mag_seven and @yorkie had the benefit of knowing my side of the story in person. They know what I'm talking about.
As a direct result, I failed to secure a scholarship to study in Japan one year later, as my lack of experience living abroad took away the enthusiasm of the Jury during the application interview. I feel handicapped ever since.

2 - I was making a habit of travelling to the UK for MCM London Comic Con.
The event was my favourite and I was tagging along with more and more of my friends, as word spread of just how amazing and surprisingly cheap it was to attend a Con abroad, despite the value of the Pound, the travel expenses, and the necessity to find a place to stay for the week.
We brought goodies and manga in English in a way that's impossible in our home country, and London was a really nice place to visit, even for weebs like us.
I also took the time to get in touch with the British railway network and meet friends I only knew online.
Eventually, COVID-19 got in the way, and the aftermath brought us a reality that is not advantageous as it once was, with Passports and Customs becoming a requirement, and the event becoming more expensive and being open for less time. We've since started looking elsewhere for our international Japanese Pop Culture needs.

3 - I had friends in the UK I used to mail and exchange gifts. It was a fun thing to do and it was a way to make our countries and cultures less far and unrelatable.
Again, with customs becoming a requirement, this exchange became an enormous pain to work out and too expensive to continue, and my last gift, already after Brexit, was a complete disaster, and my friend told me it was not worth doing it anymore...

I do feel like the UK has become more distant after Brexit, and instead of creating new opportunities, it has only destroyed the opportunities that already existed.

 

[D6130]

Only, that's not quite how it worked is it?

Any British citizen who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years was not allowed to vote. A large proportion of those people live in the EU and so I would argue it was immoral to disenfranchise those who would be affected the most, and affected they certainly were. Their government essentially abandoned them and it was EU member states who picked up the slack in many cases.

Many Brits residing in the EU feel betrayed and know exactly where the blame should be directed.

This exactly.

 

[Howardh]

We didn't vote to leave the Single Market yet that's what we did. That in itself should have had a further referendum, as there are many countries part of the SM but not the EU.
I'm surprised that issue wasn't taken to court!
I'd have been happy voting to leave the EU but remain in the SM so we keep our freedom of movement.

 

[GusB]

Only, that's not quite how it worked is it?

Any British citizen who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years was not allowed to vote. A large proportion of those people live in the EU and so I would argue it was immoral to disenfranchise those who would be affected the most, and affected they certainly were. Their government essentially abandoned them and it was EU member states who picked up the slack in many cases.

Many Brits residing in the EU feel betrayed and know exactly where the blame should be directed.

If you choose to make your life in another country for a lengthy period of time and don't return to your homeland to live during that period, surely you don't really have any right to have a say in what happens in the place that you no longer choose to live.

 

[Doppelganger]

If you choose to make your life in another country for a lengthy period of time and don't return to your homeland to live during that period, surely you don't really have any right to have a say in what happens in the place that you no longer choose to live.

What a ridiculous view.

So people who move away from their country shouldn't have to worry about the state of that country or how things might affect their friends or their families?

We are all part of a wider society, but then I guess this is Brexit in a nutshell: Isolationism and selfishness.

 

[D6130]

What a ridiculous view.

So people who move away from their country shouldn't have to worry about the state of that country or how things might affect their friends or their families?

We are all part of a wider society, but then I guess this is Brexit in a nutshell: Isolationism and selfishness.

Yep....in a nutshell.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

To think that, from the end of this year, we'll have to pay for a visa to visit our nearest neighbouring countries!

Well technically it's an ETIAS visa waiver, not a visa, that you'll have to pay for later this year. The €7 fee is basically insignificant if you're already paying to travel to Europe. It's not ideal: No fee/no bureaucracy is always going to be better than a small fee/bureaucracy, but it hardly seems something worth complaining about. You already have to do something similar (but more expensive) to visit the USA. And the administrative hassle is nothing compared to what people typically have to go through to apply for an actual visa to visit many countries (including the UK).

 

[D6130]

Well technically it's an ETIAS visa waiver, not a visa, that you'll have to pay for later this year. The €7 fee is basically insignificant if you're already paying to travel to Europe. It's not ideal: No fee/no bureaucracy is always going to be better than a small fee/bureaucracy, but it hardly seems something worth complaining about. You already have to do something similar (but more expensive) to visit the USA. And the administrative hassle is nothing compared to what people typically have to go through to apply for an actual visa to visit many countries (including the UK).

That may be technically correct....but, morally, it's something that shouldn't be happening - and probably wouldn't have happened had it not been for Johnson's hard Brexit.

 

[3141]

I voted to remain, and I still wish that viewpoint had achieved a majority, but now that we've left the EU I cannot see any likelihood of going back for many years to come, unless circumstances here become disastrous and we start to imagine that EU membership might somehow magically solve our problems - just as the leave campaign presented leaving as the solution to almost everything.

The whole leave/remain debate was highly complicated, beyond the ability or desire of most people to grasp fully. Any change as huge as that would almost certainly be disruptive, probably for years, and if there really are, on balance, advantages for the UK, it is likely to take a long time to realise a sufficient number of them to make the change seem worthwhile. Those people who say we aren't seeing the advantages because Brexit was wrongly implemented are mostly dogmatists who cannot believe that their pet idea could turn out to be bad one.

I can hardly believe there's anyone trying to argue a link between being a remainer or leaver and whether or not one favoured a harder or softer line on Covid restrictions. No-one voted to leave in 2016 because in 2020 there might be a pandemic.

 

[Doppelganger]

Well technically it's an ETIAS visa waiver, not a visa, that you'll have to pay for later this year. The €7 fee is basically insignificant if you're already paying to travel to Europe. It's not ideal: No fee/no bureaucracy is always going to be better than a small fee/bureaucracy, but it hardly seems something worth complaining about. You already have to do something similar (but more expensive) to visit the USA. And the administrative hassle is nothing compared to what people typically have to go through to apply for an actual visa to visit many countries (including the UK).

I suspect ETIAS will catch some out as it'll ask if someone has a criminal record and will run checks through Europol. But it's just another form, on top of the other forms which weren't needed before...

But I'm told Brexit was about securing borders, so all good.

 

[RT4038]

What a ridiculous view.

So people who move away from their country shouldn't have to worry about the state of that country or how things might affect their friends or their families?

We are all part of a wider society, but then I guess this is Brexit in a nutshell: Isolationism and selfishness.

A line has to be drawn, and 15 years away seems more than reasonable. The friends and families resident in the UK (or within 15 years) had their vote presumably.

 

[GusB]

What a ridiculous view.

So people who move away from their country shouldn't have to worry about the state of that country or how things might affect their friends or their families?

We are all part of a wider society, but then I guess this is Brexit in a nutshell: Isolationism and selfishness.

Why is it a ridiculous view? If you leave the country of your birth because life is better elsewhere and you intend to remain there with no intention to return to the old country, other than to visit, you have absolutely no right to dictate how the old country conducts its affairs.

 

[Howardh]

I suspect ETIAS will catch some out as it'll ask if someone has a criminal record and will run checks through Europol. But it's just another form, on top of the other forms which weren't needed before...

But I'm told Brexit was about securing borders, so all good.

Except it won't as any EUs we wouldn't let in to the UK can stroll in via the open Irish border. And don't give me the "Irish will check" nonsense, if they are EU and unless a very severe and known threat to the public, the Irish have to let them in and have no right to ask them if they intend to travel to the UK. Even so, if they could and the immigrant said no, there's no stopping them.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Except it won't as any EUs we wouldn't let in to the UK can stroll in via the open Irish border. And don't give me the "Irish will check" nonsense, if they are EU and unless a very severe and known threat to the public, the Irish have to let them in and have no right to ask them if they intend to travel to the UK. Even so, if they could and the immigrant said no, there's no stopping them.

It secures the UK borders in the sense that it allows the UK Government to determine who should be able to *live* here - which is the sense that was largely meant by those campaigning/voting for Brexit in order to 'secure our borders'. Clearly, it's not going to stop someone who wants to stroll across the Ireland/Northern Ireland border at some remote spot from doing so, but anyone who isn't legally entitled to be in the UK is probably going to have a lot of problems getting employment or somewhere to live if they can't show entitlement to be here.

 

[jon0844]

Why is it a ridiculous view? If you leave the country of your birth because life is better elsewhere and you intend to remain there with no intention to return to the old country, other than to visit, you have absolutely no right to dictate how the old country conducts its affairs.

Should you be stripped of your citizenship also? If not, why shouldn't you still be able to vote for things when you could return at any time?

 

[E27007]

Of course, for some of us, first past the post is not true democracy. And majority governments are certainly not true democracy - opposition parties have little or no scope to shape policy. Government bills just get passed, and passed, and passed again with a majority government, and the opposition is a lame duck with no power.

By 2024, the Tories will have been in power 32 years out of 45. 71% of the time. And have the Tories ever come even remotely close to 71% of the vote? They've never achieved 45%, let alone 71%, in that period. Any system which has a single party in power more than 70% of the time is seriously broken, unless that party really does command the support of an overwhelming majority of the population.

Contrast the turnout by the electorate for a General Election with the turnout for the election for Euro MPs, turnout for the European elections for MEPs, down to as low as 25%, turnout for election of MPs for Westminster around 70%. The low electoiral turnout is echoed around many of other EU member states. The EU Commission and EU Parliament has wide-reaching powers yet has a major issue with support and justification of the wielding of those powers judging by the weakness of voter turnout by the electorate

 

[Doppelganger]

Except it won't as any EUs we wouldn't let in to the UK can stroll in via the open Irish border. And don't give me the "Irish will check" nonsense, if they are EU and unless a very severe and known threat to the public, the Irish have to let them in and have no right to ask them if they intend to travel to the UK. Even so, if they could and the immigrant said no, there's no stopping them.

I was referring to the effect Brexit has had on making the Schengen border more secure.

Brexiteers triumphed the notion of sovereignty, so surely this can only be seen as a good thing?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 31 Jan 2023 ==

Should you be stripped of your citizenship also? If not, why shouldn't you still be able to vote for things when you could return at any time?

Exactly

 

[Cross City]

Why is it a ridiculous view? If you leave the country of your birth because life is better elsewhere and you intend to remain there with no intention to return to the old country, other than to visit, you have absolutely no right to dictate how the old country conducts its affairs.

If you hold a British passport you should be entitled to take part in a democratic vote on Britain's future irrespective of where you live.

I voted remain, stand by it vehemently, and tbh I'm still angry that I've had my right to live and work in dozens of other countries taken away by a largely elderly and/or xenophobic section of the country backed by a campaign of outright lies and deception.

 

[GusB]

Should you be stripped of your citizenship also? If not, why shouldn't you still be able to vote for things when you could return at any time?

No, of course not. I wasn't suggesting that.

If I moved to another part of the UK tomorrow, should I be able to retain my right to have a say in local elections where I currently live? I don't see it as any different if you move your place of residence to another country. If you eventually decide to return to the UK to live, you regain your right to vote on UK affairs. I don't see why there's a problem with this!

 

[Cross City]

No, of course not. I wasn't suggesting that.

If I moved to another part of the UK tomorrow, should I be able to retain my right to have a say in local elections where I currently live? I don't see it as any different if you move your place of residence to another country. If you eventually decide to return to the UK to live, you regain your right to vote on UK affairs. I don't see why there's a problem with this!

How come EU citizens (or citizens of any other country for that matter) living in the UK were denied a vote in the Brexit referendum?

Or are people living in countries apart from the one they were born in not allowed a vote in either their birth or residence country? Would you completely cut them off democratically?

 

[Yew]

I suspect ETIAS will catch some out as it'll ask if someone has a criminal record and will run checks through Europol. But it's just another form, on top of the other forms which weren't needed before...

But I'm told Brexit was about securing borders, so all good.

And yet the EU was nothing to do with the free movement of goods an people...