I keep hearing the argument that MPs voted for Article 50 and so they are responsible for the mess we're in. There is some element of truth in that. So I thought I would check who did vote for us to leave the EU. The BBC reported at the time:
MPs have voted by a majority of 384 to allow Prime Minister Theresa May to get Brexit negotiations under way.
They backed the government's European Union Bill, supported by the Labour leadership, by 498 votes to 114.
But the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats opposed the bill, while 47 Labour MPs and Tory ex-chancellor Ken Clarke rebelled.
The report is not quite right. Most LibDems opposed, but not all, and it fails to mention that Caroline Lucas also opposed Article 50 notice being given.
What that makes clear is that if MPs are responsible for the mess we're in that is not true of all of them.
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Considering the circumstances that fact is indeed a ray of hope which needs to be utilised asap.
Richard
My understanding is that MPs voted to give the PM the power to invoke article 50. Although this is a moot point, a lot of MPs didnt expect her to get carried away and send the letter before she actually had a plan, ie: straight away. So although MPs carry some of the responsibility, it is the lack of planning that has caused the real problems.
Interesting idea
Not how I recall it
The High Court ruled (on 12/6/18 in a permission hearing in the article 50 Challenge case brought by Liz Webster et al) that the decision to invoke article 50 was made by one person: Theresa May. The previous Gina Miller case had established that May could not invoke A50 without Parliament’s permission. The vote you cite was Parliament giving May permission. It did not require her to invoke. As a matter of legal fact, it was May who decided to invoke, and when to invoke. That said, in my view the *political- decision was made by that parliamentary vote – they knew she would invoke if they gave her permission to. That she invoked without a clear and viable plan was her choice but it was enabled by Parliament.
Fair comment
But somewhat ignoring the political reality
Legal interpretation is rarely real
It looks to me like you’re getting dangerously near only blaming only the yea voters for today’s brexit catastrophe. Strange. (A certain remainer, I would have voted for it as an MP).
When someone like you resorts to arguments like this I think the ERG remaoners saboteur argument has already won.
I better start my stock-piling.
No
I am not sure I am blaming
But I was curious and could not recall and felt it worth reminding how it happened
My understanding was the EU refused to begin any sort of negotiation until Article 50 was triggered.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/03/eu-commission-still-refuses-uk-talks-before-article-50-triggered
In effect the vote against giving the PM the power to trigger it was simply the block of MP’s for whom Brexit of any sort was unacceptable.
There seems to be a rewriting of history now saying we should have waited before triggering to ensure contingencies were in place.
Given there has never been at any point in the last 3 years a majority for anything in parliament (remain, no-deal, May’s deal, the mythical labour jobs Brexit deal) then it seems like the situation we are in would have happened regardless of when A50 was triggered.
It wasn’t a case of whether the EU was going to negotiate anything before Article 50. The problem was that we had not had any discussion about what we actually wanted to negotiate. So when did anyone discuss if we wanted to stay / leave Europol, EuroAtom, Erasmus, the Customs Union, the Single Market, etc? There was no discussion that I can recall and Theresia simply plucked all her ‘red lines’ out of a hat. Those pretty much guaranteed that no sensible deal was ever going to be possible. The EU said many times that it was impossible to negotiate with somebody that did not know what they wanted. Probably worse than that because most of the time the UK position was we want all of the benefits exactly as they are, but we won’t pay anything and we won’t stick to any rules or listen to anything you suggest or want. As others said it was like resigning from the Golf Club and then expecting to be able to play a game anytime you wanted for no fee and without having to stick to any rules of the game.
The red lines were a disaster
She could have delivered Norway ++ with ease but did not
We could have been out by now
It’s an irony that we are not out because the terms were not extreme or ‘hard Brexit’ enough for the ERG and DUP.
MPs had little option but to approve Article 50 after all the framing of the referendum as the people’s choice and that parliament would enact it. Lots of ways of arguing why that is flawed thinking, but a harder message to get across in much of England; especially with the media ready to use rhetoric like “enemies of the people”. The SNP had an easier task given a clear Scottish majority to remain.
That said, MPs are not responsible for how the government or the EU handled the negotiations. Whether they worked effectively to hold the executive to account is a matter of taste.
Moreover, we have had an election so this is a new parliament (which is not bound by the decision of its predecessor) and more recently we have gained a new PM who has rejected the whole(?) of the white paper issued about HMG’s approach.
https://tinyurl.com/ybk6hdam
There is nothing that I can see in the UK’s constitutional tradition that should prevent MPs acting to stop this government from achieving a chaotic withdrawal on 31 Oct. Whether their individual constituents agree they are right to do so is another matter.
The referendum was only advisory. The result so close, especially with both Scotland and NI voting remain, that the case could easily have been made that ‘the will of the people’ had not provided a clear mandate.
Agreed
Willie John says:
“The referendum was only advisory. The result so close, especially with both Scotland and NI voting remain, that the case could easily have been made that ‘the will of the people’ had not provided a clear mandate.”
Not to mention the allegations of electioneering malpractice, breaching of spending rules etc. which accusations were never satisfactorily addressed…….
The government of the day set the rules for the referendum (majority decision) and promised to abide by the result of the vote.
There is no credible reason why the government should not implement what they promised.
There is if it is undeliverable
And no one knew what they actually promised
Stephanie Flanders says:
“The government of the day set the rules for the referendum (majority decision) and promised to abide by the result of the vote.
There is no credible reason why the government should not implement what they promised.”
Except a lack of competence, apparently.
A complete lack of a plan, apparently.
And a lack of intent. It wasn’t supposed to happen. It was an empty promise, all to do with settling a rift in the Conservative party which has plagued it for decades. There was never any serious intention to leave the EU. And why would there be? It was an insane proposition. Geopolitical suicide.
In order to make a point of sorts, Nigel Farage, and a few headbangers would sell our birthright for a mess of chlorinated pottage.
Andy
To be fair, anti-European sentiment has also been existent in the Labour. In fact ‘anti-Europeanism’ has been a particular affliction amongst the ruling (or would be ) ruling elites of our country for some time after the post war period.
This is the underlying cause as to why Parliament has been so spectacularly unsuccessful at dealing with BREXIT effectively (add the fact that some Remain MPs represent Leave areas and you have a concoction of chaos).
All created by the first most oafish and stupid Prime Minister we’ve ever had – a certain David Cameron.
Stephanie
As I recall, the Leave proponents accepted that we could retain the single market before the vote.
Then after the result, we had our worst 2nd Prime Minister in living memory tells us that No Deal was better than a bad deal and then hard BREXIT was on the table. The same oaf of a Prime Minister also decided to call the result herself before going to Parliament for ratification (‘BREXIT means BREXIT’ – but it doesn’t) and hoped to capitalise on it by calling an election (so BREXIT went from an advisory to a FPTP confirmatory position effectively in the blink of an eye).
Leave could see blood in the water, and like the piranha’s they are went for it and still are.
Respectfully, you attempt to make it all black and white. I’m sorry but its 50 shades of grey so deal with it – there’s some nasty stuff being hidden in those shadows and I want someone’s blood for it – I want answers and I suggest it is in your interests and everyone else’s too that the mendacity of all of this is revealed and that the people who set us on this course are rooted out and destroyed.
@Pilgrim
“……by calling an election (so BREXIT went from an advisory to a FPTP confirmatory position effectively in the blink of an eye).”
With utter disregard for the fact that effectively May lost that election and was given a clear mandate …. (The voters said ‘Meh….’) to accept that the electorate was totally split and compromise was the order of the day. Time for a serious appraisal of the situation…and what we got was total denial and carry on regardless. With an opposition prepared to sit back and watch the show as if it was a disaster movie created for their amusement.
Wrong Stephanie, there is every reason why government should not implement the result of the 2016 referendum. Firstly, it was a narrow result obtained through blatant lying and proven electoral fraud. The fraud I refer to is the breaching of electoral spending rules and flows of undeclared funds by the various Leave groups. These funds were then used to micro target millions of voters using data obtained without their consent (the Cambridge Analytica scandal) to manipulate them into voting Leave.
Secondly, the Leave campaign said nothing about leaving the EU with no transitional arrangements. Since it is now proved they lied about our future relationship with the EU, and the so-called benefits obtained by being outside the EU have been proven to be nonsense, A50 should be revoked.
Thirdly ,every day that goes by sees warnings about the disastrous effects of a no-deal exit from the the EU on food supplies, medical supplies, the supply of labour for public services and agricultural labour, etc, etc, etc. These warnings come from credible sources such as the CBI, the RCN ,the NFU etc, and virtually every single economist you can name.
Again, any proper government would revoke A50 on this basis alone, let alone the other reasons I’ve given.
Fortunately for the people behind the Leave campaigns, and the ultra hard right libertarian financiers who paid for the Leave campaigns (and will benefit financially while everybody else suffers) we now have a government made up of liars, fanatics, charlatans and careerist cowards who can’t wait to implement the fraudulently obtained result.
And just as fortunately for the Leave shysters, this government is opposed by a virtually useless opposition. A Labour party that’s flapped around uselessly for the last 3 years, moderate Tories who’ll do ‘everything to stop a no-deal Brexit’ except contemplate Corbyn (who I’m no fan of) as even a temporary PM, and so on.
So barring some unforseen miracle, the UK is heading for disaster Stephanie.
sickoftaxdodgers says:
“So barring some unforseen miracle, the UK is heading for disaster Stephanie.”
….but I suspect Stephanie inhabits a higher plane….. and will float above the chaos and destruction.
If that is THE Stephanie Flanders (and I cannot confirm or deny that), then yes
“If that is THE Stephanie Flanders (and I cannot confirm or deny that), then yes”
If that is THE Stephanie Flanders I would have hoped that she would realise that her father’s lyrics for a ‘A Song of Patriotic Prejudice’ was a reflective, satirical dig at English imperialist delusions of grandeur, and not a policy prescription.
IF that is THE Stephanie Flanders I think her late lamented father might be turning in his grave. That was a fine human being and his untimely death felt, to me, like losing a family member…….his words were so much a part of my upbringing. Such wit and wisdom encapsulated in what on the surface was merely bagatelle and light entertainment. He ranks with Wilde and Coward, but is not so celebrated.
It will be a source of eternal regret that I never saw him perform live.
And if the outcome of implementing the referendum would trash existing legally binding international commitments? What then?
I am not a lawyer, but I strongly suspect that a no-deal situation will result in a barrage of international legal challenges against the UK government.
No-deal solves nothing, and I really would not be surprised to see the UK govt’s hands become tied by international legal decisions against it, particularly with regard to N.I..
Again – I am no lawyer and have no idea if e.g. the International Court of Justice would have jurisdiction over it. But in any case lawyers will be having a field day in the event of no-deal, you can guarantee that.
“[government] promised to abide by the result of the [2016 Referendum] vote.” But afaik Parliament did not.
It wasn’t until Gina Miller brought a high court case against the government and won for the case of Parliament being the legitimate sovereign body to make decisions that Theresa May was forced to consult MPs at all, let alone any other “stakeholders” who would be affected by whatever is decided. One wonders whether if even Chris Grayling was put in charge of the Brexit negotiations instead of David Davis we would have had less of the present shambles!
The ‘notification of withdrawal’ Act (following the Gina Miller case), did no more than authorise the prime minister to send a (the) A50 ‘intention to withdraw’ letter, essentially at their discretion.
The referendum was purely advisory.
So I am left wondering when, how, and by who the ‘decision to withdraw in accordance with our constitutional procedures’ was actually made (or if indeed it has properly and strictly speaking been made) – as far I can see, the best that can be said is that it was a decision made by the then prime minister in exercise of the royal prerogative.
That is correct
Jeremy GH says:
“….. it was a decision made by the then prime minister in exercise of the royal prerogative.”
Following a decision taken by her predecessor as Prime Minister, Mr Cameron, to call a referendum at all, at that time, for no better reason than to address difficulties of agreement within the Conservative Party and diffuse a threat of internal revolt, and undermining of Party discipline by persons of the (headbanger?) UKIP persuasion.
For this we stand to throw yet another generation to the the wolves.
Despair is our close companion. But we are now so accustomed to political and diplomatic ineptitude we are barely even surprised, let alone fulminating against it.