Psychoactive Substances: Rolling UK Politics in The Neo-Con Era

Knighted by David Cameron himself for services etc

He will have to be involved if the primary argument for staying in is economic and business is lining up behind them. If the UK votes no and Cameron steps aside, he's reasonably well positioned as a safe pair of hands to deal with the inevitable economic fallout. If they vote yes, he can say the issue is settled for the interim and the Tories can get on with voting for a leader who is electable but doesn't represent the grass roots again. It's difficult, for obvious reasons, to point to an economically credible anti-EU front bencher with the profile to take over if Cameron quits.

I suspect that there will be enough of a renegotiation to save face on both sides.

If the UK votes no then it will look like a personal failure from his point of view, having made the argument that it would be economically detrimental to the UK, he'll be a significantly diminished figure if he loses. We all know that a narrow victory in a referendum doesn't settle anything, and in that scenario the backlash among Tory members could be so severe that they would consider any prominent anti-EU figurehead over him - especially if Boris or May or whoever set themselves up in that role.

On the other hand, these figures tend to attract coalitions working against them, but the same is also true for Osborne. There could be enough of a split vote that someone unexpected sneaks in, Major-style. It'll be interesting to see which senior Tories disappear from view during the campaign, only to reappear untainted by either side when the hustings really begin.

Honestly, regardless of what the EU ultimately end up offering Cameron, I can't see any any renegotiation satisfying large sections of the press and the Tories. I don't think they'll settle for anything less than a full referendum at this stage.

Boris is a populist but he has a very close relationship to the City and has been swimming against the tide on immigration and the benefits of businesses being able to recruit freely from Europe. I think he'll play his cards close to his chest and come out in favour of staying. May might be more amenable to leaving but has made no indication she'll campaign that way yet.

The only prominent anti-EU figureheads the party has at the moment are IDS and Gove and neither looks viable as a challenger.

There'll definitely be a full referendum but i think Cameron will probably be able to spin whatever he gets in the way of concessions as a victory.

is it just me or is cameron showing his true colors a little more these days?

Not convinced he has any colours, true or not.

imagine iain duncan smith as tory leader

No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man

LOL

But that is not enough for anyone who wants Labour back in power, and who knows that though times have changed, being sound on the economy, strong on defence, and fairer than the Tories remain key messages in a winning formula.

This is the mistake. Stop repeating it.

God, the Labour movement misses Alastair Campbell.

Politics is exactly like football. Tony Blair and Ferguson were winners. Don't you want to win?

Both were shit overseas tbf

nice

a terrible penalty long after 45 minutes

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jan/20/tory-mp-crispin-blunt-poppers-drug-policy

Good to see Blunt speaking up about this.

On a side note, I didn't know until a few weeks ago that poppers are the antidote to lethal doses of cyanide.

thread title otm

Usual case of conservative compassion in deep hibernation till an issue affects them personally.

'i was going along with all this but there are some lines, sir, that i will not allowed to be crossed and one of those is my own personal enjoyment of bottled butt drugs'

I thought we had a ban on quoting REDACTED

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/22/communist-family-politics-religion

Many of these columnists had commie parents didn't they? Wastage of another column to work off a bit of trauma but certainly the reaction against Corbyn and lefty movements like Momentum, Syriza and Podemos point to all that painful history.

What I hate about this is how Vasily Grossman's name is invoked. Yes he had no love for Stalin or Lenin but I'm finishing a couple of books by him rn and he'd use the same moral force in his writings to decry the 'gulags' of sports direct, zero hour contracts, the cycles of poverty in which large sections of this country are trapped but no its all mummy and daddy had a faith (which is wrong as communism took root in much of the world at that time) and 'times have changed'.

speak my langauge

http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/51EE/production/_87847902_typo.png

Snigger

Many of these columnists had commie parents didn't they?

Brought up to hate the Labour Party, the sort of people who vote Labour and the Labour movement in general, so nothing much has changed there then.

He does know how to pick the vote-winning issues...
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jan/24/jeremy-corbyn-power-sharing-deal-falkland-islands-argentina

Labour leader tells Argentina he’s in favour of Northern Ireland-style deal, while party spokesman says Labour is committed to self-determination

ffs

Northern Ireland-style deal? In other words, no power sharing with a non-UK government and remaining part of the UK?

wasn't Benn's explicit condition of staying that he would not contradict Corbyn?? this is really really really shambolic

hahahaha oh jeez

oh jez morelikeamirite

Is it true what I've been hearing about bees and pesticides?

they didn't make the top 77, no

And did this come to pass:

http://metro.co.uk/2015/06/02/homeless-people-to-be-fined-up-to-1000-for-sleeping-rough-5226481/

Sorry to use thread as question board but struggle to keep up with all this

Deputy mayor Cllr Sophie Linden has now written on a council blog to confirm the order would be withdrawn thanks to "ongoing public concern" - a reference to the 80,000 people who signed a petition opposing it, as well as high-profile critics such as singer Ellie Goulding.

Cameron:

We need to ensure that when new countries are admitted to the EU in the future, free movement will not apply to those new members until their economies have converged much more closely with existing Member States.

We also need to crack down on the abuse of free movement, an issue on which I have found wide support in my discussions with colleagues. This includes tougher and longer re-entry bans for fraudsters and people who collude in sham

It means addressing the fact that it is easier for an EU citizen to bring a non-EU spouse to Britain than it is for a British citizen to do the same.

It means stronger powers to deport criminals and stop them coming back, as well as preventing entry in the first place. And it means addressing ECJ (European Court of Justice) judgments that have widened the scope of free movement in a way that has made it more difficult to tackle this kind of abuse. But we need to go further to reduce the numbers coming here. As I have said previously, we can reduce the flow of people coming from within the EU by reducing the draw that our welfare system can exert across Europe.

So we have proposed that people coming to Britain from the EU must live here and contribute for four years before they qualify for in-work benefits or social housing. And that we should end the practice of sending child benefit overseas.

Tusk:

On social benefits and free movement, we need to fully respect the current treaties, in particular the principles of freedom of movement and non-discrimination. Therefore the proposed solution to address the UK concerns builds on the clarification of the interpretation of current rules, including a draft Commission Declaration on a number of issues relating to better fighting abuse of free movement.

The draft Decision of the Heads notes, in particular, the Commission’s intention to propose changes to EU legislation as regards the export of child benefits and the creation of a safeguard mechanism to respond to exceptional situations of inflow of workers from other Member States. A draft Commission Declaration also relates to this mechanism. This approach, as well as the exact duration of the application of such a mechanism need to be further discussed at our level.

Fun to have the interests of the Visegrad group put forward by someone a significant number of people in his national government believe is a Russian spy.

Looks like there might be a compromise proposal brewing where a member state could restrict benefits for a limited time if there was an overwhelmingly compelling case to do so.

It means addressing the fact that it is easier for an EU citizen to bring a non-EU spouse to Britain than it is for a British citizen to do the same.

One way of doing this would be making it easier for British citizens to bring non-EU spouses to the UK, but that would presumably be unthinkable. Unfortunately, it looks like Cameron is absolutely determined to deport Tracer Hand one way or another.

If the compromise is as hinted it's not going to appease even the most faintly Eurosceptic, can't see why he bothered tbh

Yes, he'd need a lot more and there's no obvious reason anyone would give it to him at the moment.

To help win the last election perhaps? (xp)

lol

my thoughts exactly re: British citizens and their spouses - surely the issue here is the UK not harmonizing its own "track" with EU law (not forgetting that the British track to residency costs £££££££, as opposed to the EU track which takes longer but is free)

Thinking of offering my citizenship for sale for 50% less than the government fee

David Cameron doesn't have time to deport Tracer Hand, he's been at the farmer's market I go to over the weekend, clashing with stallholders and workers who were shaming him for his refugee rhetoric. And then trying to get one of them sacked for daring to suggest that his 'bunch of migrants' comment was... fairly unstatesmanlike.

I'm sure he can find time for both

Ironic really, that he's too busy arguing over immigration policy with artisan cheesemongers to deport anyone.

It was the Isle of Wight tomato dude, says other friends who were working. Cameron showed up with plus de hired goons and visited each stall as even the Tories amongst the customers gave hard side-eye.

http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/5E66/production/_88066142_sun3.jpg

BACK OUR BRAVE DEAL

An awful lot of glum looking twats Tories sat behind the PM.

End of the line for Cam, only a couple of years left for him now surely.

His authority was always going to ebb significantly throughout this Parliament anyway, in the way that Blair's did post-2005. Question is whether anyone forces the issue before then. Hard to see how he could stay on in the event of a referendum defeat.

We'll have too much shit to worry about at that point to be happy though

wd b jokes if a narrow majority in England voted to leave, but votes elsewhere gave stay a wafer thin victory