UK General Discussion:The Rt. Hon Alex Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Populist Hero

[vileplume]

It's time to start the rejoin campaign today.

At what point and under what circumstances is the British body politic allowed to start focusing on other issues?

When my side unequivocally wins.

So, never.

He has a point though. Brexit is an issue is not going to magically disappear, nor are the people who have become attached to either side going to detach that now that Brexit itself has happened. Remainers are angry, betrayed and no longer in the mood to compromise with the bigoted masses, while Leavers are triumphant, empowered and equally no longer in the mood to compromise with the metropolitan elite. The ideas and issues surrounding Brexit are now here to stay and going back to the old ways. Now I don't agree with Rejoin as a philosophy or a policy but the ideas that were behind the Remain campaign over the last few years are not going to disappear. Leavers underestimate those forces at their peril and the left (including Labour) underestimate its importance to the opposition to their government at their peril.

And herein lies the biggest misconception of the whole Brexit debate. Attitudes to the EU in the general public is not split into two camps (Remain and Leave) but they instead sit on a sliding scale with far more people in the middle than you would ever think from listening to the media or reading Twitter. The amount of people in the country with a strong emotional attachment to the EU, feel passionately 'European' and who cried on exit day are actually quite a small number, similarly the number of people who hate the EU with an absolute passion and celebrated on exit day is also fairly small. Most people, regardless of how they eventually voted, are to a greater or lesser degree fairly meh about the whole thing and did little more than shrug as Britain's EU membership came to an end.

I personally think it's rather unlikely the UK will ever rejoin the EU as a full member because either the whole Brexit project goes okay in which case the 'soft' Remain vote will simply melt away and rejoining will be the cause of a few fringe groups who are largely ignored, or it is a disaster in which case I doubt the EU will want Britain back whatever they may be saying now and indeed the economy would fail all the entry requirements. On top of this Rejoin is a much harder sell than Remain anyway due to having to accept the Euro, Schengen etc. and will only get more tricky as the years advance and the EU moves towards federation. However if the EU does eventually develop a kind of two tier system with an inner, federal group and an outer group (or several) I could totally see Britain eventually becoming part of the outer grouping but I don't see the country ever being at the heart of Europe.

I do think free movement (or more likely free movement in all but name) will be back fairly soon though (if it ever really goes at all) due to economic demands and large labour shortages in certain sectors such as medicine, hospitality and agriculture.

[vileplume]

Something I truly do not understand is why so many politicians on the left seem to utterly despise the interests of young people, a voting bloc which is regularly among the most reliable for the left. Every other bloc seems to get so many concessions, but the youth just consistently get spit on. If this didn't happen so regularly, it's easy to imagine that youth turnout would be much, much higher across the board.

Labour did do very well amongst the youth and they did have pretty good turnout (Putney, which was the only seat Labour gained is a very young seat that had a very good turnout increase) it's just they got absolutely obliterated with the elderly, almost certainly the worst Labour performance with that group since 1918 when they were still a third party.

Here's the vote by age group for reference (from YouGov):
18-24: Labour +35
25-29: Labour +31
30-39: Labour +16
40-49: Tory +6
50-59: Tory +21
60-69: Tory +35
70+: Tory +53

Even with the best youth turnout that you could possibly hope for, there's simply no way Labour could win an election with the over 60s going for the Tories by such a mammoth margin.

[vileplume]

That's the point though, the left (in its broadest sense, thus including the LibDems) in this country is ultimately going to coalesce around some sort of EEA/EFTA type arrangement with the EU. But only once the next GE is out of the way, in all probability.

And we *won't* be actually rejoining, not until I am in my 80s or thereabouts anyway.

Those could happen. It could also be that the left remains hopelessly divided on the issue and never coalesces around meaningful reform in the next 10-20 years. I'm more optimistic about a rejoiner movement taking off in 10ish years, but that's predicated on a fair dramatic set of policy failures on the part of the ruling party/caste (Scottish independence, Irish unification, a Suez-style diplomatic catastrophe).

The problem with Rejoining is that it's quite likely that the Tories/the mainstream right of British politics basically have a veto on it even if Labour's in power. The reason for this is that it's unlikely the EU and its member states (the French in particular) will allow a Bre-entry if there's any question about the country's total commitment to the project. If one of the two biggest political parties and roughly half the country (give or take) is against the idea, then letting the UK back in would be a recipe for instability and uncertainty that the EU simply doesn't need.

Seen as I can't see the Tories doing a volte-face on the European question over the next few decades or the public becoming overwhelmingly pro-EU and embracing a European identity, I can't see Rejoin happening even 15/20 years down the line. More likely what happens is the deal is renegotiated gradually meaning that frictionless trade, free movement (or free movement in all but name) etc. are restored but full membership is not.

[vileplume]

That's the point though, the left (in its broadest sense, thus including the LibDems) in this country is ultimately going to coalesce around some sort of EEA/EFTA type arrangement with the EU. But only once the next GE is out of the way, in all probability.

And we *won't* be actually rejoining, not until I am in my 80s or thereabouts anyway.

Those could happen. It could also be that the left remains hopelessly divided on the issue and never coalesces around meaningful reform in the next 10-20 years. I'm more optimistic about a rejoiner movement taking off in 10ish years, but that's predicated on a fair dramatic set of policy failures on the part of the ruling party/caste (Scottish independence, Irish unification, a Suez-style diplomatic catastrophe).

The problem with Rejoining is that it's quite likely that the Tories/the mainstream right of British politics basically have a veto on it even if Labour's in power. The reason for this is that it's unlikely the EU and its member states (the French in particular) will allow a Bre-entry if there's any question about the country's total commitment to the project. If one of the two biggest political parties and roughly half the country (give or take) is against the idea, then letting the UK back in would be a recipe for instability and uncertainty that the EU simply doesn't need.

Seen as I can't see the Tories doing a volte-face on the European question over the next few decades or the public becoming overwhelmingly pro-EU and embracing a European identity, I can't see Rejoin happening even 15/20 years down the line. More likely what happens is the deal is renegotiated gradually meaning that frictionless trade, free movement (or free movement in all but name) etc. are restored but full membership is not.

I'd be inclined to agree with that analysis if it weren't for the fact that the same conditions existed from the 70s-90s but with the parties' roles reversed. Prior to 1973, Labour was the party more hostile to EEC membership (both parties had pro and anti wings), but that didn't stop the Tories from petitioning for membership nor the EEC from granting it.* Flash forward 25 years and Labour had performed pretty much a volte face on the issue and became the more pro-EU of the major parties.

I agree a Rejoiner movement won't be viable as long as there's a roughly 50/50 split in opinion on the matter and until then a series of small adjustments will be made to put humpty dumpty back together again in all but name. Sadly, with the lot in charge of Labour right now, even that faint hope is unrealistic.

*Worth keeping in mind, as well, that the EEC/EU have seen the UK as a strategic partner no matter how bolshie or bigotedly anti-European the government of the day might be. Total commitment was never a condition for joining. Opposition to UK entry into the EEC prior to 1973 had more to do with DeGaulle's desire not to dilute French power or increase American influence in Europe by the back door.

It's not the same condition as the 70s because back then Labour still had a large pro-EEC faction the pro-EU faction of the Conservative Party has all but died. So yes if the pro-Europe movement could be rebuilt within the Conservative Party to the extent that a section of the party elite as well as non-negligible portion of the membership wants to Rejoin, then Rejoining would become likely. However the Tories are basically unanimously opposed and in order for that to change it would probably require a sea change in the public's attitudes with an large and consistent majority (probably 60%+ as there was for the EEC in the '70s) favouring that course of action.

I agree with the point that the EU sees the UK as a strategic partner and will seek to keep the country as close to them as possible, which will likely be achieved by changes to the deal in the coming years anyway. Obviously in their ideal world the UK would re-join as a constructive and totally committed member, however without a (near) consensus for re-joining across either the political class or amongst the general public, the chances of the UK being either a constructive or committed partner is practically nil. This means that I doubt any application by a Labour government would be accepted, remember the process for EU ascension is a very slow one anyway and a UK application is bound to hit many snags. It'd probably end up being kicked into the long grass, only to be ultimately retracted upon the Tories returning to power.

[vileplume]

It's Bristol, so a lot of those trustafarian dicks will be local anyway.

Doubtful. I lived in Bristol for a number of years and over that time it became obvious that Bristol's 'radical' reputation is caused primarily by non-native-Bristolians of a left-wing disposition moving to the city. The 'homegrown' population is far, far less left wing.

Honestly I would be pretty shocked if a large majority of these people weren't originally from the middle class parts of London or the Tory Shires.