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zero, there was a vote and leave won.
Will these people never give up?
'If at first you don't succeed' is generally held to be a good motto s it not NJ?
Except in this case apparently where giving in immediately seem to be de rigeur? lol
I don't know but wouldn't it be wonderful if their lordships found for the plaintiffs.
No chance, I would say. Over 2 years since the vote - so out of time. Many expats did feel angry that they could not vote - but that was offset by the fact that a whole load of immigrants (including students who had been here less than a year) were allowed to vote. It would have been better to have allowed expats a vote i.m.o., but to have deprived immigrants of less than 5 yrs. residence of their right to vote.


NJ -- No, they haven't learned to lose graciously and fight together for out country's best interests.
It better be zero. If it was unfair it was unfair to the leave side, what with all that government paid pro-remain propaganda before the campaigning really started.

Why are frivolous challenges given inappropriate consideration as if they had merit ?
I think (I could be wrong) that this is the only time I've ever commented on a Brexit thread.

I voted remain.

My reasons for voting remain, for the purposes of this thread, are irrelevant, but the fact is I voted remain.

When I opened my laptop at 6am the day after the vote two years ago, fully expecting us to remain in the EU, I struggled to believe what I was seeing. For me it was a real head in my hands moment.

However, as a staunch remainer, I appear to be in a very small minority of accepting the will of the majority of the people who bothered to vote, and I simply don't get why my fellow remainers are bleating like stuck pigs and demanding a vote on the final deal or a best out of three.

I Lost. I've accepted it. And therefore I'm putting my faith in our politicians to get it right.

If I have any criticism it is that I struggle to see how Theresa May, in my camp as a remainer, can successfully deliver the Brexit that Brexiteers demand and those like me that have accepted the result also demand.

And by the way, I feel the perpetually miffed who choose to protest and refuse to believe that leaving Europe is an inevitability are, frankly, pathetic.
What a very sensible and honest post deskdiary.
I actually *do* think it matters what the reasons for voting Remain were. The more committed you were to the idea that the UK's best interests were served by remaining in the EU, the more painful it should be to have seen what has followed the referendum. I've said before that it was clearly a referendum designed not to resolve the question but to kill it, and that it has badly backfired; hardly the most profound observation, but worth restating all the same. History will not be kind to David Cameron for his recklessness -- and then for his cowardice in resigning the morning after.

Clearly wanting a second referendum is somewhat cynical, but all the same even if you supported leaving the EU, you may not like the government's proposals for achieving this. A vote on the deal, leading to a rejection of what might be a shockingly poor set of terms, is not necessarily a vote for remaining forever inside the EU. There is, for example, a mechanism for delaying "Brexit", compatible with Article 50, until all sides are ready. I don't intend to get bogged down in this but still I want to at least refute the idea that a second referendum must be motivated by rejecting or ignoring "the will of the people". Who is to say whether or not the will has changed in the last two years?

* * * * * * * *

I have no particular desire for this legal challenge to be successful, though. There may be sound legal reasons behind it, bu undoing the last two years of working towards Brexit for the sake of a few hundred thousand pounds seems rather difficult to me to justify.
They are saying it isn’t time barred because they’ve only just found out about the money.

Deskdiary, As a remainer, given the way the EU have acted and ignoring our own governments dire ability at negotiating because we ‘could’ have had better negotiators or get better ones, how would you vote in a second referendum? Are you happy with the way the EU has acted? Are you happy that should we remain we will become a province?
"Who is to say whether or not the will has changed in the last two years?"

Who indeed. But why should the question be re-put? The process for leaving is (unnecessarily) lengthy and until it has been achieved and the results properly evaluated over a decent period the question should not be revisited. There's no point in asking the electorate to vote on an important issue (one that is far too important to be left to time-serving MPs) if it's simply to be revisited after a relatively short period because implementation is not to everyone's taste.

If, by about (say) 2030 or so (if we've properly left by then), the UK's departure proves to be so disastrous, I'm sure a second referendum can be held to ask whether the electorate wants the government to re-apply for membership. I'm equally sure that the EU (if it still exists) will welcome its grovelling cash-cow back into the fold.
I'm probably going to infuriate both of you, but here goes....

Cassa - I'd still vote remain. This is the bit that may (or may not) infuriate you. I like the thought of being part of the EU because, despite the flaws, and I fully accept there's lots of them, I feel the benefits outweigh the flaws.

As it stands nobody, literally nobody (despite the soothsayers on here and elsewhere) know what life will be like post-Brexit, so I'd rather stay with what I know. I know that is completely apathetic, but that's my view for which I will not apologise.

But (and this is important - and this is where I'm going to annoy Jim), I get a bit sick and tired of all of the caveats that my fellow remainers keep on lobbing into the mix.
There are several flaws in NJ's analysis -- the first point being that, if anything, the reverse of the statement "the referendum is too important to be left to MPs" is true. The whole point of a representative democracy, such as the UK is, is that the important questions are left to MPs who are then accountable to us for their decisions. It is beyond doubt that EU membership is one of the most important decisions possible, so that, at the very least, the referendum certainly should not have been held without proper planning and consideration for both possible outcomes. As we now know, there was no planning at all for the actual result.

Secondly, the throwaway comment about the EU possibly not existing in a decade springs only from the fantasies of the most hardline Brexiters. The EU is not going to collapse because we are leaving. All the signs are that, if anything, it will become even more united than it was before.
This is becoming more and more pathetic. Yak, yak, yak! We voted - everyone knows the outcome of that vote and that should be that.
Well, at least you are consistent DD :P

If there is any annoyance it's because I don't agree for a second that it's a case of caveats, or anti-democracy, or "ignoring the will of the people", or whatever other dismissive label people can come up with, to hold the position I do. I will grant, as I did earlier, that there is clearly some cynicism involved (understatement?) that motivates a second referendum; but it is equally possible to defend it rationally, as a response to the last two years of chaotic mismanagement.

On the same subject, a third flaw in NJ's analysis is this idea, naive in the extreme, that leaving the EU could ever have been simple. This is not, in itself, a reason to stay after all, of course. At least some of the troubles of the last couple of years could have been avoided, though, if Theresa May and co. had not tried to rush Brexit through. Again, it's become clear that, just as the referendum preceded any planning for the aftermath, so did the A50 notification, as the Cabinet has struggled, and continues to struggle, to decide on what Brexit is even *for*, and what will follow it. All of this stems from its complexity, which would have existed regardless of who was tasked with implementing it. Jacob Rees-Mogg, Nigel Farage, and others, enjoy the happy position of having no responsibility at all of delivering Brexit, and are therefore free to pretend that it would have been easy if they were in charge.

All of this to me suggests that conceding a second referendum on the nature of Brexit, or even of leaving at all, is a rational response to how circumstances have developed. I understand the charge of cynicism but I do want to stress that, for me at least, it's a reaction to how things have transpired and not something I would have done anyway. I accepted the result on June 24th, 2016, and I stand by that acceptance. I don't at all think that this is inconsistent with my position now because, after all, two years have passed and a great deal has changed. The most significant change is the moronic decision to hold a snap election last year, that can be reasonably interpreted as a rejection of Theresa May's Brexit vision, if not of Brexit itself. Maybe if she'd had the sense to hold the election before triggering Article 50 rather than after, things would have been different.

But, details aside, one of the cornerstones of democracy is that no democratic decision can truly be set in stone. This is so of General Elections, of Acts of Parliament -- and of referendum results. It is possible to respect the decisions of our past selves without being shackled by them.

If I may close this virtual essay with a final thought, courtesy of Sir Humphrey Appleby -- slightly adapted:

"If we must do this damn silly thing, must we really do it in this damn silly way?"
I doubt it will be successful mainly because more fuss would be being made of the challenge if it had any prospect of overturning the result.

Vote Leave was designated by the Electoral Commission as the official campaign in favour of leaving the European Union for the referendum on EU membership.

It has now been established that Vote Leave cheated and spent considerably more money than was allowed. At the very least, the Electoral Commission should prosecute the leaders of Vote Leave (they prosecuted a 22 year old fashion student), and impose some serious fines.

I wonder how the investigation into Aaron Banks and his murky money is going ?
// The National Crime Agency (NCA) is examining evidence of new Russian links to Arron Banks, the Brexit campaign’s largest donor.

The crime-fighting agency has been handed a cache of the millionaire businessman’s emails that reveal undisclosed meetings between him and the Russian ambassador in London.

The leaked communications show that Banks was offered three Russian business deals during the Brexit campaign — two more than previously thought — including a gold mine venture in Guinea, west Africa, and a lucrative stake in the privatisation of Alrosa, Russia’s state-controlled diamond miner.

One of the gold deals came from the director of a bank closed in 2014 amid suspicions of Russian money-laundering. //
"The Commission has now referred both Mr David Halsall the responsible person for Vote Leave, and Mr Grimes to the Metropolitan Police in relation to false declarations of campaign spending"

Mr Crimes is David Grimes, the leader of BeLeave who was fined £20,000 by the Commission.

Gromit may well be right but he is being disingenuous. Vote leave may well have overspent, but for balance Gromit should also have commented on how much did the Government spent on their remain flyer that was sent to every house in the country.
Why haven't the Twins replied to this post, are they still in bed? they will be raging when they see this post

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