Just because it is not written in a single document does not mean the UK does not have a constitution. But it does mean it has a particularly bad one.
If like me you were awake until 2am watching the remarkable scenes in Parliament last night, as opposition MPs stayed and protested in the Commons as Speaker Bercow, having himself entered a formal protest, led the Tories to the dissolution ceremony in the Lords, you were probably struck by the ridiculous flummery of it all. The three Queen’s Commissioners sat before the golden throne in silly hats, which the gentlemen doffed formally and very slowly three times, while the lady did not, and the Speaker and Commons staff bobbed low each time in response like a row of overdressed ducks.
This ludicrous pantomime is intended to reinforce the majesty of the monarch in the minds of the plebs, and indeed as an example of monarchical power it is effective. The prorogation, which Bercow objected to as an “executive fiat”, is just that and had it been made in the name of Boris Johnson, it is extremely probable that Bercow, with the strong support of the majority of the Commons, would have resisted the prorogation and carried on sitting. But because it is done in the name of Elizabeth Saxe Coburg Gotha, the most outrageous and undemocratic acts are suffered out of a misplaced sense of personal loyalty to the 93 year old monarch.
While Rees Mogg and his racist Brexiteer stormtroopers from the Commons turned up eagerly to grovel, it was very notable that only a dozen Tory peers bothered to show – something else totally unprecedented about this prorogation. Last week I was again up till 2am watching parliament and the much touted (esp on Guido Fawkes) Tory filibuster to stop the anti no deal Act. On a series of ridiculous procedural motions, on which counted votes were insisted despite obvious massive defeat by acclamation, the Government vote fell from in the low 100s until eventually they were being defeated every time by margins of approximately 250 to 60, and they gave up the filibuster in embarrassment. There was a remarkable contrast between the breathless excitement with which the mainstream media trailed the filibuster, as the BBC here, and the brief and sordid reality. Johnson’s repeated defeats in the Commons have rather overshadowed the utter contempt in which he is held in the Lords.
The monarchy is not a neutral player in all this. By the monarchy I mean not only the Queen, but the professional courtiers who surround her, each paid by the taxpayer. It is almost twenty years since I last held a conversation with the Queen, and I just do not know how sharp her faculties remain at 93, but I have not heard she is not still making her own decisions.
Boris Johnson should not be Prime Minister. It is not the constitutional duty of the monarch to appoint as Prime Minister the leader of the Conservative Party, and not even the leader of the largest party in the House of Commons, but a person who can command a majority in the House of Commons. For example, in 2010 Gordon Brown tried to put together a “rainbow coalition” to get a Commons majority and be reappointed Prime Minister. Had he succeeded in putting together such a coalition with a majority, the Queen would have had to appoint him even though David Cameron’s party had more seats than Labour. This was universally accepted as the constitutional position. It did not happen in the end as the Lib Dems preferred the Tories.
Nothing in the Fixed Term Parliaments Act alters the constitutional position that the Prime Minister must be able to command a majority in the House of Commons.
It was unconstitutional of Elizabeth Saxe Coburg Gotha to appoint Boris Johnson as Prime Minister when it was absolutely plain at the outset he had no majority in the House of Commons. This is not hindsight, I said so at the time. Now it has been proven that he has no majority in the House as he has been defeated six times out of six on major votes on the most important issues of the day. He has never won an important vote on anything as Prime Minister. Whether or not these are characterised as “confidence issues” is irrelevant. The man Johnson has never had a Commons majority. I can think of nothing more unconstitutional – and I think it can absolutely be characterised as a coup – than for the Queen to appoint a Prime Minister who has no majority support in the Commons, and then prorogue Parliament precisely because the executive has no majority. This is not even a government which has lost its majority – it has never had one and ought never to have been appointed.
Rather than prorogue Parliament, the Queen should have obliged Boris Johnson to resign and asked the Leader of the Opposition to see whether he could form an administration that could command a majority. That would be the constitutionally correct course of action. The monarch is not neutral in this and is acting unconstitutionally, abusing her power.
Let me put it this way. Does anybody seriously contend that Jeremy Corbyn would be appointed Prime Minister by the Queen in a situation where he had no parliamentary majority, and would remain in No. 10 despite losing 6 successive Commons votes and never winning one, and that the Queen would prorogue Parliament for him to get round the fact that he had no majority? Of course not. It is unthinkable. We are witnessing a right wing coup specifically in favour of Boris Johnson.
It is particularly worrying that so many people are happy to see dictatorship established so long as it expedites Brexit. This demonstrates the folly of introducing elements of direct democracy into a representative democracy. I am perfectly content for England and Wales to be outside the EU, though I regard extending that to being outside the customs union and single market as economic madness driven by xenophobia. I am sorry to say I do not maintain a romantic view of the electorate, having for a considerable while dwelled amongst a remarkable percentage of open racists in Ramsgate, a UKIP hotspot where Farage chose to stand. The idea that the crowd should directly wield unmediated power of executive action is almost as repugnant to me as the continued existence of the monarchy. As so often, I appreciate my views do not fit into a standard and easily labeled set of opinions and many of you may disagree. They are however my opinions and I present them with no insistence you agree, but in the hope that you will consider and discuss.
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I thought Rory the Tory was going to convene Parliament in a nearby church if it was prorogued. Perhaps he was aff his nut when he said it (nudge nudge wink wink).
My guess is that it may yet happen, though not necessarily under “Rory the Tory”. We have yet to see what’s going to happen, especially bearing in mind Craig’s assessment of the situation.
It is particularly worrying to me that a self-perpetuating cabal can illegitimately seek to overthrow the result of a referendum over three years ago that clearly showed a majority of people in this country want to LEAVE the EU
Why does one vote, won by little, three years ago, take absolute precedence over all other votes? Doesn’t sound democratic to me.
Does a 3.8% differential count as “clear”? That was the UK margin of victory. The margin of victory in England was 6.8%, now that could be unambiguously described as “clear”. And if 7% is clear, the 24% margin of victory for Remain in Scotland is a towering edifice.
For a decision this HUGE? Try a 2/3rd Majority. Anything less tends to create an Us Against Them madness verging on vendetta – which may well have been the precise intention. Cui Bono? (Hint: NOT the mythical “Will of the People”)
To not make the importance of such non binding referendum ( for all those power addicts that is) clear, the Lib Dem abstainers, blinded by a weeks of speed dating, should have at least asked for a 2/3 majority.
My hunch is that none of our representatives had any ideas of what the implicatipns were, and none of them want to give us the right to decide again, on their dithering for three years, on the changed circumstances, or the prospects we will face in future should we leave in anger with no deal.
It is a rightwing coup, why it ever was allowed to happen is a remarkable throwback to some past flirtations with a certain right wing regime.
That said, may I congratulate John Mann to his decision to leave his constuentcy, whose voters support he used to sow division via a Corbyn hate campaign, which was very likely instigated by a rogue foreign power. Good riddance stooge.
It is particularly worrying to me that such comments continue to drive the tide of xenophobia and racism in this country – you do know that people have been murdered for the sin of being a recent migrant? It is nothing in your specific words but in the lack of context that makes this tone so dangerous. Do you care to consider the ilegalities bound up with the referendum itself, or accept that “this country” deserves a Right to decide on the actual variety of Exit? What should “Leave the EU” mean? It was never sold as leaving with No Deal, but Bannon’s little puppets are nothing if not supremos of spinning the fake news top.
We know the referendum was gerrymandered. As will the next election unless they tighten the antique laws up.
How was the referendum gerrymandered?
Gerrymandered? As in, won by manipulating electoral boundaries?
Was there some other meaning that you had in mind?
How can you square your statement with the fact that;
For every 13 people who said they wanted to leave,
12 said they would rather remain,
AND
10 expressed no opinion.
So, 37% felt strongly enough to say in a public vote that they wanted to leave. Funny sort of majority that.
I think the correct fraction is 17 to 16.
(From the number of million votes for each choice in the referendum)
That is one person in 33.
It is nowhere near 1 in 3. Never mind 1 in 12.
Funny things statistics as Twain referred to of lies.
That would be a majority in England.
On a Referendum which must have been ‘Advisory’, since there were no details. ‘No Deal Brexit’ refers.
Indeed. I also lost sleep watching the latest episode of “Another Fine Coup” and honestly, anyone who has ever been caught in the middle of the MOB MIND (maybe at a contentious football match with hooligans in full swing) should grasp that Mob Rule is not what they want. Sadlly it is all too easy to trigger that species of mass hysteria by amping up FEAR, and there has only ever really been one game in town – Divide and Conquer. Mussolini would have been proud of our progress.
Craig is spot on.
Jeremy Corbyn has been speaking to the TUC.
Brexit: Boris Johnson’s claim to represent people v parliament is absurd, says Corbyn – live news
The Labour leader has told the TUC that his party will go after tax avoiders, bosses and landlords at an election
Analysis: Johnson still ahead in the polls – but by how much?
Harman vows to be ‘scrupulously neutral’ if elected as Speaker
https://web.archive.org/web/20190910102604/https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2019/sep/10/anger-abounds-after-parliament-suspended-in-night-of-high-drama-politics-live
‘Six votes, six defeats’: how the press covered Monday in parliament
PS Warning. Blair appears in the feed above.
WE ARE MANY. THEY ARE FEW.
Craig,
I would be interested to know your view on the voting system used for rhe electorate in the UK both at referendum and general and local elections.
I keep hearing about this overwhelming vote of the people, despite the legal cases succesfully brought against the leave campaigns and the system itself does not stand up to scrutiny. Despite the nisinformation given by the media. Despite the now obvious lies and cover up of facts by the Tories…and despite the fact they admit themselves that the deal they have and no deal are a disaster for the common people.
I have never been asled for any form of identification or verification at any election.. which you would think is of huge importance…and yet i need to produce such proof for virtually everything else.
I wonder why…..
I believe a fully verifiable syatem is not what the establishment of this ‘democracy’ wants….in fact the opposite.
That is the problem with secret ballots, nobody knows who voted for what, and those running the system could pretty much ‘write in’ the winner regardless of votes cast as there is no challengeable record to dispute.
I would far rather it be known what or who I voted for, than to maintain the charade that all is above board when the system is inherently corruptible and probably corrupted already.
Without secret ballots, Parnell could not have set Irish Republican party politics into motion. You really have no idea how repressive your suggestion is, observing votes being cast has been a staple of many dictatorships.
I was under the impression, that there have been no secret ballots since at least WW2.
It’s ridiculously simple for an interested ‘authority’ to find out what or whom one voted for. The voter has a registration number, the ballot paper has a corresponding number, as does its counterfoil.
My wife and I live in a ridiculously safe Tory seat, our politics though are of the left; in the office where my wife worked it was curious to her to discover that those of a similar political persuasion received no Tory electioneering propaganda, whereas those she knew to be sympathetic to the idea of a right wing government did.
In conversation, none of these people admitted to being paid up members of the Tory party .
Just a coincidence maybe, or did certain people know who they needed to keep on side?
https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,,-1051,00.html
The war in the Conservative party over Europe is and always been about old power vs new – Establishment vs Globalists. For centuries control of UK wealth has been centred on the monarchy and trickled down through the aristocracy. Then a new internationalist power cadre arose, using media and financial muscle to gain influence in National governments. Over the 20th century, this new power gained the upper hand in the West. They created the EU as a mechanism of outflanking the old established European powers. In Britain, the old guard fought desperately to hold onto their previously exclusive rights to bleed the peasants for every penny. The Conservative party’s infighting over Europe was a public manifestation of this battle.
Boris Johnson has been put in place to get Britain out of Europe and restore power to the old guard. Of course the Queen is backing him.
P.S. America is fighting the same battle. Trump is fighting for the rights of American gangsters to bleed the US, and being resisted by the Globalists.
…. or to put it another way, the unspoken truth behind the Brexit farce is that we the British are passionately fighting over which bunch of crooks gets exclusive rights to exploit us. Which is why I can’t give much of a damn.
Well put Node.
But an extreme rightwing coup is going on under cover of Brexit. It is a tragedy as well as a farce. Real-life Dario Fo.
There is no equivalence.
Hence Corbyn’s efforts to refuse to back either remain or leave and promote the Labour manifesto on housing, education, health, rights, equality, etc.
Node. Exactly
And this is why no other nations in Western Europe are screwed as much as the Brits.
Craig, you undermine your own position with your derogatory comments about the Queen ( of Scotland!)
You can be a Republican without these personal remarks.
Also, Boris is not hated as you describe…. he is fronting a (now) very minority government, and in different circumstances (ie a majority) his government would just have pressed on with the legislation. There’s little democracy in anything that the politicians do at the moment.
I think the correct term is Queen of Scots.
I’d ditch the notion of “constitution” from an analysis of what’s going on. The whole idea of an “unwritten” constitution is c*ck. Britain has no constitution. Yes the regime has something else, and not everything that goes on is completely arbitrary and by whim, but that doesn’t mean it has a constitution. There is not a higher body of laws under which laws that get passed by the legislature can be struck down. If you want to argue the contrary, you might just about be able to build a case on EU human rights legislation and how it’s been incorporated into English and Scottish law, but that’s it. That’s all you’d have. It’s such a tiny aspect of lawmaking and administration in Britain that it is utterly insufficient to build an analysis on that says that this defines what type the regime is.
Hilariously – but few are laughing – the British Library publishes a piece by some idiot law professor at King’s College London about the written documents of Britain’s unwritten constitution. Sic. Notice any mistake there, professor, or are you being a bit of a wag? Did Radio Tirana under Enver Hoxha ever come out with such obvious nonsense? Zero out of 10 for that.
I have to wonder whether Eugenics Cummings is pals with either the insane crowd prince or the monarch’s consort.
Had that creep John Bercow stayed in his chair and told Black Rock (who looked furious) to f*** off, the monarchy and its favoured political party would be teetering right now.
The following is highly significant: link to the Prorogation (Disclosure of Communications) decision by the House of Commons”.
This “humbly” tells the monarch to direct ministers to lay before the House documents that include correspondence regarding prorogation received and sent by Eugenics Cummings, Hugh Bennett, Simon Burton, Nikki da Costa, Tom Irven, Roy Stone, Christopher James, Lee Cain, and Beatrice Timpson, as well as all documents concerning Yellowhammer prepared within the government and submitted to the cabinet or a cabinet committee. And ministers are supposed to furnish these documents to the Commons by 11am tomorrow. Whoopsadaisy, the Commons got dissolved!
Do we want the outrage here to be written about first by Lord Posh in the Times in 2049? Or do we want the wound to be opened up further right now?
Someone should take this to court. I’m looking at you, Dominic Grieve. Or Gina Miller. Or for that matter, Jeremy Corbyn or Ian Blackford or Nicola Sturgeon.
The government’s position would have to be akin to a person’s argument that he can’t comply with a court order to furnish a document because as soon as he received the order he tore the document up. Try telling that to a judge and find out what happens.
Tories will say a “humble address” decision by the Commons isn’t the law. Well WTF is it, then?
They already have the material, courtesy of the Tory ‘rebels’ who were party to it all before being thrown out. If the government refuses it is in contempt of court and if they provide the material they are doomed.
“Top tip: When staging a coup d’étwat, don’t piss off and fire your inner circle before it’s complete. They were in all of your messaging groups, they know where all the bodies are buried, they know who else knows what, and they have a grudge. Rookie mistake, idiots. It’s also a trap. The information is already secure. The point of the demand is to see who complies, and who tries to withhold/destroy information.” “No government in history has ever had to lie, cheat, break laws and wreck their country in order to force through a policy that’s good for the population.
#Brexit only benefits the few.” @keira_churchill
Yes parliament, the continuity costume drama that opens proceedings is a gilded deceit which gives permission for us to enter a world bounded by extreme caricatures with extravagant fancies. Worthy mundanely costumed leftists worried about their part in the next play, Scots with their coats on and cap in hand having stood at the door for years having a conversation over their shoulders but never leaving, Tories posing as historians, who know things that no one else knows in three piece suits condescending to the air, quietly furious Tory women who somehow feel let down and disappointed with everyone else. The gilded but not golden age of chaos, melodrama and parts is with us. But not as entertaining or amusing than Acorn Antiques though.
The simple fact is that the image of the EU has been poisened in the minds of the majority of the people. Endless negative stories about it, often false and ridiculous have guaranteed that. On the reverse side, any positive is hidden completely or twisted into a negative. The story which comes to mind is that of recipients of EU money not displaying an EU flag or acknowledgement (some openly saying that it would damage the reputation of the projects). The same is true about health and safety and human rights.
As for it being a right wing coup, our elites support of any institution or norm is dependent on how useful it is to their agenda. To pretend the monarch isn’t part of the same elite or the definition of an elite is a fantacy. To also pretend that a monarch, any monarch, has ever cared about anything but a small segment of their subjects is also a ridiculous fantacy. Why people insist on loyalty to an exploitative system which demands so much and gives so little is beyond me. Something about tourism apparently.
“Something about tourism apparently.” Nah, it’s a “mission statement”. Every conceited business has to have its own fatuous mission statement. U.K. Plc’s is “We do inherited privilege”. Sends the message to the peasants; rotten right to the top.
Her Maj’s Most Gracious Speech as presented to the HoC last night by Mr Speaker to whom a copy had been sent. What tomfoolery. The world is laughing at the UK.
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-09-09/debates/207FE9D2-AB87-4EBF-86B4-B9965AE9BBDC/HerMajesty’SMostGraciousSpeech
and Bercow’s arcane preamble to it.
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-09-09/debates/F22B450C-0F24-4C12-9A99-DA6634DA779D/MessageToAttendTheLordsCommissioners
Where is Charles Lutwidge Dodgson when we need him?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lords_Commissioners_of_the_Treasury
Here, in ‘leafy Surrey’ (where all the MPs are Tories duh) there is a strange hush. The towns and shops are mostly empty and there is little or no traffic. Really weird and it’s hot and sunny. An Indian Summer they call it.
If you want to see the final heartening moments of parliament last night – watch the return of the Speaker from the other place.
Empty government benches. Standing ovation. Taking a seat below the chair to make his final report with NO ONE on the government benches – they lurked at the door.( JRM gave a visible signal that no one was to go back to the Chamber, as he left the Lords behind Bercow).
Then the final act. the MP’s filed past him and shook hands, hugged and maintained their good humour – the most heartening of moments as the coverage finally cuts out at 1.46 am.
But Corbyn does not have a majority either, surely?
Question of who can have a majority in parliament, not in an election. Johnson doesn’t have a majority, Corbyn could, but would need to demonstrate it.
Looked more like playtime at the primary school to me. If you are thinking anything as positive as a dictatorship can come out of it, I beg to differ. Perhaps when the appalling Bercow’s gone -if he goes, I’ll believe it when I see it – we might see a return to formal rules of debate and neither side pissing all over precedent in order to get the next day’s headlines. There may be some hope of better things if so. You have succumbed to the temptation of slandering your opponents, Craig. ‘Racist stormtrooper Brexiteers,’ indeed! First one to invoke H*tl*r loses the argument…
Getting exercised about funny clothes comes strangely from someone whose compatriots unhesitatingly don skirts and Jacobean jackets at the drop of a nationalist demo.
“The idea that the crowd should directly wield unmediated power of executive action is almost as repugnant to me as the continued existence of the monarchy. ” would seem to preclude a second independence referendum as much as it deplores the result of the Brexit one. But I am forgetting. We didn’t know what we were voting for because we were racist stormtroopers, while someone who watches Braveheart on loop is far better informed and completely woke. Hmmm. Just hmmm.
I don’t want to be completely dismissive, so here’s a Twitter to cheer you up:
@JohnMannMP
Just proposed to Jeremy Corbyn that Labour ends lifetime Lords appointments off he appoints any new people. Start progression to abolishing patronage based House of Lords
3:28 am – 21 Mar 2018
John Mann has been given a life peerage by May (doubtless for services to the Tories in the area of smearing his party leader)
Mann of principle.
The Tories have also appointed John Mann their antisemitism “Tsar”, even though it was the Tsar’s police and army who perpetrated pogroms against Jews in the Russian empire.
As to the roles Mann, Tom Watson et al have assumed as protectors of the Jews against “the hard left”, David Graeber wrote last weekend:
“History from Cable Street to Charlottesville teaches us when the brownshirts do hit the streets, police tend to prove useless or worse, and it’s precisely the “hard left” that is willing to stand by us. If that day comes, I know that Jewish left intellectuals such as myself are likely to be first on their list, but I also know that Corbyn and his supporters will be the first to place their bodies on the line to defend me. Will Tom Watson and John Mann, the current purgers-in-chief of purported antisemites in the Labour party, be there with them? Why do I doubt this?”
More like an anti semtism Goebbels.
What does he not get about being friends to all nations.
After this selfstrangulating Brexit this will be ever more important.
Antisemitism crusaders/witch-finders Watson and Mann have at least three things in common; they both use antisemitism to attack Jeremy Corbyn, they are both ‘friends’ of Israel, and both are not Jewish.
Some of the shite spouted by Mann, e.g. describing a constituency party meeting as being an antisemitic hate-fest because his constituents had the nerve to question why he had set a meeting uniquely on Sunday and at a time which happened to be the same time of day that Chris Williamson was speaking at a nearby venue, actually damages the cause he claims to be upholding. The truth is they do not give a shit about antisemitism beyond using the issue to generate opposition to Corbyn and Labour.
“while someone who watches Braveheart on loop is far better informed and completely woke. Hmmm. Just hmmm.”
You’ve lost the argument already, nearly everyone who supports Scottish independence will not mention BH, it simply isn’t compatible with the drive for independence.
Glad to see it’s been proscribed (Really?), and perhaps you might consider singing ‘Scots Wha Hae’ in the Commons to be counterproductive too. Even you might bring yourself to admit that there is a fair element of romanticism about any independence movement, and that that is essential to get the unthinking public on board. I cheerfully admit it in the case of England wanting independence from the EU. In your case, it successfully obscures consideration of why on earth independence can’t possibly mean independence from the EU. Or how you’re going to pay for it.
Call me cynical. Do. At my age I’m proud of it, and any other outlook is naif and idealistic.
What title is Mann taking? Lord Tel Aviv?
🙂 Good idea. I’ll put it to the appointments committee. Though, given Netanyahu’s US-backed move to claim it as the capital, Jerusalem might be more appropriate. Lord Poodle of Jerusalem has a descriptive ring about it. Though perhaps that’s reserved for Tony, when we next have a globalist New Labour government?
Come now, not “right wing coup” but fascist. Proof positive that with BoJo you CAN make this shit up.
For a future discussion, perhaps you may wish to speculate “Who benefits from chaos in the UK?”.
Surely, words and Kabuki cannot go on forever……….
What is the ultimate aim, if this is choreographed theatre OR is this a prelude to true civil strife?
Friends of the likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg and John Redwood probably, lots of opportunity for insider trading and currency speculation when you control the news agenda – have you seen the yo-yo that is the £ exchange rates?
Have you seen how many of our politicians and influencers who are not ‘friends of JRM and Redwood’ but across the spectrum, are benefiting from hedge funds and financial directorships? Insider trading, and offshore companies? There is no way that’s restricted to Brexiters.
“Who benefits from chaos?” is a very valid question though. Neither the Leave nor the Remain camps, as it happens. And to accuse either side on its own of prolonging chaos is absurd. Chaos could not persist without the compliance of both sides.
If you’re going to make snide remarks about the Queen’s German ancestry why not refer to Boris by his “real” name; Kemal. His grandfather was Turkish and adopted the name Johnson when he came to this country.
Incidentally Boris’s great-grandfather, Ali Kemal Bey, was assassinated, lynched would be a better description, for his pro-British views during the Turkish civil war of the early 1920s.
Let’s hope Boris hasn’t forgotten that.
Yeah well the way Kemal (aka Johnson) is acting in the HoC, it won’t belong till we see these kind of scenes, at Westminster.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yeDnqR2JBSM
Corbyn can’t find his arse with both hands.
That’s because it’s the tories arse his handing back to them.
It can hardly be a right wing coup since according to you the UK has a right wing constitution.
For once I agree with you completely. But let’s remember that in the new approved language of the Left even the Right is now the Far Right, and indistinguishable from fascist stormtroopers marching into Poland.
For once I agree with you completely. But let’s remember that in the new approved language of the Left even the Right is now the Far Right, and indistinguishable from fascist stormtroopers marching into Poland.
Black and white does help to simplify everything for the rest of us dim-witted blog-followers, as long as there aren’t any irritating shades of grey of course. And Craig’s slightly bombastic “stormtrooper” is fine on his own without the Fascistic marching into Poland, no doubt in iron-heeled jackboots (or into Westminster in a pin-striped suit and bowler hat, or in lace and ruffles).
All that is rotten and corrupt in the British establishment has now been laid bare. If people had the courage they would be out in the streets demanding a revolution. But most people have been anesthetized into subservience. Democracy died not with a bang but a whimper 🙁
oh damn, i just flip-flopped. again..
https://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/europe/item/23120-the-real-agenda-behind-the-cia-spawning-the-eu
Thanks to the SNP, Labour were able to stop the faux-remainers in parliament from giving bobo and his mini-Strangelove a chance to not calling an election until after 31st October, whilst ignoring the law that forces them to request a delay to A50 so that an election/ confirmatory referendum can be held in that time. Alan Duncan nailed it with how they were now hung by their own petard of the FTPA; Clarke was MIA. Grieve couldn’t nail Gove or the AG in why no-one signed the affidavit.
(It will end up in the Supreme Court and maybe even the CJEU!)
The opposition stayed in the house and sang songs. The tories tried to trip up Bercow as he left his seat and walked past their front bench.
The proof that they were certain of their grand plan is that the airways and stenographers are actually going with the election mode scripts planned to be unleashed.
‘But – why are you on about an election that isn’t happening?’ Is the question that should be put to the msm.
The people are further polarised – in the hope that at the next election they will be blinded into ignoring their best chance since 1945 to guarantee their future generations the security that they enjoyed because of that great vote, which dumped Winnie.
Johnson was chosen to avoid the same fate – he has the best ‘optics’ in their ranks.
He did look the job last night – a Macbeth surrounded by fixed grinning witches – that was spooky!
It will come down to whether the people choose parliament over the civil war they are being mobbed into.
The monarchy is much weakened – once hmq goes so will the age old hold on the public psyche – as happened in Japan and Thailand.
“The monarchy is much weakened – once hmq goes so will the age old hold on the public psyche – as happened in Japan and Thailand.”
Not so she has a large parasitic brood, who’ll continue to drain society for centuries to come.
Westminster is rotten to the core, the EU must be looking on and giving a collective shake of the head. Though Ursula von Leyden, the President elect of the European commission has hinted that a further extension (for the right reasons) may be given on Brexit.
However after three years of watching Westminster machinations, and lie after lie, and with not a clue as to where Brexit will take us except to economic armaggeddon, we’ve now reached the point of Boris and his distant relation Old Lizzie (Maybe she has lost the plot) push through his agenda.
Can anyone in their right mind ever take Westminster seriously again.
“Ursula von Leyden, the President elect of the European commission”
Elect? In waiting I think you mean. I recall no election. If you think Westminster is rotten to the core, take look at the EU. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
“If you think Westminster is rotten to the core, take look at the EU. Good riddance to bad rubbish.”
If it wasn’t for EU legislation, they’d be no Scottish/Welsh or NI parliaments. Westminster was the last EU member (virtually had to be forced) to create devolved admins.
Yeah Westminster is rotten through and through.
Re Ursula von der Leyen “elected”
“She was elected by the European Parliament on 16 July” 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_von_der_Leyen
As legitimate as any other leader.
Craig’s comments seem not only valid but also fair, or as fair as one could be on our particular band of parliamentary clowns.
RoS
When the Queen Mum was still swilling gin and ripping off bookies, she was looked upon with god like veneration. I knew a number of people of alternative lifestyles who used to have books, photos, mugs ..
Same goes for Betty.
The reverence is generational. When the old goes the new is never as good! When the young mature they don’t have the same affection through the shared hard days of the Old.
The Royal family broke that generational link with the populace with the treatment of Princess Di – treated as some broodmare. There will never be another such ‘peoples prince/princess’ even if William hands it to Harry and Meghan (who would admittedly be more popular amongs many and hated by others).
It seems that our time as the oldest monarchy in the world is nearing a well deserved end.
And here are George Orwell’s “unlabelled” opinions from The Partisan Review in 1944 to add fuel to the discussion.
The function of the King in promoting stability and acting as a sort of keystone in a non-democratic society is, of course, obvious. But he also has, or can have, the function of acting as an escape-valve for dangerous emotions.
A French journalist said to me once that the monarchy was one of the things that have saved Britain from Fascism. What he meant was that modern people can’t get along without drums, flags and loyalty parades, and that it is better that they should tie their leader-worship on to some figure who has no real power. In a dictatorship the power and the glory belong to the same person.
In England the real power belongs to unprepossessing men in bowler hats: the creature who rides in a gilded coach behind soldiers in steel breastplates is really a waxwork. It is at any rate possible that while this division of function exists a Hitler or a Stalin cannot come to power.
On the whole the European countries which have most successfully avoided fascism have been constitutional monarchies. The conditions seemingly are that the royal family shall be long-established and taken for granted, shall understand its own position and shall not produce strong characters with political ambitions. These have been fulfilled in Britain, the Low Countries and Scandinavia, but not in, say, Spain or Rumania.
If you point these facts out to the average left-winger he gets very angry, but only because he has not examined the nature of his own feelings toward Stalin. I do not defend the institution of Monarchy in an absolute sense, but I think that in an age like our own it may have an innoculating effect and certainly it does far less harm than the existence of our so-called aristocracy.
“A French journalist said to me once that the monarchy was one of the things that have saved Britain from Fascism”
https://images.app.goo.gl/38ffqTqS7TyMATmS8
“But not ..Spain or Rumania”
Oh..
Orwell’s French journalist friend makes an interesting observation, but the theory that a figurehead monarch serves as an effective firewall against a politician gaining dictatorial powers is ultimately wishful thinking.
It’s only true to the extent that one fatuously imagines that a “dictator” is necessarily a stereotypical individual “Strong Man” or Woman. This is a pardonable assumption induced by the times in which the journalist lived; i.e., such iconic “larger than life” dictators were all the rage.
But the alternative of a monarch serving as a focus of pomp and ceremony, and thereby preempting or diverting a potential “dictator” from gaining widespread public support or deference, has a fatal flaw: it simply results in those quasi-anonymous “unprepossessing men in bowler hats” establishing and maintaining dictatorship by committee.
In the US, this would be expressed as saying that a monarch merely diverts attention from the dictatorial “Deep State” shadow government.
If Orwell’s friend had lived in the era when “Yes, Minister” was in production, he would’ve realized that the individual “explicit” dictator is only one form of dictatorship– and that the “unprepossessing men in bowler hats” form of dictatorship is even more insidious than the obvious kind.
“Orwell’s French journalist friend makes an interesting observation, but the theory that a figurehead monarch serves as an effective firewall against a politician gaining dictatorial powers is ultimately wishful thinking.”
I rather think the other journalist (he was a friend, was he?) was making an observation about “what was”, not about “what ought to have been” much as Orwell did himself, describing the monarchy a year later as being arguably a “bulwark against dictatorship”. (See Hume’s Law for further details of the “is-ought” business.)
Point taken.
Yes, “friend” was careless and gratuitous. I ought to have written “interlocutor”; next time I shall be more meticulous.
No, I hope you were right and that Orwell actually did have some friends.
The only substantial point I was trying to make was about the “is-ought” problem which is constantly seen on these pages, where deficient reality is compared earnestly with futile fantasies. Sure, take the Queen, her family, flunkies and corgis down to some cellar and shoot the lot. It can be done, it has been done before (Rome, Russia, wherever royal blood was to be found). But will it really be worth the ensuing bother?
I have read a lot of garbage on this blog – but this latest offering has to be a serious contender for the biggest pile of garbage of all time.
Here we learn that John Bercow was accurate in his description of the prorogation of Parliament as being an “executive fiat” Cultural Marxists now find it necessary to declare war on language itself – but oddly are too cowardly to openly state their hatred for the Dictionary. Maybe the dictionary should be banned for being racist, sexist, transphobic, Islamophobic, exclusionary or elitist.
What role do you imagine the Judiciary to perform in the UK? Don’t you recall that in the last few days at least 3 legal challenges have been lodged with regard to the decision to prorogue Parliament. Each of these challenges have failed – although they have been granted leave to appeal. What do imagine the purpose of an appeal to be. Do you really think that if one or more of these appeals is successful then there will be no redress available in law because of “Executive Fiat”?
What was the point of going to court in the first place, if the Judiciary were unable to offer any remedy in law. To hold this view then you must believe that people like John Major and Gina Miller are literally idiots who lack even the most basic cognitive functions. Logically you wish to remain in the EU because people you believe to be idiots who lack all cognitive ability are also in favor of remaining in the EU.
Wise up and ask why.
The highest court will be ECHR.
And while we are in the EU the CJEU.
The fat lady ain’t sung yet!
‘Cultural Marxists’ – haha, a real giveaway of a term. As you would expect from someone who has bought into the alt right cliche speak – Bannonite bragging – a load of lightweight, uninformed claptrap.
Instead of engaging in ad-hominem hysterics why don’t you explain how an Executive decision that s subject to judicial oversight can possibly be interpreted as “Executive Fiat”?
You won’t do that though will you? You won’t do that because you rely on the swamp of obfuscation in order to advance your nefarious and mendacious agenda of hate.
I admire your style, Loony. It reminds me of some of the lighter passages on predestination in Calvin’s “Institutes”.
I fear a deal with the US and ergo the Zionists has already been agreed. Netenyahu and Pence at No. 10 last week. Raab, Patel, Gove in cabinet and still no reporting of Sajid Javids visit to Israel on 01.08.19 (“D” Notice ?).
Is the motivation trade deals or air bases for war ?
Yeah I still can’t get my head around Patel as Home secretary.
I’ve images of her in my head in a Göring-esque uniform, uttering when I hear of folk talk of multiculturalism I reach for my (pistol) deportation order.
Almost simultaneously, Netanyahu announces plan to annex a large portion of the West Bank, “in coordination with Trump” and Trump brusquely announces that Bolton is gone. WTF is going on?
The Donald has sacked Bolton because Donald does not agree with the advice Bolton offers Donald.
Yip RT’s two tops news stories of the day, Mad dog Bolton gone and Bibbi to annex the West Bank’s Jordan valley after election.
On the news of Bolton’s sacking the price of crude drapped aff a cliff. And here’s me laying in jerrycans of diesel agin the Iranian’s shutting down the Strait of Hormuz. Bugger!
It won’t matter how many jerrycans you stack up on, the UK will be like World War Z, after a no deal Brexit as we the plebs scramble about in the chaos looking for supplies, whilst dodging fully body armoured police/military and their teargas and baton rounds. ?
bbc says free trade deal with israel already agreed in case of brexit if israel has free trade deal with us of america,what barrier is there to free trade between uk and us of america if routed via israel
Rules of origin. A trade agreement is not the same as a customs union.
Actually the fact that Boris has been defeated so many times may be an encouraging sign that Britain’s Constitution is alive and well.
The Queen appointed Boris Johnson as PM when he did have a majority (in his agreement with the DUP), and in that capacity he made the decision to suspend Parliament. He lost his majority afterwards, but he remains PM till the Queen appoints someone else – by convention, whoever manages to get a majority of the Commons behind him at the next election. Since Corbyn turned down the offer of an election, he’ll just have to wait.
Right Wing Coup ?
Really ??
Speaker John Bercow, attempting to maintain order in the Banana Republic parliament of Westminster last night, as the salivating mob had a go.
https://mobile.twitter.com/sturdyAlex/status/1171231983697108993
Meanwhile here’s a possible outcome to the government not putting up tellers to the Kinnock amendment to the Benn bill.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/the-letter/
Why did Ian Blackford think it necessary to step forward and shake the pipsqueak’s hand as he was being led out of the chamber?
As I believe one SNP MP said in the House last night f such behaviour played out in a Latin American country the Tories would be holding it up as the undemocratic antics of a banana republic, but because its shrouded in the Union flag it’s being defended by those very same hypocrites to the very hilt. Disgusting. A rainbow coalition is absolutely required to secure the best deal (or indeed to remain within the EU, depending on the result of a second referendum) and get us out of not only this whole brexit mess but the ridiculous ten year misery of Tory austerity
Don’t insult “undemocratic banana republics”. This is a new low in politics all because a deluded and ignorant English majority voted for it. Scotland wants no part of this future.
Haha true enough, it is a bit of an insult to such places…though I hasten to add it wasn’t me who initially made the comparison but someone from the SNP raising a valid point of order
The crowned crone plotted to bring the Tories to power and to change political landscape in the US and the EU. Only when it comes to protecting her own lowly subjects she has no power.
I don’t know about anyone else but I am absolutely sickened by UK politics in general, be they Tory, Labour, Lib Dems, SNP, the whole lot and it struck me that maybe this is the point; to get the plebs (such as I) so sick and tired that we don’t care what they do or get up to.
In other words, is this a psychological tactic by the state?
People get the governments they deserve, don’t they?