Did anybody vote for this kind of Brexit?

May's deal gives us access to trade with the EU on more or less equal terms but gives us no power to decide anything and won't stop freedom of movement. It doesn't guarantee worker protections but - under the state aid rules - it makes it hard for governments to do major economic interventions like nationalising industries.

Its a Conservative (in all senses) soft Brexit.

A case can be made that this is not the worst outcome. But nobody can make the case that this is a good outcome because it has some (though not all) of EU membership benefits, no voting or veto rights and gains [i]nothing[/i] at all. So much for 'taking back control'.

A lot of people will blame politicians for selling out Brexit but this misses the point. There is no way that a good Brexit deal could be negotiated because the EU has over five times our power and no incentive to let us have our cake and eat it. May [i]has[/i] negotiated this badly but nobody who calls her soft has a tenible strategy for how they would do better. Boris and Jacob Reece Mogg flying to Brussels tomorrow and telling Johnny foreigner where to stick to make Britain Great again doesn't really count as a plan.

People [i]have[/i] been sold out by politicians but that happened [i]before[/i] the referendum when people were promised something that the politicians knew they could never deliver.

Nobody voted for this deal. We need a referendum on it.

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Platinum · M

What do you suggest the new referendum will say....Mays deal, agree or disagree

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@Platinum three options.

May's deal, no deal or cancel Brexit.

Platinum · M

Why a remain choice, we were given a once in a lifetime vote and we have had that....if we voted and remain won, do you think that is the end of it...if the vote was leave, remainers would still not accept it....@Burnley123

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@Platinum If you are offering £350 million a day extra for the NHS and most of the benefits of the the EU with no consequence then I accept it. I'm just not accepting May's deal or a no deal Brexit as in anyone's interests.

Platinum · M

Why do you people keep mentioning the bus, it said the money we save by not paying the eu, will help fund the nhs, no one said it was giving all of it and it could not be paid until we have left, although the government have already given the nhs 20 billion...if we leave even with a no deal and we get the Canadian deal we would save billions....if we stayed in the eu, each year they put the costs up and each year they have been doing less trade with us, eventually we would not be able afford to stay in....@Burnley123]

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 You still haven’t answered the question. If those are the three options, how do you determine the winner in a way that is fair to both leavers and remainers?

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Platinum It didn’t even go as far as that. It asked a question - wouldn’t it be better if the money was spent on the NHS?

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@MartinII It doesn't because that can't be reconciled. The premise of your question is based on contradictions.

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@Platinum We would also lose billions because of trade tariffs and capital flight. It feels weird to be a socialist arguining that point but it does matter.

Platinum · M

@Burnley123 we won't , you wait and see...none of us know as we hear experts who say we will be worse off and then we get other experts who say we will be better off..what you need to understand is are any of these people, just worrying about themselves...most politicians gain from staying in the eu and a lot of businessmen make money from the eu...I don't think us normal people will see much difference financially...

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@Platinum Almost all economic banks mists see Brexit as a bad thing. Just because something is anti establishment doesn't make it good. Trump and Jeremy Corbyn are not the same thing.

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 Sorry, don’t understand. The question is a perfectly simple one. If you have three options, how do you decide the winner? Surely not on a first past the post basis. Since two of your options are to leave, and only one to remain, that would be grossly unfair, and would mean the result had no legitimacy and would not be accepted by the losing side. (Of course, as we know, that’s the problem with all referendums, even when the question is a fair and simple choice between two options.)

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 Almost all economic forecasts are wrong - by definition I mean, not just in the Brexit context.

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@MartinII No they are not. Conventional macro economics didn't see the 2007 crash because they didn't see systemic risk in the form of private debt.

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 I’m sorry, I think they are. The reason is that economics is not really a science. It has certain laws, or tendencies - supply and demand, the economic cycle, and so forth - but they are far less reliable or precise than, say, the laws of physics. So all economic forecasts are strongly influenced by the orthodoxies, beliefs, prejudices etc of the people making them. And to say that most economic forecasts at a given time or in a given place are similar proves nothing, except that most of the forecasters are following the same orthodoxies etc.

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@MartinII I agree that economics is not a science. Its a social science. It can draw patterns and make predictions. That doesn't mean that it is 100% wrong all the time. If ALL of them predict hard Brexit is bad, they we need compelling reasons to say otherwise.

Platinum · M

But all of them have not predicted a hard brexit will be bad.....we can start trading under WTO rules more or less straight away, but the way things are being worked, we will get Mays new plan passed and accepted by the eu and we will be worse off than before and for this I blame all the remainers including May....@Burnley123

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 I’m not saying that economic forecasts are 100% wrong all, or even any, of the time. I’m saying none of them are 100% right any of the time. All economists do not predict “hard” Brexit will be bad - Patrick Minford’s pro-Brexit group of distinguished economists take the opposite view. Most current UK economists are anti-Brexit, but that’s a political, not a scientific or academic, position. As I say, all of them, whether pro or anti Brexit, will be wrong, to some extent. If you think about it, that must be the case. Brexit, in any form, will carry huge risks and opportunities. So will remaining. So will the curious hybrid currently proposed by the Prime Minister. What the country, and future governments, will make of the risks and opportunities, on any scenario, is anybody’s guess.

Burnley123 · 41-45, M

@MartinII Can you honestly see Brexit ending well?

MartinII · 70-79, M

@Burnley123 Of course I can. In fact I can’t see it ending badly. The same goes for remaining. Of course whether Brexit turns out to be better than remaining would have been, or indeed vice versa, is something that no-one will be able to judge conclusively, because the counter-factual will be impossible to establish. But no judgment of any kind will be possible except in the long term, and therefore probably not in my lifetime.