[Abernathy]

Apparently, the man-frog/cunt has a new project. He is seeking to pull off a repeat of his Brexit referendum con-trick by pressing for a new referendum on whether the UK should continue to pursue carbon-zero status in line with the vital objective of contributing to the mitigation of global climate change- or - Farage’s preferred alternative - abandon it all.

It’s almost as if he cares not a jot about exposing his dependency on the Putin regime and keeping the Uk dependent n Russian oil and gas. And he seemingly wants to fuck things up for the UK even more while dressing it up as “the will of the people”.

The man is completely disgusting. Sod human rights - at least where Farage is concerned - I’d have absulutely no qualms about throwing the cunt in jail right now and slinging the fucking key in the Atlantic.

[Andy McDandy]

I sincerely hope that he ends his days upside down, suspended from a petrol station sign.

Or in a ditch, doused in petrol, on fire.

As long as some petrol is involved.

[Rosvanian]

I know, you know and Farage knows that there isn't going be a referendum on energy policy. In fact, barring Scottish independence, there isn't going to be another referendum in the UK for a very , very long time and possibly never again.

[davidjay]

I know, you know and Farage knows that there isn't going be a referendum on energy policy. In fact, barring Scottish independence, there isn't going to be another referendum in the UK for a very , very long time and possibly never again.

I do wish that could be put in writing.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

We once had a long-haired cat that would swallow its own hair. Then when it shat there would be a lump of catshit tethered to its arse with a length of hair, so as the cat walked around a little turd bounced along behind it. Just like Farage and Putin.

[Boiler]

I know, you know and Farage knows that there isn't going be a referendum on energy policy. In fact, barring Scottish independence, there isn't going to be another referendum in the UK for a very , very long time and possibly never again.

Clement Attlee had a strange bedfellow in Margaret Thatcher, both of whom viewed the idea of referendums as something alien. We elect Members of Parliament to hopefully act wisely in our best interests and thus render the necessity for them null and void. We have seen that much of the electorate is too easily exploited by conmen and charlatans for their own ends where referendums are concerned.

I would quite happily vote for anyone who would legislate that they will never be used again.

[Abernathy]

Agree completely. Referenda really are the original Cunt’s Trick, loved by the likes of the man-frog both because he repeatedly fails to get elected to Westminster, and because it allows him and his fellow cunts to dress their perverse objectives up as some sort of immutable will of the people, thereby reinforcing their imposition.

I’d happily see them banned, withe possible exception of the all but inevitable Indyref2, which it is my hope will have th3 proper safeguards built in.

[Boiler]

I’d happily see them banned, withe possible exception of the all but inevitable Indyref2, which it is my hope will have th3 proper safeguards built in.

The EU Ref should NEVER have been called at all but for a rich cunt who discovered rapidly he wasn't as "rather good at [being PM]" than he believed himself to be (must be the benefits of that Eton and Oxbridge education) but a sensible thing should have been for it to have been a set target of 55%, not 50% +1 vote.

And I still believe it was meant to be advisory only.

[Andy McDandy]

As others have said, if it was legally binding, then it would have been thoroughly investigated for the various discrepancies and most likely overturned.

Its "advisory" nature paradoxically gave it its year zero holy writ status. Funnily enough, just after the referendum, Tony Parsehole in the Sun pointed out (in a rare stopped clock moment) that the 17.4 million or so who voted for Leave may have been the biggest vote in British history*, but the 16 million or so who voted to remain was the second biggest. And that the worst thing anyone could do would be to say "You lost, your opinions are no longer relevant, you don't matter".

Otherwise, the main problems were:

1. It taking place in the first place. If Cameron had had any guts, he could have just booted a handful of ERGers from the party, pour encourager les autres.
2. The campaigning organisations being instantly dissolved after the vote, meaning there was no path of liability or responsibility.
3. The structures of said organisations being so opaque that no individual could be tied to any incorrect statement ("It was a group decision and I simply repeated the party line").
4. The exclusion of anyone outside a subsection of the Conservative party in the negotiations.
5. The appointment of a Brexit secretary and the placing of such responsibility in the hands of an elected and active politician.

*Yes I know that there may have been bigger numbers at general elections, but it quickly became part of the Leave narrative.

[Abernathy]

Yes, the legal status of the referendum was unequivocally and unambiguously non-binding and advisory only, which meant that the decision to end the UK’s membership of the EU was entirely a political one, taken exclusively by the Tories, though it suited them to present the result as the immutable will of the British people, when it was nothing of the kind. Ironically, it was Rees-Mogg who suggested that it would be better to have two votes, the second being to confirm or re-consider the decision to leave (or remain) before taking the final decision either way.

Other things wrong with the referendum -

* A fantastically complex decision of crucial national importance on whether to end nearly 40 years of involvement in the most successful single market on the planet should arguably never have been subject to a referendum at all, and certainly not one requiring only a simple majority.

* The franchise on which the legislation for the referendum was framed was, not to put too fine a point on it, gerrymandered. It deliberately excluded three key groups with an interest in the UK retaining its EU membership - young voters aged 16 to 18, a group which had already set a precedent by being enabled to vote in the referendum on Scottish Independence in 2014, EU citizens of other member states resident in the UK who were already otherwise able to vote in local government elections, and expatriate UK voters resident in other EU states for longer than 15 years.

* As Andy has already alluded to, the Leave campaign engineered its desired result on a platform of blatant lies and disinformation. The disinformation and lies were not in themselves criminal, but the campaign funding irregularities and evidence of outside (Russian ) interference with the vote, were demonstrably so, and went all but uninvestigated. As Andy says, had the referendum’s legal status been that of a binding vote, this potential criminality would have had to be investigated, and prosecuted. Potentially, the result could even have been declared void. It remains a huge scandal, in my view, that nothing was done.

In short, the referendum, and Brexit, together represent a vast, shameful con-trick perpetrated on the British people,. Brexit is the most catastrophic political event in my lifetime.

[davidjay]

Abers has said it far better than I could but possibly the worst thing to come out of the ashes of the referendum shitshow has been this idea that 'the people' are now the ultimate arbiters of the nation's future. Anything you don't like, just ignore it as the will of the people. And it came about because there isn't a single golf club whose bar is leaned against by the cunts who engineered the whole thing that has a rule stating its constitution can be altered by a simple majority.

[Nigredo]

All the shady underhanded machinations of the vote itself aside, once Leave emerged as the victory any non-radicalized grown up nation would've then put it to people what exactly they wanted a post-Brexit UK structure to look like and not begun any legal proceedings until all that had been agreed upon. Not just walking away from it abandoning a troublesome flat lease and working out what to do over a cigarette and fry up breakfast in the cafe afterwards.

[Andy McDandy]

And then, despite the assurances of various liars in the campaign (and indeed, in the aftermath), the people in charge of the leaving, both in the media and in politics, started playing the ignorant xenophobe card over and over. Whatever the EU offered was not enough, or a transparent plan to keep us wedded to the ECHR, or the common market, or whatever. Everything was shot through with "whatever they're offering, they're up to something". So eventually we came to the shit deal and all the rest of it.

Now, entering cock-up vs conspiracy territory here, but I have to wonder. Was this part of the plan, to drag things out as much as possible, until enough people were ready to go "fine, whatever, we just want out"? Because let's just imagine that in 2017 or whenever, the UK negotiated leaving the EU but accepting a "Norway style" deal.

Some trade, tourism and transport hiccups, but largely things carry on as normal. After a while, people may ask why we left at all, as the big difference will be that EU funding not being around, particularly in deprived areas.

Instead, turn everything to shit in the name of ideological purity and getting rich quick. Simultaneously run down standards and expectations in public life, the latest part of a plan that has been brewing for years but really kicked into gear in 2009, resulting in a grossly inept and corrupt government, a politicised and underfunded civil service with morale and resistance to authority at rock bottom, and a public perception that all politicians and parties are as bad as each other but at least this one doesn't bang on about equal rights all the time, and does a nice line in non-PC jokes. Get rid of anyone in the Tory party with a conscience, or ability, and replace them with a bunch of shiny faced pimps, perverts, and rich kids who rejected the BNP because they were a bit common.

Covid and Ukraine aside, that looks like their plan. Both of those have bought out a level of common decency among the public, and a revulsion at the government's handling of them. Also, realising that no amount of arse kissing will save them, the BBC and other media outlets seem to have woken up and decided that fuck it, if they're getting cut anyway, better go out with a bang.

[Abernathy]

Covid and Ukraine aside, that looks like their plan. Both of those have bought out a level of common decency among the public, and a revulsion at the government's handling of them. Also, realising that no amount of arse kissing will save them, the BBC and other media outlets seem to have woken up and decided that fuck it, if they're getting cut anyway, better go out with a bang.

That was indeed the plan, or so it seems. This is the thing - It's all fucking connected[, and that includes Trump, and Putin too. No fucking wonder conspiracy theories take hold.

[Nigredo]

[Boiler]

I see Fenton's picked up on this new project, where - surprise, surprise - it seems Fargle wants a fucking referendum.

Can we have a referendum on firing Farage into the sun, please?

[Youngian]

Doubt the Tories would be too bothered by the Fracking Referendum Party. They are very worried about Farage leading a 'Send back the Ukranian job-stealing scroungers' Party.

[Abernathy]

It's all fucking connected, part 379 :

https://bylinetimes.com/2022/02/24/bor ... KWL4mDCWEY

[MisterMuncher]

Doubt the Tories would be too bothered by the Fracking Referendum Party. They are very worried about Farage leading a 'Send back the Ukranian job-stealing scroungers' Party.

Fracking is probably the ideal Tory project. Requires massive doses of (public) startup dosh, and only really becomes worthwhile at market peaks when they can bend the customers over for maximal profit, and can be safely abandoned as an "example of government run business failing' when the market can't sustain it.

[Boiler]