Regret it Brexit Part 2

Labour MPs may be encouraged to fight against Brexit by this survey of Labour constituencies Brexit/Remain balance.

The number of Labour leave voters in each constituency could be lower than previously thought, suggesting MPs in pro-Brexit seats who fear being punished at the ballot box unless they adopt a hardline stance could be worrying unnecessarily, a campaign group has said.

In a study of all 650 UK parliamentary seats, the pro-remain group Best for Britain found numerous examples of Labour-held constituencies where remain supporters outnumber the MP’s majority.

The group has briefed many MPs on its findings in the hope of emboldening Labour politicians who had been reluctant to push the party leadership to support staying in the European Economic Area because of constituents’ views.
www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/may/29/labour-mps-fear-brexit-voters-unfounded-study

Guardian article:
"The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has ruled out supporting a Norway-style close relationship with the EU, although his deputy, Tom Watson, hinted at the weekend that a policy shift to back EEA membership could still be on the table.

Seven in 10 Labour-held constituencies voted to leave the EU and a recent meeting of the parliamentary Labour party was dominated by a bitter row over the single market, with MPs in pro-Brexit seats warning that supporting it would damage their electoral chances."

A recent poll suggest that the labour vote in the GE was more remain than leave voters for certain constituencies.

With the reputation that polls have over the last ten years of being wrong, what MP would put his job on the line by taking the risk of believing any poll. They are not going to take any risk of that Poll being wrong and will ere on the side of caution assuming that the Poll is wrong.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/may/29/labour-mps-fear-brexit-voters-unfounded-study

I think it would be a good idea, Ally, if you were to differentiate more clearly between quotes from the article and your own interpretation of it. Someone reading quickly might miss the little quotation marks.

From the article:

In a study of all 650 UK parliamentary seats, the pro-remain group Best for Britain found numerous examples of Labour-held constituencies where remain supporters outnumber the MP’s majority.

It's a 'study' not a poll and the basis for it was YouGov data compiled post the referendum. As it is information on what people have 'done' rather than what they 'intend' to do I suspect it is more likely to be reliable.

I'm intrigued as to how they managed to narrow it down to constituency when the vote was regional but as YouGov have a regular bank of people to be polled I assume that they can pull out a representative sample of voters by constituency by virtue of the data they hold on them.

Remain was the verdict of the majority of Labour MPs, the majority of Labour Party members and the majority of Labour Party voters.

Why have all these people been sidelined by the Labour Party Leadership?

The last time the people were asked to elect MP's to Parliament was in the General Election. Labour stood on a pro Brexit mandate, therefore all MP's who are in Parliament now, are there because the people who voted for them did so on a pro Brexit mandate. The cross party referendum is one thing but the General Election confirmed and committed elected MP's to a Labour Pro Brexit mandate.

This chart shows the numbers of Remain and Leave voters amongst the supporters of each political party.

The last General Election, like all GEs in this country was fought on the basis of First Past The Post, which means that there are only two parties who can possibly win. In many places there is little point in voting as the same party always wins. Most voters end up being represented by someone they did not chose. Because of this many folk abstain from voting. Those who do vote often do so on the basis of the "lesser of two evils". Many policies might be considered and it is nonsense to suggest that everyone who voted Tory or Labour endorsed brexit.

This country will never become a proper democracy until we have electoral reform and replace FPTP with a system of Proportional Representation.

Despite the leaning of the political parties some MPs stuck to their principles are stayed supporters of RemIning in the EU.

Despite all that has been said, MP's in Parliament now, were elected at the General Election when the two main parties stood on a Pro Brexit mandate.

The current electoral system is majority vote wins.
We can talk forever about who abstained, who voted but didn't believe in the Pro Brexit mandate on which Labour and Conservative stood for election. The truth is that both main parties stood on a Pro Brexit platform for election, they were elected, as were their MP's therefore if they had no intention of fulfilling that promise then that is a deception on a grand scale that the electorate will not forgive. It will bring our democracy down. That will never happen.

It is nonsense to have voted for a party that clearly say's they are Pro Brexit, when that is not your view, then complain when the promise is about to be fulfilled for those who believed the promise and that was the majority vote.

There is a clear misunderstanding or confusion about being a remain voter at the Referendum and voting at the General Election.

Remain and leave camps came from cross party sources, a free individual vote. The General Election was party politics. The vote was to decide which party would Govern the country and they gave promises about how they would do that.

I know this is stating the obvious but that is what a General Election is about. MP's should not stand if they do not believe in the mandate on which their party is standing. This is Party politics, not a referendum, where MP's can vote for what they want. Candidates stand as a Labour or Conservative MP on the Party's mandate. The Whip in each party ensures compliance with the party policies, and the promises made to the people who voted for them on those promises.

A grassroots group of Jeremy Corbyn supporters and trade unions is to launch a major UK speaking tour, billed as the leftwing campaign to remain in the EU. The Left Against Brexit tour will attempt to persuade Corbyn and his allies of the leftwing case for a pro-EU position and will argue that the party can reap electoral benefits from a shift.

Speakers on the summer tour of British cities will include Manuel Cortes, the general secretary of the transport union TSSA, Michael Chessum, who was on Momentum’s first steering committee, the Labour MEP Julie Ward, the former shadow minister Catherine West, and the co-leader of the Green Party, Caroline Lucas.

Organisers will argue that a Corbyn-led programme of economic reform would be hampered by a damaging departure from the EU, threatening jobs and investment.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jun/01/leftwingers-launch-campaign-to-shift-labour-position-on-brexit

In my view this is long overdue. Corbyn has allowed himself to be bullied by the brexiters for far too long. Although he says he voted to Remain, he has been accused of being a "closet leaver". It is about time he represented the views of the majority of his party's MPs, members and supporters.

Varian Corbyn and his MP's stood for election or re-election on a Pro Brexit mandate. Much as I do not support Corbyns politics he seems to be keeping his word to the people who voted himself and his MP's back into Parliament on the pledge of a pro Brexit stance.

The LP do not have to stick to their manifesto as they aren’t in government to carry it out. The GE was fought on lots of issues such as transport, nhs etc May claimed it was to give strong and stable government and we all know how well that turned out, The job of the opposition is to oppose the government and it’s about time the LP made the most of the opportunities presented by the weak incumbents. I voted for a local MP not a party leader. She stood on a platform to oppose Brexit, fight for the nhs and other policies. The GE wasn’t a referendum it was fought on a whole raft of issues.

he seems to be keeping his word to the people who voted himself and his MP's back into Parliament on the pledge of a pro Brexit stance.

you have to be blinkered or naive to believe that people voted for Corbyn on the strength of his Brexit stance. They voted for the LP because it wasn't the tory party.

If people perceive the LP to be as pro-Brexit as the tory party then voting on the Brexit issue becomes irrelevant.

What then matters is what the party proposes to do for the day to day running of the country. Voters clearly preferred the LP's manifesto in sufficient numbers to deny May the majority she though she would get.

To me it is really important that GNetters who are Labour Party supporters address this question.

I am not a Labour voter. I am a Liberal Democrat and our party has always been clear about where we stand. We want to remain in the EU. Now there are a minority of LibDem supporters who voted Leave, but the clear majority supported Remain and now campaign for a meaningful vote on Parliament and/or a peoples' vote when the terms of the deal are known. At that point the choice should be between the deal which has been negotiated or the status quo - revoking Article 50, which we are legally entitled to do, and remaining in the EU as other EU nations would welcome that decision.

There are strong divisions of opinion on the GN News and Politics forum - divisions between right and left, between Daily Mail readers and Guardian readers, divisions between Leavers and Remainers, but in the last few years it has struck me quite forcibly that the most bitter divisions seem to be between the pro-Corbyn and anti-Corbyn factions in the Labour Party. This may be no worse than the divisions in the Tory Party, but it has got in the way of really effective opposition to this dreadful government which we desperately need.

In 2016 both Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn behaved in a very similar way. They were both ostensibly in the Remain camp, but kept their heads down, hardly ever speaking in public at all.

Then when Leave campaign, based on lies, won by a narrow majority, both just caved in to the brexiters in their parties.

Theresa May at least had the excuse that her party had a majority for Leave, but Corbyn's party had a clear Remain majority at every level - MPs, members and voters. So why on earth did Corbyn let all these people down by feebly following the Daily Mail agenda?????

Why is it only now that the pro-REmain faction of the Labour Party (which is after all the majority) starting to make its voice heard???

Yes you’re right Varian.
I think they are starting to see sense.
As a Labour Party member for nearly thirty years I feel helpless.

The Referendum advised, leave the EU by majority vote. The General Election, the two major political party's stood on a Brexit mandate. All members of Parliament currently are therefore in the Commons because their party stood on a Brexit leave mandate.

All members of parliament did not stand on a Brexit mandate. Lib Dem’s, SNPs.?People voted for individual constituency MPs, many of whom from all parties, oppose Brexit, and even more who do not approve of the government’s mishandling of the process. To pretend there is consensus in the HoC is rather simplistic.

Corbyn is sticking to what he believes about the EU, that it’s no good at all for the UK.In this ( and only this) I agree with him.Mrs May was probably undecided but supported Cameron on Remain.
Good for all politicians who respected the outcome of the referendum and got on with it.

All members of Parliament currently are therefore in the Commons because their party stood on a Brexit leave mandate.
Not Libdems, SNP or Green Party. Quite a lot of MPs in those parties. Labour was lukewarm.
A second referendum on Brexit was one of Libdems’ major policies last year. The Green Party and SNP wanted a referendum on the final deal.

Government report on the consequences of no deal Brexit reported in The Sunday Times.

Britain would be hit with shortages of medicine, fuel and food within a fortnight if the UK tries to leave the European Union without a deal, according to a Doomsday Brexit scenario drawn up by senior civil servants for David Davis.

Whitehall has begun contingency planning for the port of Dover to collapse “on day one” if Britain crashes out of the EU, leading to critical shortages of supplies.

Don’t worry - it will be dismissed as scaremongering - even if it is their own report!

Gerispringer Fri 01-Jun-18 17:36:45
"The LP do not have to stick to their manifesto as they aren’t in government to carry it out".

So Geri, have I got this right? You are saying that it's acceptable to ask people to vote for the Labour Party candidates, based on pledges (promises) to the electorate at any election, in this case the General Election, then if you don't get the majority and become the "opposition", just don't carry out the mandate on which the people voted for you! In this case the Labour Party MP's all re-elected or elected on a mandate that included a Pro Brexit pledge!

Allygran1 Sun 03-Jun-18 00:33:46
"The Referendum advised, leave the EU by majority vote. The General Election, the two major political party's stood on a Brexit mandate. All members of Parliament currently are therefore in the Commons because their party stood on a Brexit leave mandate."

"Not Libdems, SNP or Green Party. Quite a lot of MPs in those parties."

I agree. Just:
"The two major political party's." Not all members of Parliament.

All Labour Party MP's stood on the Labour Party mandate for election or re-election part of that mandate was a Pro Brexit pledge.

MaizieD Fri 01-Jun-18 17:44:44
"you have to be blinkered or naive to believe that people voted for Corbyn on the strength of his Brexit stance. They voted for the LP because it wasn't the tory party.
If people perceive the LP to be as pro-Brexit as the tory party then voting on the Brexit issue becomes irrelevant."

Md I believe that basically and largely the Labour Party mandate on which all Labour candidates stood for re-election or election at the General Election was believed by those who voted Labour. If the core promises are lies, then what does that say to the electorate who voted based on those promises? The electorate remember and thank goodness they are not as blinkered or naive.

We, the electorate know a promise and we know when that promise is broken it changes into a lie. We also know when we have been "had" and that will not be forgiven. Politicians know this.

The Labour voters did vote on the entire mandate or they would have voted for another Party such as the Lib Dems or Greens etc, who had a clear remain mandate at the General Election.

After all there were two major Party's at the General Election who stood on a Pro Brexit mandate. So the choice for the Labour voter was not Labour or Conservative on Pro Brexit promises. It was neither if they wanted an anti Brexit Government or Opposition.

So I do "believe that people voted for Corbyn on the strength of his Brexit stance" as part of the promises in the Labour Party mandate at the General Election.

Now they want the Labour Oppostion to deliver on supporting Pro Brexit.