A COMPLETE humiliation’ was the Telegraph’s splash headline after the defeat in the Commons of May’s Withdrawal Agreement. Yet ‘Theresa the Terminator’ is still Prime Minister. Little, it seems, has been learnt by her, her Government and unfortunately the majority of MPs. In response Michael St George shone his torch on the Remainer coup that is already under way.
If confirmation of his thesis were needed, we saw Project Fear Mark 2 on trade immediately stepped up on the BBC and elsewhere. Ruth Lea’s factual rebuttal, her authoritative unveiling of Britain’s ‘trade truths’, can be read here and should be sent by our readers to their MPs.
Once more too, quite unbelievably, we saw the Norway option being seriously mooted as the preference of some MPs in the mainstream press. Well, those in Government still in need of information as to why it is not can read here, direct from the Norse’s mouth, that it is a logical impossibility.
Meanwhile it seems there’s still no end to the EU’s hostility to Britain that our Government sucks up as Janice Davis, TCW’s ‘man’ in Europe, reports here. Yet, as Melanie Phillips writes in her cri de coeur, this desperate battle is not just for the future of Britain but for the West itself, and it is hanging in the balance.
As ever our readers have offered their own unique comments, insights and information, a selection of which we reproduce here.
First, in response to Hjörtur J. Guðmundsson’s explanation of exactly why the Norway option is impossible,
Benthic_aka_dinoflagellate wrote:
I spend a lot of time in Norway around Stavanger, Bergen, Kristiansund. Anecdotal, I know, but it seems to me after many conversations that the only people who want to be part of the EU are the government.
David wrote:
As a dedicated Leaver this is confirmation of yet more good news.
My good friend in Norway, a convinced patriotic man, although gently centre-left unlike me, who was also very active in their referendum struggles, advised me at the outset of the UK’s journey towards the referendum of two things.
Firstly don’t underestimate the sheer divisiveness, vitriol and longstanding dislikes that the whole process will create.
Secondly, whatever happens, don’t take a Norwegian type deal. Remember such a deal allows for continued open-door immigration.
He explained that they were forced into this poor deal, as a price for access to the EU’s markets, because they are, demographically, a small nation, albeit with a large land mass and the highest per capita income globally.
Indeed he eagerly anticipated our escape, on better terms, after which his country would try to argue that they too should receive better terms.
So to be reminded, three years after his excellent explanation, that this option will not fly boosts my cautious prediction that we will get out under WTO rules.
Cerberus ventured his own warning:
This article explains the logical impossibility of the Norway idea and how it would be incompatible with the rules. Very true and sensible. However leftist pygmies running countries don’t do logic or good sense, and as for rules, the rules they apply to everyone else are quickly forgotten when those rules get in their way.
Finally Suthringa pointed out exactly how Norway was manipulated into where it is today:
1) Norway had referendums on joining the EEC/EC and then the EU, both failed to win approval by the Norwegian electorate.
2) Nothing daunted, the Norwegian political establishment created with the EC/EU the EEA as a means of accession – the Norwegian people have never been given a referendum on the EEA.
3) The answer to anything like ‘Norway Plus’ or ‘Canada Plus’ (so-called ‘off the shelf’ agreements) is that the EU would insist on interminable negotiations over it, irrespective of the fact that the UK is 100 per cent currently aligned with the EU. Such negotiations will take place only if the UK either extends Art 50 (!!) or agrees the May WA’s transition period, which is of course exactly the same as the WA anyway, so why bother with negotiations?
4) Once again we find all alternatives to LeavEU WTO Brexit are forms of RemaIN EU.
In response to Ruth Lea’s detailed account and breakdown of Britain’s trade with the world versus its trade with the EU,
VirtualGirlFriday wrote:
Ruth Lea is the only economic adviser who doesn’t make me shout at the television!
PierrePendre added:
The Guardian’s anti-Brexit campaign becomes more facetious – to put it politely – by the day.
Yesterday it warned that leaving with no deal might mean no flowers from Holland for Mothers’ Day.
One can imagine a conversation in 2119 between a little girl and her grandad. She’s come across a reference in a school book to the former United Kingdom and asks what it was.
Grandad replies that it was the island province of the United States of Europe where Britopeans like them still live.
‘We had the opportunity to leave the USE way back in 2019,’ grandad says. ‘It was called Brexit and meant that the United Kingdom would have kept its independence as a country. But when the moment to leave came, it was discovered that if we did, and most people wanted to, there’d have been no flowers from Dutchopia for Mothers’ Day that year. Clever people in the government thought that was too big a price to pay.’
The little girl looks puzzled. ‘You mean we gave up everything, our history, our traditions, our independence, our rights as a people, our self-respect and our place in the world for ever and ever for a bunch of tulips?’
Grandad looks embarrassed. ‘Well, as I said, it was very clever people who decided . . .’
Colkitto03 wrote:
Brilliant analysis as ever Ruth.
I was in Westminster Central Hall last night at the ‘Let’s Go WTO’ rally. The speakers were Iain Duncan Smith, Kate Hoey, Rocco Forte, Tim Martin, Nigel Farage and Esther McVey.
I took away four things.
Firstly, if we, the public, really understood the dark games being played behind closed doors at Westminster we would be shocked to the core.
Secondly, the fight for Brexit must carry on vigorously and that means ordinary people getting involved.
Thirdly, the only real way forward is for a true WTO Brexit.
Finally, this really is now a battle between the People and Parliament and it’s not going to stop.
To Janice Davis’s post on our EU ‘friends’ https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/with-friends-like-this-in-europe-who-needs-enemies/,
Uusikaupunki responded:
Yes, the EU is bad . . . but our home-grown fifth columnists are worse.
As Cicero said:
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly.
Enraged by the betrayal of Brexit taking place in full view, Politically_ Incorrect endorsed Janice’s view that it is time to dispense with deference and ‘start kicking ass’:
It’s quite true that British people are less likely to take their protests to the streets than, say, their French counterparts. It’s something about the British character to seethe inwardly while being outwardly polite. Unfortunately politeness will count for nothing in the present situation. I’ve always felt this is the problem with MPs like Jacob Rees-Mogg. They have the right ideas but wrap them in such polite deference that the object of criticism, such as Theresa May, probably takes it more as a compliment. Contrast that with the vitriolic bile expressed by Remainers. I don’t want to stoop to their level, of course. We are however already in a state of cold civil war between those who believe in the democratic process and those who are too arrogant and insecure to accept it. The ordinary people need to start kicking some political ass.
Finally, on Melanie Phillips’s article we find ourselves in complete agreement with James Chilton who wrote:
Excellent commentary by Melanie Phillips – to which it would be conceited to add another word.
