Being right more important than what's right.

^The Government advocated a Remain vote and in its leaflet to all households in the UK it was clearly stated:
"This is your decision. The Government will implement what you decide."^

Would you find and show me in Hansard where parliament approved that statement?

Because it seems to me that that is an example of the government exercising arbitrary power without the approval of parliament; parliament voted for an advisory referendum, not, as far as I am aware, a binding one.

Though I'm willing to be proved wrong.

Good post, MaizieD. If, as I hope, the Tory party loses the next general election, does anyone seriously think that they will say 'Oh well, it's the will of the people' and stop trying to work to get what they think is right for the country to come to pass? I observe the result of the referendum but I do not accept that it is the final word, and along with many other people, I hope for it to be reversed in due course.

More insults - now according to varian I'm "gullible". However, I do realise that there are and always have been vested interests - not least all the corporate lobbyists in Brussels.

On the advisory nature of the referendum - MPs voted in Parliament to have the referendum and delegated the Brexit decision to the voters, so they have no right to try to stop it now. The Government advocated a Remain vote and in its leaflet to all households in the UK it was clearly stated:
"This is your decision. The Government will implement what you decide."

Paddyann, couldn't the gc parents take them somewhere. Where do you think is best? What European country is do much better than ours? I travel extensively and I couldn't tell you one country without problems. Can you name just one please. I think the bigoted people are those cannot see a democracy as getting the most votes, to say you could have got more if people had got out of bed to vote, doesn't really cut it. Carry on as they are and before too long we will have given away our democratic rights. Perhaps paying people to ensure the votes go the way minorities want it? That's what happens when you don't respect the ballot box, just because it doesn't go your way. Another two words Sour Grapes trips off the tongue.

I'm afraid that 'democracy' isn't just observing the result of a vote; it also allows for dissent from that result and those who are seeking to overturn the vote have a democratic right to do so. There are people who have been opposing the initial decision to remain in the EU for the past 40+ years and no-one has questioned their right to do so.

When we vote in a General Election we observe the result of the vote in that the party getting the most seats in Parliament becomes the party of government but this does not prevent the other parties seeking to overturn or amend proposed legislation if they believe that it is damaging to the country or to sections of the community that they are responsible for representing. Parliamentary procedures have evolved to allow for opposition and representation of minority views. Opposition is not treasonous; it allows for the views of all the electorate to be represented, not just those of the people who voted for the governing party. Nor does the presence of a party in government prevent parties using the time between GEs in seeking to persuade people that the government is wrong and that they offer better solutions. Democracy is a living, ongoing process.

So, while we have a government which has 'respected' the result of the referendum, members of the sovereign parliament are at liberty to question every aspect of the way that the government implements it and a duty to maintain the sovereignty of parliament. 'The people' are sovereign by way of their representatives in parliament, representatives who have a duty to have regard to the good of the country as a whole; not just the wishes of part of their constituents.

The 'government' is the representative of the Crown in parliament but it is constrained by the exercise of parliament's sovereign power. We fought a Civil War to establish this.

If you think of 'the government' as actually being a monarch who wants to do exactly as they please and parliament as the representative body of the people which is preventing them doing something harmful to the interests of the country does it make it any easier to understand? The result of the Civil war was to curb the arbitrary power of the monarch and to establish that 'the people', through parliament, had a voice in the governing of the country.

At the moment, some of 'the people' seem to think that parliament is no longer the sovereign body in this country and that MPs have to obey them. This is not so. MPs have to have regard to what they say but they also have to have regard to those who don't agree with 'the people'. If it is any other way it would be a complete Revolution and totally destroy the constitution of the UK. And, by God, I fear Revolution far more than I fear Brexit. I want to exercise my democratic right to oppose and to voice my opposition. And no revolution that I've ever studied has allowed that.

Our democracy is a parliamentary democracy. That means that we elect (albeit by a very undemocratic FPTP system) MPs who are supposed to make important decisions on our behalf.

The vast majority of MPs (who are generally better informed about politics than the rest of us) voted REMAIN.

The ill-judged referendum was ADVISORY.

Many of the MPs who thought we should remain let us down when they bowed to the pressure of the right wing gutter press and voted to trigger Article 50. However Article 50 can be revoked.

At long last enough of the Tory Remainers have had the courage to do the right thing and vote for the final decision on brexit to be made by a vote in parliament, undermining the agenda of those who wanted to "take back control" from our elected representatives and give it to the foreign billionaires and tax exiles who control the gutter press and swayed the votes of guillible readers.

At last we have a glimmer of hope that our country will not be run by these sinister vested interests.

Luckylegs - I think you have made a valid point and agree with most of what you say - I'm disappointed by the MPs who voted against the Government - I think it could undermine our negotiators.
The vitriol in some of the responses to the OP makes me so glad I didn't discover GN until after the referendum - I bet the debates became unpleasant.
But, heh, I'm just an "ignorant" "bigoted" (paddyann, I think you'll find there's only one t in bigoted - but what would I know - I'm merely "brain dead" and like an American "red-neck" I can't put a sentence together) Brexiteer.

I'm sorry but I don't understand the OP. Who particularly is trying to bankrupt the country and bring us to our knees? Are you refering to the MPs who wanted a vote on the final deal? But isn't this exactly what Parliament is there for - to oversee and debate decisions which are made by the executive - and this in fact is why many said they voted to leave the EU because of the loss in control of Parliament itself.

I also don't understand your remark POGS that 'I accept the result but...' is necessarily a bad attitude. I would have thought that 'I accept the result but I want to make sure that we get the best deal that we can' is a perfectly valid statement to make. Unfortunately, along with many other people, I'm not sure that those who are negotiating on our behalf are clear on exactly what their end objectives are. Actually I'm certain they aren't, since the cabinet don't appear to have come to a concensus yet.

Luckylegs

I understand your point and I agree with a lot of your sentiment but I fall short of using the word treachery. My post is regarding 'democracy' .

I say this as a person who voted Remain by a whisker. I have been shocked by the ease the Referendum result is trying to be negated by so many .

I am left with no other impression than democracy and having a democratic vote means absolutely nothing in some quarters any more. What for example does the comment,
'I accept the result, BUT". mean if not I am not really accepting the result?

Worryingly the use of the percentage gap between the vote result is used by some to try and say the result is not acceptable. Apart from the hypocrisy that can be attached to using the percentage gap when it suits in one direction or another to fit with an individuals own vote, what does a democratic vote rely on if not the higher percentage of the vote wins, irrespective of the percentage?

As for 'working together' it would be wise and intelligent for all politicians of any colour in the UK and the EU to do so but alas politics is about posturing and it will be a miracle if they can pull this one off for the good of ALL but I wish them well . I just hope the agreement today to move onto the 'Second Phase' sees some major compromises for the good of ALL on both sides of the talks but I don't really believe it will happen and it will be a case of trade comes second to politics.

We're on the road to hell thanks to the brain dead bigotted brexiteers.These people had to idea the ills of the country were all down to Westminster ...not the EU .If I was 40 years younger I'd pick up my children and take them somewhere they'd have a future they sure as hell wont have one here.These "brexiteers" wanted sovereignty..something they already had ....and when it was exercised in Parliament they are sending death threats...honestly? Its like watching the rednecks that voted for Trump trying to put a sentence together and just about managing "make America great" .Unbelievable that the world is so full of ignorant people ,sadly it wont just affect them ..we're all dragged down with this madness!

I don't know why, but I am frequently reminded of the the final chapters of the last book in the Narnia series. Anyone else who has read it might recall the monkeys who were unable to see that the interior of the dirty stable in which they sat had turned into what was clearly meant to be 'heaven'. Trapped by their thoughts and beliefs they couldn't see the wonderful landscape around them, just the dirty stable.

I've no doubt that Leavers and Remainers will apply this analogy in different ways to themselves and their vision of what is happening at the moment. I see a little huddle of monkeys blinded by their self deception...

The Independent is reporting this morning that talks about future trade relationships with the EU won't be happening until March. As it's all supposed to be done and dusted by October yet it's taken us 9 months already to crawl a few inches into negotiations. I find this terrifying rather worrying...

Agreements with the EU are always on a ‘nothing is agreed finally until everything is agreed’ basis, but there is no reason to think it will go pear shaped at the stage we are at now.Anything else is just conjecture.

But those first phase agreements - we don't know if they are binding or not - D Davis doesn't know either.

Agreements were made for the first phase, were they not?
Negotiating with the EU was always going to be like packing live eels into a sock.

Good job what planet are you on lemon

By no measure can this government be praised as doing a good job.

I wouldn’t hold your breath about country over self interest either.

Typo, Parliament.

It does not matter that the vote was only won by a million and a half votes, would we say that in a GE? No, we wouldn’t.
However, what matters is that Parliamment actually puts the future good of the UK in front of their own views and party politics and honours the pledge by them to leave the EU, and in the best way.
So far T May and team have done a good job, particularly with reference to Ireland, but the harder phase comes next.

Sexual - not what the iPad decided it was!

QY last night Oakeshott accused Morgan of humiliating the PM.

Oakeshott exposed Cameron and his se Hal encounters with a pig.

Is that humiliating enough for you.

What barefaced hypocracy

I really can't agree with the OP. "they want to bankrupt us". It is the Brexit process that is bankrupting us. The pound dropped and jobs are going solely because of the Brexit vote. "There's nothing worse than a bad loser and a bully". Brexiters are bad winners and bullies. I have had Brexiters being really rude and aggressive to me because they won. It was a very close vote, nearly half the country voted Remain. No-one voted for hard Brexit which the Government are going for - it was not an option in the referendum.

blue sorry to confuse. I was talking about the rebels who voted for democracy in parliament and have suffered such vile abuse from Brexiters. Death threats etc. Glad to hear that the police are involved

Whitewave there is no democracy in a desision built on blatant lies Farage et al killed democracy in our country

People only had a binary choice - leave or remain, they weren’t given a choice of terms. Now Parliament is trying to determine those terms and not be railroaded into the Brextremist option via an incompetent leadership. This is surely democracy.

It was a small majority vote. The Leave and Remain campaigners did not address the issue of what happened after the outcome of the vote, particularly if the outcome was Leave.
Cameron promised a referendum as a sop to his right wing. He never dreamed the outcome would be a narrow margin for Leave. Both campaigns left a lot to be desired but the Leave campaign peddled lies and misled people into believing the NHS would benefit and immigration be slashed. Sadly, the Remain campaign was ineffective in challenging the misleading information being put out by the Leave campaign. The Remain campaign failed to address the real costs of a Leave vote to our social and economic situation.
I don't understand why the OP believes "they want to bankrupt us and bring us to our knees". Who are these people? I'd say it's the Leavers not the Remainers.

What those who supported Brexit conveniently forget is that theirs was not a landslide victory. They squeaked in at the last minute with a small majority.

There are nearly as many Remainers in the country as there are Brexiteers and the cavalier way the Brexiteers have ignore this, does them no credit whatsoever. I hope, had the the decision gone the other way, those voting remain would pay more respect to the views of their opponents.