Corbyns Inertia

Speaking on BBC Radio 5 Live’s Pienaar’s Politics Watson said “you shouldn’t rule anything out” when engaged in “complex negotiations”.

His comments came after shadow home secretary Diane Abbott told The Andrew Marr Show that “the Labour Party doesn’t support a second referendum”.

Watson said: “We’ve not said we want a second referendum, what we actually want is a negotiated settlement.

“The point about the vote this week was we don’t want power to be taken away from unelected bureaucrats in Brussels, as the debate went in the referendum, to be given to the executive or unelected bureaucrats in Whitehall.

“We want Parliament to have a say on it.”

When pushed on whether Labour would rule out a second referendum he said: “When you’re in complex negotiations on behalf of the nation you shouldn’t rule anything out.

“What I am trying to say to you, I don’t think it is likely at all, it would be more likely that we try and renegotiate the deal should Parliament reject it.”

Shadow international trade secretary Barry Gardiner said that Labour would “honour the referendum result”.

He said: “The Labour Party has not said that we will have a second referendum.

“We will honour the referendum result, but we last week got a final vote for Parliament on the deal.

“That is the democratic guarantee that now is there because of Labour Members of Parliament and 11 Conservatives joining with us.”

Gardiner said after Brexit the UK had to remain “closely aligned with our major trading partner” – the EU - which could mean continued membership of the single market.

He told Sky News’ Sunday with Niall Paterson: “We haven’t swept either the single market or a customs union off the table. We have said we are not fixated on the structures, what we want are the benefits.”

You can criticise the Labour Party all you like over it’s ambiguous stance, but there is no denying that it is working with the voter.

Labour will continue gradually evolving its brex it stance until it is necessary to lay its cards on the table.

No need yet. No problem.

What this government does is imo the most important message and one that has been a total mystery. Let’s hope that they can thrash something out this morning, although I would not have any great hope that parliament will be terribly supportive given that those trying to come to a conclusion are not the brightest sparks and given to be too extreme.

I was indeed a Labour Party member for quite some time- and also the Lib Dems. And I am NOT anti JC at all, nor am I afraid of the Labour Manifesto.

But we all know that the 'old guard' of the Labour Party, including JC, have always been anti Europe. And I do disagree that the opposition does not need a stance on Brexit, or anything of importance. There is clearly a split between the stance of Umuna, Starmer, Emily's outlook and open attitude to the EU, and that of JC and others. And this is not helpful.

Of course, waiting and waiting. for the right moment to genuinely 'oppose' - could be a very clever and effective stance- saying 'we respect the referendum' until it is so absolutely crystal clear that it will be vastly detrimental to the NHS, jobs, job security and conditions, the environment, and so much more- and then they could then say 'we respected the vote- but now we have to oppose it because... (see above).

As said DJ- my concerns about the Labour Party's lack of clear opposition- are different as I am not anti Labour at all, and have great respect for JC.

The NHS, social services, housing, schools, addressing poverty, and so much more - will not get the funding- and this especially in the hardest hit areas (even Grimsby now realises this). So Brexit is massively important in doing what the Labour party want to achieve (and that I agree with).

I think that Corbyn is right to plug away at everything but Brexit on PMQs. Those problems appear to be forgotten about - probably on purpose - by the government and right-wing media.
May told so many fibs about the homeless last week, and none of the papers picked her up on them.
24housing did, but most people do not read that.

I presume because May wants to be secretive, we wouldn't know if the Labour lawmakers were discussing Brexit with her.
She needs to take more notice of the Brexit panel, not her government. Either that, or sack the hard Brexiteers.

Cabinet reshuffle needed. Trouble is Maybot is so indecisive and incompetent.

Maybe she will tell them at their Christmas party, as happened to hundreds of workers at a factory in Norfolk last week.

durhamjen

" I don't see any problem with not knowing Labour's stance.

Labour do not need to have one, as they are not in power. They can continue having discussions about it until the next general election."

I thought Corbyn and Labour were a 'government in waiting' !

What if there is a snap election?

Thank goodness at last there has been some honesty in admitting Labour has no stance .

whitewave

" I think that you need to listen to labour’s Brexit shadow minister, that will tell you what you need to know.

" It is also clear that labour’s message is quite deliberately ambiguous."

Now put those two comments together and you make total sense.

I struggle where the Conservatives are heading re Brexit to be honest but I have not a clue where Labour are with it all full stop.

One day Starmer says we cannot stay in the Single Market because of the 4 Freedoms another day he wants Labour to stay in the Single Market. He faces two ways and says what he thinks the person he is speaking to wants to hear. McDonnell says something different Starmer , Barry Gardiner something else etc.

pogs not quite sure it is my fault that you haven’t a clue about Labour.

I’m quite satisfied that I know what is intended. Perhaps I read more left wing stuff than you?

Fortunately most Labour party members that I know of are quite happy with the Labour party's stance, POGS.

I didn't say they don't have one. I said I don't see any problem with not knowing.
Keir Starmer was in Brussels today, discussing Brexit with those who matter. I dounbt whether that will be seen as important enough to be put in the papers tomorrow.

This is an interesting article by Paul Mason. Quite left-wing, he is.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/18/the-british-elite-is-at-war-with-itself-on-a-scale-weve-never-seen-before

I like this paragraph.

"Brexit was supposed to make the rich popular again. It was the great rhetorical wheeze that would reunite the Boris Johnsons and the Rees-Moggs with the plebs amid a bonfire of regulations and a sick-inducing spasm of nationalist joy. Instead, because the elite has already lost control of Labour, it threatens to put in power a government that will switch off the great privatisation machine, save universal public health provision and empower workers to an extent that has not been imagined since the 1970s."

whitewave

" You can criticise the Labour Party all you like over it’s ambiguous stance, but there is no denying that it is working with the voter. "

Really? Did you watch Question Time from Barnsley? Barnsley obviously being a safe Labour seat will always be a red rosette area but I don't think Labours 'ambiguous' stance is working with everybody in the Labour Heartlands.

Now I am sure some posters , as per their usual posted comments , will deem the Leavers who commentated as thick, bigoted, racists but continue to treat them as such with smugness at Labours expense, nobody else.

No I don’t watch QT. Used to but got bored with it.

The only political programme I watch occasionally is Newsnight. Sometimes watch parliament, but nothing else really.

whitewave
"pogs not quite sure it is my fault that you haven’t a clue about Labour"
----

It's not your fault you haven't a clue about me.

I know about Labour , I have said before on GN I was brought up by a working class Trade Union Representative/Works Convenor father.

I also understand Momentum, unlike yourself and a couple of others who have stated you know nothing about Momentum.

No, you have your prejudices against Momentum, which is not the same as understanding them.

Why are your posts always so full of innuendo?
If I want to find out anything about Momentum, I know where to find it, but I don't make it a habit to read their website or www.labourlist.org all the time.
Is that where you get all your anti-Momentum information from, because they don't like Momentum, either.
Assuming, of course, that I'm one of the 'others'

pogs jolly good, lets leave it that then shall we? Best all round really

But you're not Labour any more, are you POGS.
I was brought up by Tories, and my dad was a union man.

Strange, that.

"The main convention is that the British elite never loses its cool.
But it has well and truly lost its cool in 2017 – and the repercussions are echoing across public life. Oppose the government and you’re a traitor. Support Labour and you’re a Marxist traitor. Defend progressive values and you’re a luvvie – formerly slang for people in theatre, transformed by the tabloids into slang for people who care about knowledge, reasoned argument and restraint. The denigration of expert opinion emerged as a theme of the Brexit campaign and it has intensified during the elite civil war, as the tabloids belittle the reputations of lawyers, central bankers, economists and anyone foreign."

Labour don’t have a clue about their stance on Brexit!
Abbott was a joke ( as usual) on Andrew Marr Show on Sunday.

Somebody elses words again durhamjen who was it this time?

durhamjen

I have been interested in Momentum and those behind it from it's start and I have posted on Momentum from the beginning, as have you.

I don't need biased coverage to form my opinion of Momentum but it is valuable hear or read biased coverage from time to time to be able to agree with or argue against it's content, dependent on how factual the content is and that can vary from fake news to reasoned debate. Biased opinion would indeed be Labour list as you mention along with The Canary, Jack of Kent, Kitsy Jones, Guido Fawkes, Skwawkbox etc. etc.

There is no 'inuendo' in my comment I mean what I post .

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/18/the-british-elite-is-at-war-with-itself-on-a-scale-weve-never-seen-before

As you can't be bothered to read upthread.

Not the Fail or the Torygraph?

durhamjen

" The main convention is that the British elite never loses its cool"
---

Now you have mentioned 'cool' ! Isn't the term Bollinger Bolshevik a cool term in 2017.?