Let’s stop pretending the referendum was illegal eh?

MaizieD says to Urmstongran.......’are you suddenly going to develop an empathy bone’ that seems impolite to me!

lemon it may not worry you but it worries me and I know I am not alone. I think it is rather arrogant/patronising of you to say I should not be worried, that is up to me.

I do not understand how 'many' could know what was right or wrong years before the referendum. Yes, there could be a 'few' who knew enough to inform their vote but most people 'knew' very little before 2016 and therefore must have voted without enough knowledge.

Amazing what you can say about a non-truth isn't it. Could anyone show me just one of the "so many times" a leave voter has said "the referendum was illegal"? I shall not hold my breath.

Do we get a prize when your "hyperbole" gets to 10 UG

From the metro. Caroline Lucas and a number of other MPs

It is a big step to take legal action against the police, but I have joined a group of politicians in doing just that. The issue is something which strikes at the heart of our democracy: politicians breaking the law to get the results they want – in this case, the UK leaving the European Union. Those of us who have decided to action are not a group of Remoaners, trying to get the Brexit result overturned. We come from different political parties and from both Remain and Leave camps, but we are united in a deep dismay that our electoral laws were broken in what was the most important vote in this country for decades. The law-breaking is not in doubt; the official regulator, the Electoral Commission, has fined two main pro-Brexit campaigns – Vote Leave and Leave.EU – and been strongly critical of both. Vote Leave was fined £61,000 for breaking spending limits. This was the campaign which was fronted by several government ministers, including the man who is now the front-runner to be our next prime minister, Boris Johnson. Vote Leave’s contempt for the law didn’t end there. It even refused to be interviewed by the Electoral Commission and destroyed key documents. On the other end, Leave.EU – Nigel Farage’s anti-EU campaign – was fined even more (£70,000) for a series of offences including breaking its campaign spending limit, inaccurately reporting loans it had received and not being clear about who had provided the money. It also failed to declare services received from a US campaign organisation. We’ve become used to Nigel Farage being on the receiving end of unexplained loans. He has been generously bank-rolled by the insurance tycoon Arron Banks, receiving nearly half a million pounds in the year after the referendum. Banks himself is under criminal investigation for his role in ‘multiple suspected offences’ within the Leave.EU campaign. People who break the law should be held accountable and so far, that hasn’t happened. This is not just a matter of campaign teams failing to keep track of invoices. As the Electoral Commission said, both Vote Leave and Leave.EU ‘broke the electoral rules set out by Parliament to ensure fairness, confidence and legitimacy at an electoral event…’. The regulator has done its job, investigating and fining both campaigns, and would have fined them more if it had had the power to do so –but it doesn’t end there. People who break the law should be held accountable and so far, that hasn’t happened. Nearly a year ago, the Commission handed over more than 2,000 documents to the Metropolitan Police detailing why they believed serious offences had been committed by Vote Leave. Since then, there’s been nothing but silence. The police have two things to consider; firstly, is there enough evidence? The answer is clearly yes. Furthermore, is it in the public interest to prosecute? If you believe in the rule of law and the fairness of the democratic process of our country, then the answer to that must also be yes. MORE: BREXIT Brexit 'might make beer cheaper in pubs' claims minister Posters appearing across UK 'will highlight treasure trove of Boris Johnson hypocrisy' Yellow Vest activist James Goddard guilty of assaulting photographer We are used to some political parties having much deeper pockets than others, as well as the two main parties being bank-rolled by wealthy individuals, corporations or trade unions. But during election periods, limits are set on how much can be spent. When that breaks down, one of the pillars of our democracy crumbles. Because it is not universal suffrage which upholds our democratic system, it is the rule of law. When it is broken, those responsible should be held accountable. The police must take action against those who broke the law or explain why they are not doing so. At the moment, that isn’t happening and we need to know why.

Read more: metro.co.uk/2019/06/26/brexit-campaigners-broke-the-law-now-they-must-face-the-consequences-10064164/?ito=cbshare
Twitter: twitter.com/MetroUK | Facebook: www.facebook.com/MetroUK/

Remain now has an 18 point lead!

Paragraphs are your friend WWm2
?

Leave EU

'Leave.EU has been fined £70,000 by the Electoral Commission for offences committed under electoral law, following its investigation into the campaigner’s funding and spend during the EU referendum.'
--

Lib Dems

'Details of £18,000 in fines for the Liberal Democrats have been published today by the Electoral Commission; this follows an investigation that found the party failed to deliver a complete and accurate spending return as a permitted participant at the EU Referendum.

The total sum, which nears the Commission’s maximum individual fine of £20,000, is made up of two fines. '
--

Smaller fines were given to other groups.
----

What has always interested / baffled me is the High Court case. Extracts:-

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-45519676

' The High Court agreed with the Electoral Commission finding in July that Vote Leave had broken the law, but said the watchdog had misinterpreted the rules, in the run-up to the June 2016 referendum, in advice it gave to the Leave campaign.'

' In his judgement, Lord Justice Leggatt said the Electoral Commission had "misinterpreted the definition of 'referendum expenses'" as defined by the Political Parties, Elections and Referendum Act.

He added: "The source of its error is a mistaken assumption that an individual or body which makes a donation to a permitted participant cannot thereby incur referendum expenses.

"As a result of this error, the Electoral Commission has interpreted the definition in a way that is inconsistent with both the language and the purpose of the legislation."

Confuses me.

I read the above post as stating that the Electoral Commission wrongly advised the Leave campaign. So how can the Leave campaign be held responsible, if it followed that advice?

Again, per my earlier post, if the Remainers had won, and the legality of the referendum was in doubt, how many remainers would have insisted on a re-run? Nil, nada, zero, zilch, they moan because they didn't get the result they wanted. End of.

Reading what many Leavers have written, anybody would think that the period since 1973 has been disastrous for the UK. I went into articles that year and in 1979 we bought our first house for £18,000. It was a wreck and as we could not afford to pay anyone to do the work, my husband did it, working 7 days a week, either on his business or on the house. Now that house is worth around £1.5 million. Not that we own it anymore and are probably worth 1/4 of that.

The fact is that life has had its vagaries but has generally been good. I'm sure than many of you out there would say the same. So, how has being in the EU been bad for us?

So, how has being in the EU been bad for us?

That's one of life's little mysteries, Dinahmo. Along with, 'How is leaving the EU going to improve our lives?' ?

One thing is clear is that we have NO trade agreements at all, and it will years before we get to that stage. Meanwhile we are expecting our businesses to compete with the rest of the world who are all in comfortable trade agreements easing life for their businesses.

No wonder the world is looking at us with such incredulity

Well I'm gobsmacked! The last 2 posters have been perfectly satisfied with how their lives have been over the years that we've been tied to the EU. Maybe in our own small worlds this has been true. We now need to think of the country's future, not simply our own. This is exactly why many do not want to see change.

gangy5 I did not write that I was perfectly satisfied, merely that life has generally been good for me and mine and I assume for most people.

The sad thing is the way in which over the last 10 years the government has ignored the problems of homelessness, schools, young people and social care.

They've allowed private companies to do pretty much as they wished, with few controls. Examples - G4S and the Olympics, Capita, Carillion and now Southern Water.

Need I go on - the list is endless.

Just going back to the OP - from a Good Law Project update.

The Vote Leave saga continues

If you recall, the Good Law Project launched a judicial review into the Electoral Commission’s failure to investigate whether Vote Leave was guilty of criminal conduct in relation to referendum overspending. We succeeded in the High Court, which ruled that the Electoral Commission had misunderstood the law surrounding donations during the EU Referendum. The consequence was that the body in charge of ensuring the referendum was fair had unlawfully tilted the playing field in favour of Vote Leave.

However, the Electoral Commission decided to appeal the decision. The hearing will take place on Thursday 4th July, and we will, of course, let you know how that goes.

We have launched a crowdfunding campaign, where you can read more about the background of the case. Please help us defend the ruling that Vote Leave broke the law.

www.crowdjustice.com/case/our-democracy-isnt-for-sale/

gangy5 (Thu 27-Jun-19 08:11:37)

Do you really believe that those who didn't vote as you did did not "think of the country's future" but that because you voted leave you have a more patriotic outlook? What an incredibly arrogant opinion.

Perhaps you could explain why you believe the country and all its citizens is actually going to have a better future by leaving. No leaver ever does as far as I can see so I won't be holding my breath.

Richard Corbett MEP

In 10 years BBC QT has asked 50 MEPs onto its show

Pro- remain. 0. Zilch none

Anti-EU. 100% of which 36% was Farage.

And now it come to light that the BBC allowed the Tory party to erase from an interview with BoJo, the fact he called the French turds, as it would not be helpful in getting a good deal. The BBC has been shown, again and again, to be biased- which is why so many of us have switched to channel 4 news.

Mind you, I dreade QT last night and only intended to watch for a few minutes- but the guy from the Sun was actually very good, and the CEO of Iceland was massively impressive- and Liz Truss her usual haughty, snobby, look at people down her nose, hopeless and looked ridiculous.

I voted Leave in 1975, again in 2016 and, if there's ever another referendum and I'm still alive, I'll vote Leave next time. Nothing will ever persuade me to think that it's better paying a sh*t load of money to have a 'supposedly free trade agreement' and to live under the control of a corrupt regime like the EU, when we could be an independent country. Even if it means making some mistakes, they would be our own mistakes.

And Aysha Hazairika was brilliant.

"So, how has being in the EU been bad for us?
That's one of life's little mysteries, Dinahmo. Along with, 'How is leaving the EU going to improve our lives?"

Exactly that! We don't know whether we would have been more prosperous if we had stayed outside the EU. And we don't know if leaving the EU is going to improve our lives. WE DON'T KNOW. None of us knows. So we all have to vote with what our gut tells us, and mine is to leave, before we join the Euro and our economy then becomes inextricably linked to every other Euro country, most of which are much smaller than us and do not have such large economies. We would then be bailing out the likes of Spain, Greece, Italy et al, ad infinitum. No thanks.

GracesGranMK3 "Perhaps you could explain why you believe the country and all its citizens is actually going to have a better future by leaving. No leaver ever does as far as I can see so I won't be holding my breath".

Well here we are - my reasons for leaving the EU:-

1. We will be free to make our own trade deals. Currently all deals are negotiated by the EU with a dose of protectionism thrown in. This is limiting us trading with the rest of the world.
2. We will revert to our own judicial system which is the envy of the world and based on common law.
3. We will hopefully retake our fishing grounds
4. Farming will be returned to our jurisdiction
5. The exchequer can decide how all revenue is spent. I am also sure that in most years - the EU budget hasn't balanced!!

The most important things are that we won't be drawn into the Euro or the EU's ongoing plans for federalism.

The big downer with all that's gone on is the fact of the totally wasted last 3 years. It is no wonder that, by now, business is getting jittery. Any fallout that ensues is completely the government's fault and don't forget the civil service in this also

I now invite the remainers to tell us why they choose to remain

I voted leave, as did my OH. We didn't have a vote in 1975 due to the fact that we were stationed in Germany where my husband was a serving soldier. We would not have voted to join, have never thought we should be in the EU and were delighted when the referendum was announced. We would vote leave again - to the extent that as life long Tory voters, we voted for Nigel Farage in the European elections. Like many others, we wanted to get the message across that we are fed up of waiting.

1. We will be free to make our own trade deals. Currently all deals are negotiated by the EU with a dose of protectionism thrown in. This is limiting us trading with the rest of the world.

This has always puzzled me, gangy5. Can you explain how EU 'protectionism' damages our trade, seeing that we are, for the present, part of the EU and benefit from any 'protectionism' implicit in deals made with our input and on our behalf, by the EU.
(I interpret protectionism as taking measures, such as required standards, which protect our own products against being undercut by cheaper imported goods produced to lower standards. If I'm wrong, do clarify what it does mean)

Interested to know what part of the world we don't now trade with which we will be able to trade with if we leave the EU and how advantageous that will be to the UK.

The most important things are that we won't be drawn into the Euro or the EU's ongoing plans for federalism

We weren't going to be required to do either under the terms of the agreement Cameron reached with the EU. Agreement that was to be incorporated into the Treaties which determine our relationship with the EU.

And if you'd taken any real interest in the EU you would know that there isn't a great appetite for federalism among the other member states.

I don't think you will get an explanation Maisie but I do appreciate you at least answering the original question gangy5

Firstly, I find it cowardly when people attack those who can't answer back. The Civil Servants are doing a job. I suppose if you are the sort of person who would take on a job and then try and undermine what you should be doing you can imagine that others would do likewise. We are so lucky to live in a democracy. Blaming Civil Servants or traducing MPs is not going to change the situation we are in. It sounds very much as if you are seeing things going wrong with this and getting your excuses in first.