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A Tory vs A Labour Brexit - What Real-World Consequences?

maxflinn

pfm Member
Yes, a lot must happen before either could become a reality; but putting that aside for now, what might be the actual real-world differences between them in terms of the economy, jobs etc, if we assume that any Tory Brexit is now likely to be a no-deal Brexit.

Thoughts?
 
Depends on just what a "soft-Brexit" looks like (assuming one can be agreed, which is a very big assumption given the lack of support for a moderate solution), however unless it's very similar to remain (and therefore completely pointless by anyone's standards) surely it's just death by firing squad v death by hanging?

Probably best if you tell us what you think a Labour soft Brexit contains first.
 
My thoughts are that the only Brexit that may happen is a Tory Brexit : in the unlikely event of a GE in the near future, won by Labour, I think Brexit will be stopped.

Just last weekend I was feeling fed up that my attempts to obtain Irish citizenship had been thwarted by my Irish great-grandmother traveling to London not long before giving birth : I had always thought my paternal grandmother was born in Dublin. I had stated here that if BoJo became PM, as now seems likely, I would give up my British citizenship in disgust.

However, I also recall the national shame felt in September 1992, when I was still living & working in the UK, at the apparent catastrophe of being forced to leave the ERM, which turned out to be one of the greatest blessings to the UK economy in recent decades.... but NOBODY saw this at the time, everyone thought it would be a huge negative for our economic well-being, even though the benefits became clear within 10 years, perhaps sooner.

The truth is we don't actually know if leaving the EU will be the unmitigated long-term disaster that so many of us fear : it may actually be better for the UK in the long-term.
Time "in quaaludes & red wine" will tell.... (and we haven't left yet !).
 
Depends on just what a "soft-Brexit" looks like (assuming one can be agreed, which is a very big assumption given the lack of support for a moderate solution), however unless it's very similar to remain (and therefore completely pointless by anyone's standards) surely it's just death by firing squad v death by hanging?

Probably best if you tell us what you think a Labour soft Brexit contains first.
"New and comprehensive customs union" plus "dynamic regulatory allignment" with the single market. Outlined here:https://www.theguardian.com/comment...mainers-leavers-norway-model-customs-model-eu
It's clear enough and it's also been consistent. I know the response will be "Unicorn!" but key EU negotiators have seen it and made approving noises.

Given Labour's anti-austerity policies and industrial strategy the effects of such a soft Brexit are likely to be not that bad. They bear no comparison whatsoever with those of a no deal Brexit. Yes, remain plus the same policies would be better but if it has to happen, this is how Labour would manage exiting the EU and it wouldn't be awful.
 
There is, and always was, only one type of Brexit.

A Tory Brexit.

They were in power, enabled the referendum, had a majority.

Labour supporters knew this, yet still many voted leave.

Frankly, any leave voting Labour supporter who feels 'shocked' by the outcome of the Tory Brexit, whatever horrific form it takes, needs to look at the way they acted three years ago.

It's not as if they were not warned of the consequences.

It was never going to be a positive outcome for anyone other than a small cadre of millionaire Conservatives.

Stephen
 
"New and comprehensive customs union" plus "dynamic regulatory allignment" with the single market. Outlined here:https://www.theguardian.com/comment...mainers-leavers-norway-model-customs-model-eu
It's clear enough and it's also been consistent. I know the response will be "Unicorn!" but key EU negotiators have seen it and made approving noises.

Given Labour's anti-austerity policies and industrial strategy the effects of such a soft Brexit are likely to be not that bad. They bear no comparison whatsoever with those of a no deal Brexit. Yes, remain plus the same policies would be better but if it has to happen, this is how Labour would manage exiting the EU and it wouldn't be awful.

It's 'unicorn' because it will not, and never was going to be, the outcome of this process.

On the day of the referendum, it was clear the Conservatives would decide what the Brexit process would be, should people choose that pathway.

Stephen
 
It's 'unicorn' because it will not, and never was going to be, the outcome of this process.

On the day of the referendum, it was clear the Conservatives would decide what the Brexit process would be, should people choose that pathway.

Stephen
99% of Brexit discourse is people bursting blood vessels over hypothetical scenarios in what, for you, is a kind of afterlife. Max staged this particular hypothetical scenario in the hope of at least attaching the discussion to some real world referents. In any case, it's clear that the Conservatives haven't been able to determine the Brexit process and there's no prospect of them being able to do so, so it's worth getting our bearings.
 
99% of Brexit discourse is people bursting blood vessels over hypothetical scenarios in what, for you, is a kind of afterlife. Max staged this particular hypothetical scenario in the hope of at least attaching the discussion to some real world referents. In any case, it's clear that the Conservatives haven't been able to determine the Brexit process and there's no prospect of them being able to do so, so it's worth getting our bearings.

I agree.

Max's conjecture is, and always has been, hypothetical. There is, and never was, a Labour Brexit.

The Tories (and MPs now) have determined the process. It's what happens by law in October.

The speculation is pretty much pointless now. It's what remain voters said would happen, after all.

Stephen
 
I agree.

Max's conjecture is, and always has been, hypothetical.

The Tories (and MPs now) have determined the process. It's what happens by law in October.

Stephen
Like it happened in March?

No, we don't even have the certainty of a default no deal - we can't take our bearings from it.
 
Like it happened in March?

No, we don't even have the certainty of a default no deal - we can't take our bearings from it.

March was different.

May had a deal. She at least came to understand over three years that no-deal was going to be a disaster. MPs had a chance to vote on this deal. She wouldn't chance no-deal and so, sensibly, asked for extensions.

There is not a deal on the table to vote on now, nor will there be. Johnson won't chance putting another deal to be voted down to the house.

Johnson's hard-Brexit enablers actually want no-deal. He probably doesn't care as long as he's PM.

That's the important difference. There'll be no Hammond or Grieve or Stewart in Government to give reasonably good counsel.

Johnson will be PM until 2022 as it'd probably take a few years for the damage to really become apparent. If he goes to the country in Jan 2020 after Brexit and wins he'll last until 2025. If he loses, Labour will be blamed for Brexit's effects.

I'd love you to be right Sean as much as I'd have loved an election next year that Labour had won.

Stephen
 
Depends on just what a "soft-Brexit" looks like (assuming one can be agreed, which is a very big assumption given the lack of support for a moderate solution), however unless it's very similar to remain (and therefore completely pointless by anyone's standards) surely it's just death by firing squad v death by hanging?
Well that's what this thread is designed to tease out. Up until now, unless I've missed it there hasn't been any thread asking what any differences might actually mean for Joe public.

Probably best if you tell us what you think a Labour soft Brexit contains first.
Sean has provided info on what Labour's version would be like.

I wonder how many people have actually considered comparing the likely consequences of each potential outcome. I'm guessing a low percentage.

Perhaps it's now time to start doing so? I think so anyway as it appears Britain remaining is an unlikely outcome at this point.
 
I agree.

Max's conjecture is, and always has been, hypothetical. There is, and never was, a Labour Brexit.

The Tories (and MPs now) have determined the process. It's what happens by law in October.

The speculation is pretty much pointless now. It's what remain voters said would happen, after all.

Stephen
I would keep an eye out for a response from the EU come the witching hour in October.
We will not leave via no deal, the EU will not allow it. Another extension followed by a few years of further extensions until Brexit becomes an afterthought to the real problems this country face under further Tory rule.

It was never going to happen & never will.

To answer the OP, i'm afraid the question is a moot point as neither scenario will come to fruition.
 
The economic impact of the various flavours of Brexit has already been estimated, not least by the government themselves (though infamously denied by the man who ordered them) and discussed at length here. Some of those chickens are coming home to roost in manufacturing, though of course, like the immediate and sustained fall in the pound on June 23 2016, that’ll be nothingtodowithbrexit™.
Isnt the thread really only another rhetorical question anyway? Look, it’s like this- Jeremy and his team are getting behind a Brexit that will work for everyone and aren’t all these predictions about Brexit a bit over the top? (purred in the voice of Barry Gardiner).

It’s what I meant three years ago, that Labour and the Tories are two cheeks of the same politically self serving arse and we know what they’re going to produce. It’s what arses do.
 
The economic impact of the various flavours of Brexit has already been estimated, not least by the government themselves (though infamously denied by the man who ordered them) and discussed at length here. Some of those chickens are coming home to roost in manufacturing, though of course, like the immediate and sustained fall in the pound on June 23 2016, that’ll be nothingtodowithbrexit™.
Isnt the thread really only another rhetorical question anyway? Look, it’s like this- Jeremy and his team are getting behind a Brexit that will work for everyone and aren’t all these predictions about Brexit a bit over the top? (purred in the voice of Barry Gardiner).

It’s what I meant three years ago, that Labour and the Tories are two cheeks of the same politically self serving arse and we know what they’re going to produce. It’s what arses do.
The lengthy discussions about the economic impact of the various kinds of Brexit have, like the discussions of much else, been remarkable for their symmetry: leavers deny the validity of the reports insisting on the fact that Brexit will be damaging, remainers deny the validity of those same reports when they point out that that damage would be much less significant in the case of a soft Brexit. In the one case there is a refusal to consider the evidence in front of everyone's eyes (businesses failing or packing up at least partly because of Brexit), in the other a refusal to consider logic (these businesses cite the prospect of no deal and supply chain problems, neither of which would be an issue with a soft Brexit).

There is also more than a little symmetry around this insistence that they're all the same. In the case of leavers of course it's a dangerous, populist assault on democratic institutions; in the case of remainers it's just weary recognition that our political class has failed us, and that a new kind of politics is necessary. Both sides claim to be shocked and outraged by the foundational fact of a party political system: parties need to "serve themselves" - hold themselves together, win support - if they are to govern. Stamping their feet about this necessary identity they hide the difference: the Conservatives want to govern so that they can set fire to the country; Labour want to govern so that they can end the suffering of millions of people.

(And where are the SNP in all of this, while we're at it? They appear to be acting with complete disregard for this natural law of party politics, that is entirely selflessly - despite their not entirely consistent approach to Brexit. In no way are they using all this to further their own agenda. From the English this is all part of the patronising colonial schtick [Can we all move to Scotland! Oh your politicians are marvellous can we have them down here!] but from actual supporters it has to be considered disingenuous.)

There was a report out last week that showed the typical No Deal supporter to be old and wealthy: that is, very likely a beneficiary of asset price inflation, dependent neither on paid work or the state. Anyone who can hold Tory no deal in one hand and a Labour soft Brexit in the other and say, See! They're the same! has to be similarly well-insulated from the effects of the former. There's the key symmetry. In the end it's not some Tory-Labour pact that risks giving us no deal, it's a Hard Leave-Hard Remain alliance between radicalised wealthy pensioners.
 
You haven’t addressed the security, influence, cultural or cooperative losses that will stem from placing ourselves outside the European Union. All this to retain and win a target list of anti-European seats at the next GE. I’m also uncertain how Brexit will bring about asset price inflation- it’s going to knock a hole assets. By all means put your savings into retail property funds.
 
You haven’t addressed the security, influence, cultural or cooperative losses that will stem from placing ourselves outside the European Union. All this to retain and win a target list of anti-European seats at the next GE. I’m also uncertain how Brexit will bring about asset price inflation- it’s going to knock a hole assets. By all means put your savings into retail property funds.
Would all these losses be the same in the case of Tory no deal and Labour soft Brexit?

The asset price inflation has already happened, and it has to be seen as one of the main drivers of Brexit: it's led a large slice of the population to think of themselves as invulnerable, and young people as desperately in need of toughening up.
 
Labour ... A Marxist, anti large (and small business), nationalise everything, anti national defense, 10 million public sector employees hell hole with large (and small) wealth creators (business) either being forced to close or re-locate abroad due to punishing corporate taxation and/or brain dead schemes such as giving workers compulsary stakes in companies.

Of course, personal taxation will have to rise too to pay for all that social funding but they are pretty quiet about that.

What's the bad news :)
 


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