Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

Started by Josquius, February 20, 2016, 07:46:34 AM

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How would you vote on Britain remaining in the EU?

British- Remain
12 (12%)
British - Leave
7 (7%)
Other European - Remain
21 (21%)
Other European - Leave
6 (6%)
ROTW - Remain
34 (34%)
ROTW - Leave
20 (20%)

Total Members Voted: 98

Sheilbh

Separately some of these factors seem relatively temporary. It's unlikely given the way the war is going to see significantly more Ukrainians arriving (I've actually heard about people returning to Ukraine); similarly I expect the student numbers are probably having a temporary post-pandemic blip as the ONS says.

But work visas are also up, so far the Hong Kong BNO scheme seems to be operating at about 20-50,000 per quarter (obviously a lot more applications when it launched) - but it is about to expand to include people born after 1997 if one of their parents holds a BNO passport, which is good because I think young people are particularly at risk. Sadly I suspect we'll see the numbers from Hong Kong fluctuate and occasionally spike based on what the Chinese state does.

It seems mad to me that after the 2019 manifesto removed the Tory target of net immigration under 100,000 that Braverman is talking about it. Failing in her aim to solve the small boats issue (good questioning from Tory MP Tim Loughton on the issue on this), it seems like a bold strategy to then set a new goal that she'll inevitably fail. If Theresa May, who I think is the most restrictionist Home Secretary or PM we've had in a very long time, couldn't do it, I doubt Braverman can:
QuoteMigration to UK rises to record 504,000 with Ukraine and Hong Kong schemes
Jump in number of international students a factor in figure that is at least 400,000 higher than home secretary is aiming for
Rajeev Syal and Jessica Elgot
Thu 24 Nov 2022 16.59 GMT
First published on Thu 24 Nov 2022 11.53 GMT

Net migration to the UK has reached a record level of 504,000 after the arrival of Ukrainians and Hongkongers under government schemes and a jump in the number of international students.

Asylum applications are at their highest for 32 years, but nearly 100,000 people are waiting more than six months to have their initial claims processed, official government data shows.


No 10 indicated on Thursday it was examining options to bring down the numbers of international students. "We are considering all options to make sure the immigration system is delivering and that does include the issue of students' dependents, and low-quality degrees," Rishi Sunak's spokesperson said.

The new net migration figure released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) is an increase of 331,000 in a single year and is at least 400,000 more than the home secretary, Suella Braverman, is aiming for.

She promised in September she would try to get overall migration down to "tens of thousands" – a promise previously made by David Cameron and Theresa May but never achieved.

Responding to the figures, Braverman said she remained committed to reducing migration – but did not repeat her aim of reducing immigration to tens of thousands.

"The public rightly expects us to control our borders and we remain committed to reducing migration over time in line with our manifesto commitment," she said. "This level of migration has put pressure on accommodation and housing supply, health, education and other public services. We must ensure we have a sustainable, balanced and controlled approach which is why we continue to keep our immigration policies under review.

"My priority remains tackling the rise in dangerous and illegal crossings and stopping the abuse of our system. It is vital we restore public confidence and take back control of our borders."

Downing Street said Sunak wanted to bring overall immigration levels down.

About 504,000 more people are estimated to have moved to the UK than left in the 12 months to June 2022, up sharply from 173,000 in the year to June 2021. The total is significantly higher than the 224,000 projected for next year by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR).

The increase stems from a rise in visas for foreign nationals to live, study and work in the UK, which exceeded 1 million for the first time in the year to June.

A total of 1.1 million people are likely to have migrated to the UK in the year to June, the majority – 704,000 – from outside the EU. By contrast, 560,000 people are estimated to have left the UK in the same period, almost half of them – 275,000 – going back to the EU.


Students accounted for the biggest proportion of immigrants, at 277,000, nearly double the 143,000 who came to the UK in the year to June 2021. One factor was overseas students returning to their courses in the UK after studying remotely, the ONS said.

Humanitarian and other family visas accounted for the second largest proportion of immigrants, at 39% or 276,000 in the year ending June 2022. These included 89,000 Ukrainians, 76,000 from Hong Kong and 21,000 Afghans or UK returnees from Afghanistan.

The ONS said the UK was living through a unique period when travel was recovering after Covid 19. The statistics also show that the number of people applying for asylum was the highest for nearly 20 years, at 72,027.

The backlog on asylum decisions is now 143,377, with nearly 98,000 people waiting for more than six months, according to Home Office data. Forty-one per cent of applications for asylum come from people who have travelled to the UK in small boats, the statistics show.

Enver Solomon, the head of the Refugee Council, said: "The number of men, women and children now living in limbo has risen by 20,000 in just three months, meaning 143,000 are now waiting for an initial decision on their case, with just under 98,000 waiting more than six months.."

Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, said the figures showed serious problems and Conservative mismanagement of the immigration and asylum systems.

"Despite their promises to stop dangerous Channel crossings, they have failed to tackle the criminal gangs, and asylum decision-making has collapsed – with only 2% of people who arrived in small boats over the last year having had their cases decided," she said.
Let's bomb Russia!

Tamas

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/nov/25/voter-id-laws-what-they-really-are-voter-suppression-and-an-attack-on-young-people

I have no doubt the Tories want to use this to make sure votes against them won't bother to turn up, but regardless not requiring ID to vote is ridiculous.

Only thing more ridiculous is marking your vote with a bloody pencil.

The Larch

Oh the irony, big social media companies want EU laws to regulate them.

QuoteMeta seeks government protection from Rees-Mogg's EU law bonfire
Facebook owner seeks assurance that vital directive will not be purged by former business secretary's bill

Facebook and Instagram have asked for government protection from Jacob Rees-Mogg's bonfire of up to 4,000 EU laws on post-Brexit statute books.

In a letter to a parliamentary committee to be published on Friday, the parent group, Meta, asks that laws underpinning social media firms are either "explicitly maintained elsewhere" or "removed from the scope" of the retained EU law (revocation and reform) bill.

If they are not, groups like Facebook would be "less likely to operate in the UK", wrote Richard Earley, the UK public policy manager at Meta.

The Labour MP Stella Creasy said the bill could force social media companies out of the UK by accident.

"Many of us want social media companies held to account for how their platforms are used. Closing them down by default is not the way to do that but Meta themselves say it's possible because of the government's REUL bill," she tweeted.

Representatives of private and public interest groups were invited to contribute to a consultation on the bill earlier in November with criticism flooding in from organisations ranging from the Institute of Directors, trade unions including Unison, the TUC, and the Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI), an organisation dedicated to consumer health and safety protections.

In a letter also published on Friday the CTSI calls on the government to delay the bill warning that there are 250 pieces of "vital legislation" covering food and product safety, animal health and welfare, fair trading, rogue and predatory trading, and legal metrology – the system for enforcing weights and measures so consumers get what they pay for.

The CTSI says a survey it conducted showed the public were most concerned that food standards would be affected by the bill.

It also found that tackling EU law was last on the list of priorities of voters who were more concerned with the cost of living and NHS. The controversial bill was the brainchild of the former business secretary Rees-Mogg.

The bill is at the committee stage in the Commons. It proposes to delete up to 4,000 laws covering everything from animal testing of cosmetics to holiday pay and passenger compensation rights, unless these are actively saved by a minister. It has been widely criticised as "reckless" and "anti-democratic" by legal experts because of the unprecedented powers it gives ministers.

The speed with which the government wants to push through the bill, tabled by Rees-Mogg in September, when he was business minister, has also been criticised.

Under a so-called sunset clause, all EU laws that are not amended or updated by 31 December 2023 will automatically be switched off.

This week the bill was described as "not fit for purpose" by the government's independent assessor.

Earley wrote to the committee to draw its attention to a set of laws derived from the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 that are at risk of being changed or deleted.

The laws contain provisions known as "intermediary liability" which protect social media companies from being liable for user conduct and content.

The inclusion of the e-commerce directive within the scope of the bill "will cause serious concerns", Earley wrote.

If the protections for social media operations were not maintained the "ultimate effect", he said, was that platforms and websites would be "less likely to want to operate in the UK and may pull back from making the UK a hub for innovative new products and services in the way the government envisages".

Sheilbh

Quote from: Tamas on November 25, 2022, 06:14:57 AMhttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/nov/25/voter-id-laws-what-they-really-are-voter-suppression-and-an-attack-on-young-people

I have no doubt the Tories want to use this to make sure votes against them won't bother to turn up, but regardless not requiring ID to vote is ridiculous.
Factually that's probably unlikely - the largest group in the UK without a valid ID are the over-65s. I think they imported the idea of voter ID from the US and I think the criticism of voter ID has also been cut and paste from the US.

I think that's probably the reason why it will be the law that everyone is entitled to a free voter ID card. That removes most of my objection to voter ID because my issue is that it shouldn't cost to vote and it shouldn't be limited by class - people who drive or need a passport. In my veiw a free voter ID card fixes those issues....But adds to my suspicion that voter ID is just a trojan horse for a national ID card system (which Labour has been floating again in recent weeks).

Although I agree with Polly Toynbee (which is rare :ph34r:) that if a form of ID is acceptable for the elderly it should also apply to young people.

QuoteOnly thing more ridiculous is marking your vote with a bloody pencil.
Oh no! You've been radicalised into #UsePens :ph34r:

QuoteOh the irony, big social media companies want EU laws to regulate them.
:lol: This is standard from Facebook.

It highlights the real issue with Brexit which was always going to be that businesses have to comply with different legislation in the UK and EU, which increases the cost to them. It's the same reason that Facebook, Google, Apple etc are the biggest advocates of a Federal privacy law in the US because different states are doing their own things which is difficult to manage.

But also that specific threat - they make it every time and in every country when there's a risk of legislation they don't like. I remember Facebook threatening to pull out of Australia over Australia's law forcing social media companies to share advertising revenue with traditional media publishers - they didn't. I think Facebook also threatened to leave the EU over consent requirements (sort-of replicated by Apple) which had a huge impact on Facebook's revenue - they didn't. My view is that social media companies are frankly a little bit like oil majors in the 20th century suddenly facing laws from all these post-colonial states deciding their own regulations - they're not used to it yet, but they'll get there.

The bill itself is ridiculous - on one of the days there was a committee hearing about it it came out that the civil service had identified another 1,400 pieces of legislation affected by it. It shouldn't pass - and I don't think it's likely to go ahead. I don't think it's a bad idea to spend some time doing an audit of retained EU law and identifying good changes (arguably someone should have been doing this for the last 6 years), but just deciding that's too complicated and it'll all be abolished unless retained is insane, if only from a legal certainty perspective.

The whole intermediary liability issue is complicated and likely to be changing anyway in the UK and the EU through things like the Online Safety Bill, or the EU's DMA and DSA (plus recent CJEU cases). I think people get that there is difference between, say, something like Steam or an App store as an intermediary and Facebook. The EU has already started moving on this and I have no doubt Facebook would very much like the UK to be stranded on old regulations from the early 2000s that give intermediaries very strong protections.
Let's bomb Russia!

Sheilbh

Obviously this guy is just a Twitter rando so I won't cyber-bully him. But I love this on so many levels :lol:
Let's bomb Russia!

The Larch

If he misses monasteries in England he might be a time traveller from the XVth century or earlier.

Sheilbh

Quote from: The Larch on November 25, 2022, 10:23:52 AMIf he misses monasteries in England he might be a time traveller from the XVth century or earlier.
I just love the idea of a late middle aged/retired English person looking up like "hang on....WHERE HAVE ALL THE NUNS GONE!?" :lol:
Let's bomb Russia!

Josquius

Stupid woke Henry VIII.

And here I thought we'd reached peak woke with feathered dinosaurs.
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Syt

I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
—Stephen Jay Gould

Proud owner of 42 Zoupa Points.

Sheilbh

#23124
Quote from: Josquius on November 25, 2022, 10:26:26 AMStupid woke Henry VIII.
"Not that I particularly care, by the way!"
Let's bomb Russia!

viper37

Quote from: OttoVonBismarck on November 23, 2022, 01:55:45 PMI didn't follow all the stuff mega-closely, but at least my memory is we were promised the last referendum would be a "once in a generation thing", I don't remember it being suggested they'd run it again in a few years. Now, obviously they are using Brexit as the pretext to justify that, but I think there's a valid argument to be made that voting on separatism every few years is not proper or good.
There would have been no cause for a referendum without Brexit.

And I don't think the UK has followed through on its promise of "max-devo" either.
I don't do meditation.  I drink alcohol to relax, like normal people.

If Microsoft Excel decided to stop working overnight, the world would practically end.

Duque de Bragança

Quote from: Sheilbh on November 25, 2022, 10:25:51 AM
Quote from: The Larch on November 25, 2022, 10:23:52 AMIf he misses monasteries in England he might be a time traveller from the XVth century or earlier.
I just love the idea of a late middle aged/retired English person looking up like "hang on....WHERE HAVE ALL THE NUNS GONE!?" :lol:

No nuns means no longer any nunsploitation movies, come on.

Barrister

Quote from: Sheilbh on November 25, 2022, 10:27:50 AM
Quote from: Josquius on November 25, 2022, 10:26:26 AMStupid woke Henry VIII.
"Not that I particularly care, by the way!"

I feel like that's distressingly common on the crazy right - bemoaning the decline in "traditional values" and Christianity, while not actually bothering to go to Church themselves.
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

HVC

Quote from: Barrister on November 25, 2022, 12:09:38 PM
Quote from: Sheilbh on November 25, 2022, 10:27:50 AM
Quote from: Josquius on November 25, 2022, 10:26:26 AMStupid woke Henry VIII.
"Not that I particularly care, by the way!"

I feel like that's distressingly common on the crazy right - bemoaning the decline in "traditional values" and Christianity, while not actually bothering to go to Church themselves.

Church is boring and takes away from their ranting time.
Being lazy is bad; unless you still get what you want, then it's called "patience".
Hubris must be punished. Severely.

Sheilbh

#23129
Quote from: Barrister on November 25, 2022, 12:09:38 PMI feel like that's distressingly common on the crazy right - bemoaning the decline in "traditional values" and Christianity, while not actually bothering to go to Church themselves.
Although it's one of their more understandable lines.

I don't really care or listen to, say, BBC Radio 3 which is all classical music or classical music in general - but I'm glad it's there and would mourn its loss even if I wasn't interested in it. I feel broadly the same about the CofE or Songs of Praise on the BBC even though it's not for me - the village church etc. I get it's a conservative instinct but it is one that I share.

Now how you square frustration with virtue signalling while bemoaning the loss of cloistered orders of people sworn to celibacy, poverty and obediance who have withdrawn from the world is a little beyond me :P

Edit: Thinking ahout it I feel broadly the same about things like the Antiques Roadshow or stately homes and quite a lot of other things too :hmm:
Let's bomb Russia!