Currently reading: Brexit and diesel fears stall car sales, says new research
Exclusive Autocar survey finds sales being delayed by worries over Brexit and diesel

As news of yet another monthly fall in new car sales emerged last week, there is strong new evidence that substantial numbers of car buyers are delaying purchases as a direct result of Brexit and confusion over powertrain choices.

Exclusive data has been collected for Autocar by market research firm Simpson Carpenter from a sample of more than 1000 British car owners.

It shows that among those whose car is more than two years old, almost half said they had originally planned to replace their car before now. Younger people and those buying or leasing new cars are most likely to be delaying their purchase.

An underlying level of delay is to be expected, as changes in personal circumstances often get in the way of new car buying decisions. But one in four of those surveyed attributed the delay to the effects (potential or already felt) of Brexit, and 39% cited general economic concerns as a reason. A mix of uncertainty about the future of diesel and confusion over which powertrain to buy are the reasons mentioned by 27% of those sampled.

Both Brexit and powertrain concerns have hit the new car market harder than the used, according to the data, with both factors cited by a majority of those intending to get a new car the next time they do upgrade. The premium car category is most badly hit: around a third who mentioned the two factors intend to buy more expensive cars.

The hiatus seems likely to continue until the Brexit uncertainty is resolved. Almost a third claim they will put off their purchase until the effects become clear, with those aged 25-44 and those intending to buy in the next two years most likely to delay their decision. Conversely, two-thirds claim their next car purchase won’t be affected.

Brexit appears to be affecting people’s choice of brand, too. One in five say they are more or less likely to buy certain marques as a result of Brexit, with German brands such as BMW, Volkswagen and Audi and French brands such as Renault, Peugeot and Citroën all most likely to be dropped from consideration. More people are likely to buy Fords and Toyotas, although Nissan loses slightly more than it gains – possibly as a result of the decision not to build the Nissan X-Trail in Sunderland.

Tom Simpson, managing director of Simpson Carpenter, said: “New car sales are clearly being damaged by a political failure to provide clarity – firstly over the future of diesel and then the seemingly neverending Brexit negotiations.

“The new car market is unlikely to recover until these uncertainties are resolved. And in these circumstances, it’s difficult to criticise car manufacturers if they delay decisions to invest in the UK.”

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professor x 22 May 2019

Brexit (Part Four)

The Brexiteer's getting upset with the Farage Newcastle milkshake moment on Monday 20th May should be mindful of the following facts. It wasn't a "hipster" who attacked him. The man, though bearded was wearing chinos and no self respecting hipster wears those, similarly his beard was substantially underdone for a hipster too.  Farage called the man a "yobbo" too which aside from the "hipster" comment also stokes division (so atypical of him) and seems to have an extremely negative view of those people less well off than him. In  fact the incident had the distinct air of being a Brexit Party political stunt to gain media coverage and thus get votes before the 23rd).

Farage's further fecklessness also manifests itself in the fact that he equates a milkshake with the levels of violence suffered by Jo Cox who was murdered for her views on Brexit. Reality check time. Both are  not the same. Now whilst there's the right to protest, as valid as the right to vote itself, there's no place for what amounts to common assault irrespective of what I personally think of Farage and his "I'm a man of the people with a pint" persona, or people like Tommy Robinson.

And what of Farage's claim to have been working for the people to protect "Britain's fishermen"? Well, do some serious research about his time as an elected member of the EU parliament and it's clear that little Nige simply wasn't there to discuss fishing at all for at least half the relevant meetings. Then ask yourself whether you really want to vote in someone like that in the first place. Yes, really do. And that lack of a manifesto still shows a party with complete disregard for being held accountable for their own actions and words. None of which engenders the very trust little Nige loves to say is missing in his (and it is still his fault it is) "Broken Britain" like he's run out of clichéd sound bites to feed the gullible.

Little Nige's political posturing is dubious when other facts about him and his deeply cynical views are considered. The biggest one is his anti-elite stance. Rich for someone who is a former city trader and was educated at private school. Hardly the kind of background that's at all credible as a (self professed) "man of the people". And yet his supporters seem to care little about facts.

Farage also moans about due political diligence from the Electoral Commission's desire to investigate how The Brexit Party are funded. However with Aaron Banks being less than squeaky clean regarding his involvement in UKIP's funding the concerns into how little Nige and Banks are connected may still prove to be justified. The further irony is that little Nige is all too happy to see the political establishment have a hard time from public pressure and be investigated when negatives in the public interest come to light but the minute the spotlight's on him he's back in hissy fit mode. Which proves that he's rather childish indeed, and not the sort of character who is worthy of public trust.

 

His parties inability to produce viable plans that not only define what Brexit is without any shadow of doubt beyond that one liner I stated previously and the complete lack of any kind of cohesive detail behind his machinations of politics do have a dangerous machiavellian aura about them and the wider public should be 100% aware of the many pitfalls engaging with someone like him actually means before they place an X in any box.

Meanwhile in Scotland Ruth Davidson has been banging on about a "Blue Collar Revolution" using the embarrassment to Aberdeen that is Ross Thomson as one of her pro Brexit henchmen in the process.  I suspect, as do many serious political analysts, that this will do more harm than good and support for the tories in Scotland will be as diminished as Tokyo usually is after a visit from Gojira. And the revolution she aims for will mean drowning her sorrows later. That it may involve more than one wee dram may also prove accurate.

May-hem still fails on every level imaginable with her Brexit strategy and the fourth vote has the hallmarks of utter hopelessness running through it like Blackpool Rock. I fully expect it to fail for a fourth time. As do many others. The notion the clueless cabinet she's cobbled together backing it means it will actually fly is hysterical. As is the notion parliament will back it.

May-hem and the Conservatives idea of "seeking common ground in parliament" is extremely laughable to the point it looks like Emperor's new clothes syndrome or something very reminiscent of a line about trusting the new boss in a Who song. The smartest of political commentators are once more forecasting another massive defeat for this blink and you miss it bill with a likelihood over one hundred people more than she can muster will be against it. Even the front bench pro-Brexiteer's are against it.

Labour's stance is as confused as the parties politics itself, much like the state of confusion voters have in general about the thing they voted for in the first place and could have cost them dearly again by the 23rd. Keir Starmer seems to have been one of the few willing to speak out about what could happen next and has shown himself a bit more switched on than Euro sceptic lentil head Corbyn. Gordon Brown's late intervention may too hold some truths but also some dangers as people still have not forgiven him for the financial sectors deregulation which was at the root of the worldwide financial crisis, the bailing out of the banks and the following austerity which has pained so many people.

And what's been happening to "Britain" or that so-called "United Kingdom" whilst that's been droning on in the background like maniacal comic book villain in their final monologue? Well Europe had a further long hard laugh at the "British" during a thing called a "Eurovision Song Contest". True to the rubbish form this alleged united countries got, the lame, anodyne, mass-manufactured rot we rolled out (again) came last. So well done us. Further failure due to Brexit bumbling.

Then slightly more seriously we had the news "British Steel" is in significant trouble. And why is that? Well manufacturing is being harmed by Brexit and as the steel industry directly feeds the same UK based car industry this country needs as part of its balance of payments, if that car industry is in decline with Brexit as a factor in how it does its business, then the steel industry which is part of the global supply chain also suffers. So Brexiteer's give yourself a big hand and whack yourselves on the bum for that one. What an absolute masterstroke of stupidity! You've cost the country at least five thousand jobs if not a further twenty thousand in the supply chain with the lacklustre thinking on show there.

And that's  still on top of the warnings that large parts of the business sector have been giving since day one and the inconvenient fact that car sales are also down for the tenth month in a row due to consumers holding off on major purchases. Which, over much of the last three years has affected house sales and the retail world too, both of which are used as indicators of a healthy, strong economy.

The last three years of division, toxicity, hate, bias, in-fighting, squabbling and general ham-fisted fudged bickering has reduced so-called "Great Britain" to a joke of truly epic proportions on the international stage. Of that there can be no doubt.

With the polls still suggesting that The Brexit Party has some 33-34% of the potential vote that leaves another 66% which could be made wholly of votes for Remain and staying in the EU. Which is a fairly large majority in favour of potentially revoking Article 50 and getting back seamless borders for trade and travel. Maybe, just maybe some, possibly enough people will decide to silence Farage once and for all. Stranger things have happened...

professor x 18 May 2019

Brexit and where we really are...

Parts One & Two (with some subtle additions)

Before  anyone gets their political knickers in a twist I'll preface this by stating I am 100% apolitical. Furthermore as someone with a unique automotive design qualification and a cv which also includes self employment and running a franchise I have wider business knowledge too. I have also spent the last eight or nine years putting Elon Musk's deluded fans in their place, and as there's twenty three million of them, compared to 17.4 Million anti-EU Brexiteer's  who don't scare me one bit either.

As far as Brexit itself goes there's quite a lot that can be said when viewing that Nigel Farage created and Conservative misled mess from afar. Starting with what can only be described as misguided notions of imperialistic, monarchical delusions rooted firmly in the past, as part of the so-called "Great Britain" or as its latterly been called "One Britain" (really what the heck is that? and I mean that in all sincerity not in some sense of not knowing), which has been muddied by dim-witted views of (firmly) English nostalgia for the second world war and ideas that they were (through that imperialism and cluelessness related to outdated colonialism) world leaders.

I mean really, get real. Even when that was the case, say with series one Landies and minis designed y Alec Issigonis (ironically to the average dim-wit whose fallen for Farage Issigonis was born in Greece thus proving the necessity of being part of something larger in the car world). Furthermore without the help of the EU and Europe in general automotive safety would not be what it is today. Using the might of Sweden's Volvo as a good example of why European ideas which saved motorists lives in the so-called "Britain" and then directly influenced the remnants of the British Leyland companies, many of whom have disappeared in the wake of the European , and Japanese competition beating them at their own game, and being better built and more reliable as well.

And where was the great British motor industry back then? Dying on its bandaged knees, much like Theresa May(hem) and her plan to get all of the allegedly United Kingdom parliament in Westminster behind the get out of the EU deal she's brokered. But that's not her only problem. looking as she does like a Skeksis from Jim Henson's cult classic "The Dark Crystal" and with a deranged sense that she's uniting the country (the country in question is always England as the Scots have been fundamentally against leaving the EU and see that there are many, many positives to come out of EU membership in terms of the world's view, trade and travel and any number of other socially led possibilities) when all she's done is create yet more division, hatred and uttered more nonsense than any nonsense poem you might be able to think of.

Ask the pro-Brexit leavers where they have bought their cars from in recent decades, and who owns those companies and what mechanisms which enable those sales they've benefitted from as owners of shiny new BMW's, Audi's and Mercedes-Benz's, alongside VW's, Seat, Skoda and others actually are.

The costs of which will rise in the wake of Brexit, especially with a No Deal scenario being the preferred option of so many of the retired coffin dodging half wits who are still banging on about a No Deal being brilliant without ever thinking of the real world consequences. It's no joke that Porsche, part of the mighty Volkswagen Audi Group has raised its RRP for its entire model range prior to Brexit's alleged leaving day on the 29th of March. Just wait till every other car manufacturer and business follows suit due to the extreme negative market conditions that's been created by Brexit and watch the morons beg to let back into the EU.

Ask them too where many of them have spent time on holiday and remind them too just how pain free and harmonious travel  actually is if you are a member of the EU.  Ask them if they have ever drunk wines, beer and spirits made within the EU. Ask them where their weekly and monthly shop really comes from. Ask them too about who some of their favourite football players are (given some of the names in the English Football Leagues) and look at the awkwardness of their "monochrome flash and my mind is grazing" gaze.

Ask them where the disadvantages of the European Court of Human Rights, in Strasbourg, actually are and ask them how any of that UK involvement was negative. Then witness the blank faces. Then ask them about all the advances in all forms of medical science and access to prescription medications which is dependent on  seamless EU trade and benefits us all.

Ask them where the UK housing market has been at the same time - incidentally it like most other businesses has flat-lined, or where the "growth" in the UK's economy has been too, most months since the vote it's been almost in negative equity much like the housing market, as 0.1% really is nothing to write home about. Ask them about the NHS being unable to fill vacancies, ask them about who has been picking the UK's fruit which is then exported for them. In fact just ask all the people who voted for Brexit as many awkward questions as possible and watch them run from you in horror.

Examples of the continuing gross stupidity and hypocrisy from Brexit voting zombies include people like Dr David Bull, one of the grinning like he's on the same "Smylex" that feckless Farage is on. A doctor who has spent a whole lot less time in his beloved "England" than he would like to admit to as he's been living it up on the masses of money he's made out of dumb Californian's. So he's less than convincing to say the least.

Then there's Lucy Beresford who regularly appears on television as a "go to" psychologist whenever the nations mental health is in question. She too has been big on pushing the Brexit button of late and is dissatisfied with the wastes of space of Westminster. However, she too is not immune from political lampoonery too as she admitted she likes a bottle of Blue Nun (a German wine in case you don't know) and loves, yes loves, the Eurovision Song Contest. You know that singing contest that would not exist if not for the very same Common Market and EU that the Brexiteer's hate with a vengeance.

Farage's tories in scheming, the pro white supremacist racist lot they are, virtually all love Donald "The Dump" Trump and his own particular brand of mafia led thuggery passing itself off (though not the well read or well informed) as making Britain Great Again via "Making 'Murica Great Again". Just take one look at Boris Johnson for buffoonery on a wholly different plane, Liam Fox and Michael Gove, or Andrea Leadsom or that stuck in the eighteenth century moron born with a silver spoon in his stuck up gob Jacob Rees-Mogg  and you find a pathetic bunch of half-wits, who unlike the aforementioned SNP, were so scared of being found out and getting their separatist ideas mauled that they didn't produce a single line of a manifesto beyond an (intellectual) knuckle dragging "We want out of Europe and We want it Now". And the gullibles who barely engage with the political system in Britain bought it, hook, line and sinker. Some have even said they were more fished in than a scene in "Wayne's World".

With a real prospect of leaving the EU with a "No-Deal" scenario looming the automotive sector and many other business sectors must be extremely worried indeed. In fact for a party that alleged to be pro-entrepreneurs and business the Conservatives under May-hem spineless leadership have fallen foul of so much common sense. All the big business with precious few exceptions,  like James "I make expensive vacuums in Singapore" and the numpty behind woefully dull pub chain Wetherspoons, have warned all the pro-Brexit politicians of impending doom, and so have the Federation of Small Business (which makes up the majority of UK business interests accounting for 80%)

Right now that "United Kingdom" is anything but and the only things that will place it back on track are another referendum which the insane Brexiteer mad men and women have been afraid of since the beginning of the truth about what it really is the fools actually voted for was first aired. Its well understood that May-hem's deal has been voted down twice and the idiot she is she insulted all of Westminster's politicians in one go meaning her (quite possibly illegal) third vote has gone down faster than a lead balloon.

Indeed with a reported one million people marching for a "People's Vote " in London, and throughout the UK,  on 23rd March and the "People's Vote" petition crashing due to the number of citizens adding their names to the pressure for some level of common sense to accurately gauge the current public opinion, not that of just over three years ago, it's about time the politicians started listening.  Within a matter of days that petition has gained over five point eight million signatures and yet May-hem, the cabinet and the UK parliament still have got their assorted heads in the sand.

One look at Westminster in recent months, especially over the last year,  has witnessed a large amount of pro-EU flags waving and not an awful lot from the pro-Brexit lobby. It also doesn't take much to see that not one of the anti-EU Brexiteer's has mustered a protest on the scale seen by the pro-EU Remain side, and that too is rather telling.

Ask yourself where they all are, ask too why with an alleged 17.4 Million people in favour of leaving the EU we have not seen one iota of sense from their side if they are so right, ask too where their large protest is. And the answers to that is they have not got one iota , on all those significant counts. For the record Farage's pro-leave protest mustered a mere 200 people including Farage himself, which says so, so much.

Yes, I hear you cry there were "thousands" on the march protesting against the UK parliament on the 29th during the day. And yes, there were cries of "let's leave without a deal, it's what we voted for" but thousands does not even begin to equal the slightly more than one million from the previous weekends Pro EU protest and is absolutely nowhere near the almost six million who have signed the petition to completely revoke article 50 in its entirety. Not by a long, long, long way.

Because "thousands" is not in any way at all equivalent to 17.4 Million. Never has been, never will be. To me, reading all the comments about the many who voted pro-Brexit and their perception of being right and only their way is the solution to it all, if there were 17.4 million truly in favour of Brexit three years on from the vote then Parliament Square in London should have been completely saturated and over-run with protesters on Farage's side.

And yet, they simply did not turn up en masse as you might reasonably expect.  So where were they all? Off getting tanked up in a local boozer (read craft beer emporium) somewhere? Was it giro day? Did the best tattooist in town have an offer on? Or was there a special consignment of real ale going a-begging? Did they have an urgent hair and nail appointment they'd booked months ago and only realised it was today this morning? Or was it their bikini wax day? Incidentally that's just the men I'm talking about.

And too there were howls of derision and frustration from the leave camp yelling "Betrayal" at every moment they could. However I wonder whether any of the people who were gormlessly grunting that have the intellectual gumption to realise that the true betrayal of the Brexit vote, as history may well conclude if my assertion is as correct as I think it is, was the betrayal of the Brexiteer politicians who led the country down the path to its own self made and deluded destruction. 

What really showed their utter inability to accept how inane and stupid their own understanding of the UK political process was the fact so many were still outside the, entirely shut for the day, House of Commons late on Friday night. It's clear that the idiots doing the shouting at that time of the day have little real sense at all when all you are doing is getting hoarse yelling at an empty building.

Similarly Leadsom's talk of following the "will of the people" still negates that most awkward of facts that the true will of the people has not accurately been fully tested by electoral process since the vote all the Brexiteer's including Leadsom herself, are still so keen to point to.

And where does that really put May-hem? Firmly on the political chopping block as not one UK parliamentarian wants her deal, and not one really wants the no-deal either if truth be told as that would be as cataclysmic and catastrophic  as many outside the UK think it will be. And if the (alleged) UK goes for WTO rules then all the deep level comments about tariffs which the automotive industry has written in the small print (it's some paragraphs down in the stories about Honda closing the Swindon plant, and all the manufacturers depend on the same global supply chain, not just the Japanese firms like Honda and Nissan), and some media has not highlighted near enough then pretty much every single UK business , large and small will suffer.

So what then does that mean? Well as some may predict May-hem will shrug her scrawny shoulders and fly off to some tax haven or other with her venture capitalist husband, who as I write this stands to gain quite a few pence betting against Brexit and its consequences.  But the tories don't want anyone talking about that, oh no. That is far, far too inconvenient for them.

In Scotland too, the tories are in deep, deep trouble given how many of the recently elected Scottish conservatives have taken the May-hem line completely disregarding the idea of public representation they should stand for when elected to parliament. So any gains they think they have over their hated Scottish adversaries the SNP (Scottish National Party) will evaporate when the Scots public realise that one.

The notions many Scottish Conservatives, including Michael Gove and Ross "I like to have a grope in Westminster" (if you walk round his home town) Thomson, have of Brexit managing to continue with a seamless border and business tariffs enabling the Scottish Fishing fleet and farming sectors to carry on as before is, frankly ridiculous. WTO rules and anything like Canada Plus Plus will annihilate that in a swift and savage move.

As any of the proposals being mooted involves arrangements which automatically add to the paperwork and business costs of the Scottish farmers and fishing fleet, and I am not factoring in the ultimate harm of Theresa May-hem's Deal or No Deal scenarios (both of whom would be substantially worse for the so-called UK economy) its utterly idiotic and beyond any reason that anyone would then follow through on the options now being considered to deliver Brexit in a post May-hem compromise world as touted by Rees-Mogg and Johnson.

Furthermore it's as ironic as it is unintentionally hilarious to note that not that long ago, the very same Scottish fishing fleet was sold out by the very same political oiks in Westminster actually causing the grief the fishermen of Scotland have been moaning about as if it was all the EU's fault.

Big clue it 's not. Its more to do with the hopeless incumbents and ne'er do wells which have frequented Westminster and in recent years too, created the expenses scandal, numerous sex scandals and generally treated the poor and the populace as a means to their end. Or if you want it another way the same morons who sold the so-called  "Britain's" fishing fleet down the river due to their spineless negotiation skills.

But did the people who voted for Brexit account for the fact they voted with exactly the same sorts of morons who "gave" the country all that?

No they did not.

Crucially the EU weren't involved in those situations which lost public support for the misguided MP's who brought the country into disrepute.

And do many people who voted for Brexit really have the level of political knowledge they need to understand in a well informed manner how the local, national and international political systems  which "Britain" and its trade benefit from?

That answer to that too is no. In fact there's been a staggering amount of naivety from those who voted leave.  They have attacked legally here EU citizens, who are here to study or working and thus contributing to the countries well being,  whilst ignoring the fact the UK Government (yes them again) have hammered anyone who is poor, ill or both with their lack of humanity evident in the social care policies introduced after the banks killed the economy.

None of the pro-Brexit commentators have made the connection between the bank induced meltdown, the fact nobody's really been held accountable, or even jailed for the billions of the resulting UK government bailout , or for the losses of thousands of people in the UK,  or the businesses which folded in the wake of the scandal, and then how those UK decisions made by wholly career politicians have as massive negative effect on people's lives whilst the system rewards itself for a job badly done via the morally flawed Honours system, which in essence lie at the root of the reasons why the Brexiteer's including Farage have latched onto like parasitic lice on a salmon.

Whilst Brexit has been thoroughly boring the pants off of everyone throughout the so-called UK and in Europe and the wider world, there's so many more pressing parts of government business, in some cases absolutely urgent cases at that, which simply have been thrown on the fire of indifference and contempt as direct result of the 2016 vote. And seemingly that's just fine and dandy with the politically inept who vote Brexit through. Guess what? It isn't for so, so many other people and that is not on at all.

The sad fact though is there are many, many other reasons why the majority who voted to leave have felt left out and ignored by the system, but that does not negate the counter argument that so many people who voted leave have never, ever engaged with the politicians and used the system to change it for the better, instead of forming their own ideas, contacting local and national politicians and using their voice to raise issues and facilitate positive change in an adult way.

The Scottish parliament in Holyrood has already systematically thrown out every single Westminster option with good reason too. Only, and this is wholly ironic too, the Scottish tories have towed the Westminster party whip, thus ignoring the true democratic will of many thousands of their own constituents, to then talk about being democratic and of democratic will, when they actually mean the English will, not Scottish. And that means wee Davie Muddle (David Mundell) as well as Jack-ass KerLaw (Jackson Carlaw) both of whom crawled all the way up to mummies teat and sucked as hard as possible. And in this scenario "mummy" is the nickname allegedly given to May-hem by her most loyal half-wits in waiting.

One of the funniest quips came from Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon whilst she was talking about the hollow worded emotional blackmail of May-hem by saying "She fell on her sword and missed" regarding May-hem's alleged decision to resign. No wonder too that when Scottish MEP Alyn Smith said "Leave a light on" for the Scottish he got much the same reaction from the European Parliament as he got when he made his "Scotland is European" statement after the Brexit vote.

The Welsh and the Irish may well decide that Brexit and the tories must be vehemently challenged given all the toxicity that Brexit has brought over the last three years or so and what that will bring may turn a lot of the current mis and preconceptions on their heads. It's also not for nothing that the Welsh have joined forces with the Scots on some earlier parts of the last lap of Brexit. So watch that space too.

The ever thorny issue of the "Northern Irish Backstop" means that the dim-wit Brexiteer's still want out of the EU at the entire expense of peace in all of Ireland, a peace that took many, many years to gain, and ultimately through a vital piece of legislation agreed upon 100% by Westminster at the time called "The Good Friday Agreement". Brexit selfishly removes that agreement in one blitheringly baffling swoop. And do the Brexiteer's actually care about the peace loving people of Ireland on that one? No, not all as long as they get out of the EU who cares seems to be the irresponsible prevailing attitude.

No wonder then that the so-called "New IRA" have begun terrorising the alleged "United Kingdom" with suspicious packages left in Glasgow University and other places within the UK as May-hem has been dangerously counting down the clock till the 29th March. Do not be fooled into thinking that those two are at all unrelated, because they are not.

That too brings to mind Donald Tusk's all too humorous, and true, "There's a special place in hell" for Brexiteer's as the hell of a substantially more active Irish terrorist group whose main raison d'être is to cause carnage, confusion and destroy the hard gained peace  is not something that many Brexiteer's will want when it's on their doorstep. And that extremist behaviour is something very, very real due to Brexit. Unless Brexit and the Withdrawal Bill disappear the so-called UK is on the cusp of another era of terror within its own borders. Do any Brexiteer's really want that? Because most people who voted Remain probably don't either. Even Frankie Boyle noted this on the first episode of his new "New World Order" series on Friday night.

The idea that Theresa May-hem has had of forever denying the Scottish people another vote on independence is extremely dangerous, as dangerous for her politically as denying the entire so-called UK electorate another say on what they want now that so much of the lies the ever feckless Farage and his blithering buddies hawked on the people in a worse manner than some side street second-hand car dealer with a line in "clocked motors".

What the tories, and the English casually forget is that if the Welsh and the Irish sympathise with the Scots (who in turn ally themselves with their independence seeking Catalan cousins) it could be that Brexit Britain will hasten the need for Scotland to be independent once more, as it was before the act of union. A further danger for the English, who are still bleating on about their lost empire will probably lose Wales and Ireland too if the way they treat them is anything to go by too. Another aspect which precious few will have realised is that any potential pro-Brexit English person who currently resides in any of the (non England) post independence countries of Britain, may well find themselves quietly ushered over any relevant borders and told "Don't come back".

So what of the middle England at the heart of this god forsaken mess that has the world laughing their heads off in disbelief and the in-fighting and back stabbing as each party and politician in favour of Brexit has gone into apocalyptic meltdown at the thought that they were wrong and the entire scenario is bringing the truly dysfunctional and dis-united kingdom into serious disrepute on the world's stage?

Well part of little En-ger-land will more than probably still vote tory even after this Brexit mess has been wiped from history and the bitter recriminations have eventually ceased. In fact with some of the noisy pro-Brexit tories being hypocritical (stand up Lord Lawson as you allege to hate Europe and the EU but in the last year he bought a house in France) and some like Farage married to EU citizens by birth it's clear that those blatant liars will go to ground.

To say that the EU parliament must have been glad to see the back of him is probably understating it somewhat when Farage's UKIP imploded after the 2016 vote. Farage is absolutely kidding himself with his new "Brexit Party" as that was what UKIP was and all it did was openly waste the very same EU money Farage had the audacity to moan about during his self-aggrandising stint inside Brussels.  His threats to the EU in Brussels show a man who has forgotten what an imbecilic relic he and his UKIP party were, and he's still on the same drugs (for want of a better phrase and that's to really say he's drunk on his own ego and self-perceived power) with his Brexit Party. For his own sake somebody really should find a nice quiet padded cell for Farage and do it soon.

Theresa May-hem's decision to immediately step down after her latest defeat on the 27th March shows a woman who has completely and utterly failed on every single level at all to "unite the country" (which is still really just England) as being the tory she is she regards Wales, Ireland and Scotland with the same disdain and hatred as Thatcher did. Proof of this lies in how she's rolled out the poverty inducing policies which now means that so many in an alleged first world country are surviving (barely) by relying on food banks and has created so many children at a major life disadvantage due to that poverty, whilst she and Cameron bailed out the immoral financial institutions who caused a worldwide fiscal meltdown and fell for Farage's ruse in the first place..

The never ending merry go round of the muddled mess and miasma that is making the elected politicians vote on the same deal and expecting the result to be different is straight from the lunacy booth of the most deranged and deluded.  The idiocy of a third vote, still likely to be defeated and then having another on April Fool's Day and one on the 12th of April (the Titanic anniversary) is equally hilarious and shows a Prime Minister who has lost all her marbles.

Really what is May-hem on? Does her GP know? Does anyone? Because it looks increasingly like she's escaped from the same institution as Chief Inspector Dreyfus from the "Pink Panther" films whilst she acts with the incompetence of Cluseau, but crucially and unlike Cluseau, never solving the case. 

There's been some talk of replacing May-hem with someone pro-Brexit but the real question is who? Too many of the Brexiteer's are back benchers who significantly lack the leadership skills to run a country. Some of the majors names are literally a joke. Most are so deluded and stupid that they make Dubya's term in the White House seem like an oasis of brilliance.

With Boris Johnson once more being touted as a replacement for May as viable it negates the fact that he's another self promoting wind bag, a buffoon and a carnival sideshow  who could not find his way out of a wet paper bag with a hole in it, a way out sign written in 200 foot tall illuminated letters lit up like a Christmas tree. As a figure of fun and a "Have I got News for You" panellist he's fine, and still that aforementioned joke, but Prime Minister? Get real. He's been scurrying away far too much when asked questions which indicates far too much political weakness to be credible.  

Do not be fooled by his "serious" haircut he's been sporting of late as that's just him pretending to be a "grown up", which he isn't. Voting Boris Johnson in as PM is madder than a box of frogs. Frogs which at this particular time may just be dipping their heads into a bender to see what its like, and then wondering what the strange slicing sensation is. And don't get me started on the even more idiotic candidates like Leadsom or Gove. For some real fun watch Frankie Boyle for his view on what lies behind Gove's glasses. And then think of having him as PM. In fact don't, it's even more horrific than who I mentioned before him.

Notions of some Norwegian or Canadian style WTO deal or No Deal should have been dismissed long ago due to the many negative implications for citizens and industries as they will mean increased levels of tariffs and thus will harm what  is left of "British Business" in the wake of HBOS, RBS, Northern Rock and the rest of the closing their branches with alarming frequency banks.

Funnily enough they actually were with the indicative votes when all conceivable options were debated and voted on in Westminster as ways forward to resolve the catastrophe that is Brexit. And nobody was in favour of any of them.

Some idiots have decried the entire parliamentary process since the 2016 vote as undemocratic whilst ignoring the inherent basic fact that all of Brexit has had to be enshrined in UK law, just as entering the European Union was. To do anything less, and ignoring due diligence and political process itself would have been undemocratic. The same too can also legitimately be said of the early decision by the UK's lawmakers in the Supreme Court to ensure that a legitimate course in the negotiations and forming the necessary Withdrawal Bill was taken. That those previous idiots also want nobody to vote in another referendum or have another say from the public should actually be more worrying if you adhere to the notion of a democracy in the "United Kingdom".

Those same Brexiteer's have also conveniently forgotten a long held political truth. That sometimes three hours is a long time in politics, never mind three days of even three months, let alone three years. And, as we all know it's almost three years since that vote so it does have as much resonance as relevance. It's also true to state that the public has been allowed through democracy to change its mind through the regular elections for local councillors, national and international politicians too. To argue, a some Brexiteer's have done that there was only one vote in a wholly democratic system is as weak minded as its ill-informed and shows people who are fundamentally deeply scared of losin now that so many truths have been uncovered about the 2016 vote and the lies connected to the claims about the NHS and others during the referendum.

What too of the £4 Billion pound plus cost of Brexit to the UK taxpayer when so many are stifled by austerity and squeezed salaries? What of the yet to be fully accounted cost of the lengthy "next stages" and what that does to the economy? What about the true cost of the "final payment" to the EU? What of the likelihood of burdening the young people who are still at school with the dim-witted debts produced as a result of what amounts to a con-trick? Is that really an enlightened way to treat the citizens who will shape the future of Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales?

Right now the only real world options are another referendum to ascertain what the public thinks,  including all possible options, revocation of Article 50 (quite possibly soon after a public vote) as May-hem's notion of any parliamentarian being in favour of a deal which has been thrown out three times is utter lunacy of the kind I'd expect from Elon Musk and his twitter account.

Part Three

The Brexit bumbling and belligerence shows no signs of abating with the news that Theresa May-hem lost the most council seats since 1994 with 1334 councillors out of jobs in the wake of the Brexit negotiations. The same Brexit negotiations that have to all intents and purposes failed so miserably that they have made the so-called united kingdom an international laughing stock.

May-hem may like to point to Labour losses, totalling 82 seats, but the Conservatives haemorrhaged   so many people that it cannot ever be explained by May's dim-witted response of the tories being sent a message about getting on with Brexit. Not by a long way in fact as there's more than one or two not exactly inconsequential facts which prove otherwise.

The first is the previously mentioned six million signature petition for another referendum which thus far the so-called democratic UK government is keen to ignore regarding Brexit. Then there's the Westminster protests which saw over one million people march for another say on what should happen. And the fact that Nigel Farage's big march on London (for Brexit) only got about two hundred people including him and the other people who make up the alleged silent majority of 17.4 million were apparently washing their hair that do and didn't turn up.

So where oh where does that leave an allegedly Pro-Brexit England during the local elections? Well not voting for the pro-Brexit parties. With Labour and the Conservatives getting "a bloody nose" and "summarily drubbed" (as the media has expressed it) and no major wins for either UKIP or The Brexit Party the case for removing the so-called United Kingdom from the EU is even more non-existent than it was when it was first touted by Farage all those years ago.

Lest we also forget Farage has failed to be elected as an MP not once but seven times. And that does not strike me as "leadership material" or a mark of someone the public can trust with public finances, a point also proven by his EU expenses and way he's openly milked the same system he allegedly despises (the EU, for those not keeping up at the back).

So, who gained seats in the local elections? Well the Greens made some small gains which will please them, but the bigger winners were the Lib Dems. Yes them. The same Lib Dems most people had written off as a dead and gone political party in the wake of their collaboration with the tories in the wake of the worldwide financial meltdown created by scumbag banks like RBS, Northern Rock, HBOS and the rest of the morally repugnant greed merchants who ripped so many people off for the sake of a few quid they could squander to their heartless content.

703 seats gained in a post Brexit world where the so-called United Kingdom still wants Brexit seems incredibly odd if you follow May-hems ever more deluded and befuddled reasoning. However I see other things at play with that result.

After all, if you were a Brexiteer and still wanted Brexit why in your right mind would you knowingly vote for a party with a pro-EU and anti-Brexit policy at the heart of their campaign?

The simple answer is you would not do that at all. Not in a million years in fact. So my own conclusion is that the English local election result is another major marker in the sand which shows the UK politicians that Brexit is bust and simply should not happen.

Farage's fear of a second referendum and full revocation of article 50 will undoubtedly douse the dying embers of his dream of EU departure which has divided the so-called United Kingdom and splintered the union like never before.  But some people and politicians question whether they should happen, as that is their right.

The counter argument is that the post EU referendum democratic process and the indicative votes has not worked at all as its still left so many negatives and animosity in its wake.  So that means finding ways forward and if that ultimately means returning to the basic questions of the following many politicians and citizens will have to adjust to it.

1. Leave the EU as per the Conservative "Deal".

2. Leave with No Deal and WTO rules.

3. Remain in the EU with full revocation of Article 50 and a return to the previous UK/EU arrangements with immediate effect.

With the next EU elections we have another massive test of Farage and his EU exiting dream and it will be incredibly funny if people turn out and vote for pro-EU candidates and both UKIP and The Brexit Party fall flat on their faces.

May-hem has no more than a month in post with all those losses and so many of her defeated councillors calling for her immediate resignation. But, anyone with sense, given the scale of her many, many, many losses prior to this devastatingly crushing humiliation would have gone long before now. May-hem and her doggedness is so utterly devoid of credibility and will probably be remembered for being even worse than Cameron and his clueless cronies who got us into the mess in the first place.

And the potential May-hem successor still leaves the allegedly united kingdom with a scurrilous bunch of despotic, dim-witted desperadoes with not an ounce of decency between them. Whether it's Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, Andrea Leadsom or any other they are a pathetic plethora of not-wits and ne'er do wells who are best suited to the kind of life they have consigned so many to with the way they voted through so many Cameron and May-hem policies. And by that I mean send them to work in a modern warehouse for a pittance and see how they like welcoming in big business and the harm they've done to the welfare state.

Meanwhile the Scottish tories are so scared (if Scottish read feart) of a second independence referendum for Scotland that wee Davie Muddle (aka David Mundell) mentioned it not once but thirteen times on the first day of the Scottish Conservatives Party Conference in Aberdeen. Talk about a scaredy cat and a hypocrite when his party has done more in the last three years to create division than anything made by Indy Ref One in 2014.

Post baby Ruth Davidson, the Scottish tory leader is equally showing signs of being on the same "happy pills" as Davie Muddle too with her notions she's going to replace Sturgeon when the tories have less than the minority government SNP in Scotland and are only at their present level due to some SNP backlash. She also still negates and let's face it, avoids the truth that Scotland is predominantly pro-EU and that her party have done everything to openly frustrate the political will of the people of Scotland and their right to decide if or when they may, or may not want such a thing as another referendum on Scottish Independence.

Then there's Aberdeen's very own Ross Thomson, a Boris Johnson wannabe with an alleged penchant for pinching men's bums in Parliaments many pubs, who claims that the drubbing May-hem got at the local elections was not really worth bothering with. Some people in the Granite City (thanks to tories and their pariah's of oil tycoon pals and their "hingers oan") think that the city has less granite and is substantially worse off due to him, his party and his careering political pratt-falls and that Ross Thomson should stop himself, or better yet resign like May-hem,  before he causes any more embarrassment to Aberdeen.

But has he?

Well no, and indeed no. With his behaviour being stringently questioned in The Guardian on Thursday 16th May and the vacant empty headed gazing out the window during one of the last Scottish Select Committee meetings being televised at the end of April on STV News at Six Ross Thompson's doing a very good job of cooking his very own bacon in a spectacular act of self sabotage not seen since Ian Wood declared war on contemporary art and Union Terrace Gardens in November 2008. I predict just like Wood Thompson will lose big time if he presses ahead with his

The fact that it's still a hot topic is down to the way the tories under clueless Cameron promised the Scottish population they would be still within the EU if they voted to still be within the UK if they did not want to live in an independent Scotland after the 2014 Indy Ref. That betrayal has sown the seeds of discontent with Westminster and, as such, the tories have not one single shred of dignity when it comes to the truth about the real culprits behind why Scotland wants another referendum in a post Brexit vote world. No those thoughts are too inconvenient for them, and the English Brexiteer's living in Scotland too.

However with Ireland showing signs that the so-called  "New IRA" might be here to stay in this post Brexit (dis)United Kingdom with senseless acts of violence being perpetrated against innocent individuals its time the Brexit question was wiped from history before any sign of new troubles begin on a much larger scale as nobody really wants that on their conscience.

Wales, like Ireland is now talking up being a country with more independence too which makes the split of the United Kingdom seem inevitable. There's no way that with three out of the four countries wanting to wholly manage their own affairs that little England can stop any of it from occurring. Not if that is what the Welsh, Irish and Scots want. And like I have said before, if you want a Brexit and you feel like you're alienated in any of those countries England will probably be the best place for you and your separatist views.

What the Brexiteer's fail to realise is that its wholly selfish and undemocratic to foist their views upon the rest of the country (and countries) when so many people do not see things the same narrow and nutty way they do.

Proof of this is shown with the mailshot to all of Scotland's citizens by the feckless Farage and his "Brexit Party". Its ultra desperate tone is set with the words "We must leave the EU" and the paragraphs that follow.  It's almost as if Nige didn't get the memo that Scotland does not like him, his previous party (UKIP), his UKIP cronies or his new "Brexit Party" or the massive news that Scotland is still predominantly an pro EU country.

As if that wasn't a hollow howler enough the English's Nige carries on (so apt a metaphor given what's happened because of him in the run up to that referendum and what's been going on since 2016) decrying the EU elections that "weren't supposed to happen" - and yet they did due the aforementioned woolly headed "thinking" of all Nige's ickle pals and Nige himself.

He also slates the UK government for a betrayal all the while ignoring his own part in the story and why the nation (i.e. the four nations) got here due to his lies. That to me is a betrayal worth getting angry and upset about, not some rubbish about an ill-defined and ill-judged notion written on the back of a fag packet after a few swift ales down the local boozer.

However the notion "politics is broken"  may well be true but certainly not for the reason Nige claims on his partly political bumpf. And "Enough is enough"? Especially when his "Brexit" has meant so much damage and so little real parliamentary business regarding running the country and keeping people in better positions than the post worldwide financial meltdown has offered them. Yup. enough really is enough of Brexit and the waste of tax payers money whilst people starve on the breadline due to tory austerity and paying for Brexit.

The English's Nige even has the front to claim that "Trust, Honesty and Integrity" should be put "at the heart of our democracy". Rich given his spending claims and total dishonesty in the EU parliament and the scandals associated with Nige and both his political parties (UKIP included) which have further sullied the lack of trust and faith people actually have with politicians in the UK in the wake of the Westminster expenses scandal.

To put it even more bluntly Nige has been absolutely nowhere when it comes to sorting out the very mess and cluelessly  chaotic claptrap he created. Nowhere at all.

Now I for one do not call that leadership material. Shonky, shoddy, and some other words beginning with S with a negative slant, yes. So why would anyone trust him in an EU election? Why indeed when the Brexit Party and UKIP too failed once more to set the political landscape alight with their posing and posturing during the English council elections.

And what of Nige's "policy" (which in real provable legally acceptable electoral terms is not) of claiming that his leave the EU plan is policy to his politically illiterate fans, who history will prove have been duped by one of the world's worst  people, when it's nothing more than a state of mind and has not managed to pass due diligence in political process. The same process which has to be legally enshrined in law if it it's to be taken seriously. Or if you want a shorter way of looking at Nige's claims its total lunacy.

Any political party who cannot bother themselves to make a manifesto is not worthy of public trust too. And that is another thing little Englander Nige and his Brexit Party has blissfully forgotten about. And why is this? Because Nige doesn't want anything in written form that he can be held legally accountable for, or as I like to express it, just as he's done before. Which is as cowardly as it is lame and shows what a pratt the man actually is. And you can also add the fact he's unwilling to appear in a public debate with other parties as Heidi Allen noted too.

But that's not all that's seriously wrong with little Nige's political stunt career. Take  a more intelligent view of his "performance" on the Andrew Marr Show on Sunday 12th May. Little Nige took significant umbrage at being held fully accountable for the words he previously stated on a number of EU and Brexit matters. As that other Andrew (Neil) suggested, Nige was upset at the temerity that Mr Marr had doing so.  Imagine that! A politician being held accountable for their actions, deeds and words. Who' da thunk it!

Then little Nige blamed the BBC in his usual Donald "The Dump" Trump-esque lets shift the blame away from me and my dodgy actions onto the media with his dim-witted diatribe. Of course with the very media you need to help spread your political message as your enemy you are in no way, shape or form, at any time ever, shooting your big mouth in the foot.

Another woeful example is Nige's Brexit Party launch at Holyrood in Edinburgh on Monday the 13th. Not only did little Nige not turn up (mostly rooted in the reason that Scots found him out sooner than the English for the moron he really is) because he still hasn't  realised he's got a snowballs chance in hell of getting mass support for his latest jolly wheeze.

Oh no that wasn't enough of a grave error that Nige made. He did what the political elite always does when Scotland is mentioned, he flew in a few little Englander's from the south to talk down to the Scots. Or, again in Brexit's latest alleged non-news, is just like the considerably diminished conservatives when they want to control the Scots by having their flying visits in an out lasting no more than an afternoon in a country they have little regard or respect for.

Kind strange for a party that bemoans the political establishment and then does exactly the same thing. Or as I've said before, just like Nige and his EU spending which is dodgy as the lot in Westminster and what they get up to.

Meanwhile lentil-headed anti-Semitic Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn's indication that the tory minority UK government is "disintegrating" in and around the cross party talks to break the Brexit deadlock. None of that seems like any of the Westminster politicians can unravel the mess created by the feckless Farage and his con-trick he played on the con-servatives. And, given that the certainty of the EU elections and the UK still being in Europe becomes clearer. In as much as it's still the common sense alternative to the chaotic, cataclysmic dross that the Brexit vote has always been.

The cross party talks too are another total waste of political time and money connected to the wastage that Brexit has already incurred at public expense. It's not at all surprising to know that over six weeks of talks have produced absolutely zero in real terms for a reasonable solution to the bumbling Brexit mess. And yes, we are right back at Farage and his conniving collusion deluding the people who voted for him, because they are still the root of the problem.

Other observations worthy of note are the facts that the Conservatives look all serious and shouty with furrowed brows like Ruth Davidson's campaign. Likewise Jeremy Corbyn and Nigel Farage and his Brexit Party have got some major unhappy stern looks. Now I don't know about you but I prefer people with positive things to say and who look calm and happy. Which leads me to how both Nicola Sturgeon and Patrick Harvie (of the SNP and Scottish Green Party respectively) seem in their EU election literature. In fact they  look the exact opposite of the crumbling Tory and Labour leaders and their support and of The Brexit Party.

And that must count for something, maybe even something significant when May 23rd rolls around. With recent Brexit voting towns like Grimsby being spotlighted by the BBC it's clear that workers in the smokehouses which export smoked fish to the EU  still want Brexit while caring little about how much that will directly affect their own (EU protected) job they have. And why is it EU protected? Well that's due to the status given by the EU to indigenous foods and without that status it will mean that the legal protections and money earned from gaining it disappears. Hardly big or clever thinking there people. And yet that is exactly what Brexit voters have done. Or, to put it another way, shot themselves in the foot.

The rest of the Brexit debacle, which will undoubtedly cause more consternation, division and fuel the hate which is ruining the so-called union is the fact that next vote in Westminster must decide on the Withdrawal Bill's technical aspects. The fact that some very smart people have foreseen many problems with how even that will have an extremely slim chance of being passed by the time May-hem steps down from her embarrassing tenure as Prime Minister may also be moot too. So it looks as if June will be as unresolved and as damaging as every other month that Brexit has stifled business in parliament to the detriment of all other parliamentary matters.

The further fact that it may come down to two options or either a No Deal Brexit or a No Brexit may worry some people but the direction of travel seems to definetly point to many people who voted for Brexit doing so out of protest with the effects of the worldwide financial breakdown, the extreme levels of austerity and the way that Westminster governs itself with issues like the expenses scandal. It may also work in the pro EU remainer's favour with the levels of Brexiteer voter apathy atypical of the way they have predominantly failed to engage with the political system in the first place. But the Brexiteer's seem oblivious to their own ineptitude with that one too.

The direction of travel also points to Brexit having run its course having essentially boring everyone in sight with the deluge of dim-witted dirge thrown at the public before, during and since the referendum. So despite what many Brexit voters may think their inability to get what they want is actually wholly down to the lies feckless Nigel Farage told you and that is that.

 

 

 

Bazzer 17 May 2019

You have to wonder at the EU

You have to wonder at the EU/Brexit leaning of Autocar's editorial team.  Probably in-keeping with the rest of the British media...in their ignorance.

ballyblack 17 May 2019

Bazzer wrote:

Bazzer wrote:

You have to wonder at the EU/Brexit leaning of Autocar's editorial team.  Probably in-keeping with the rest of the British media...in their ignorance.

Seriously, you’re having a laugh...the most ignorance I’ve come across has been from The Sun, The Mail, The Express and The Telegraph.   Collectively, they’ve fooled half the nation by peddling a fantasy!