Young Master Smeet
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Oh, another one:https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/06/swiss-eu-standoff-striking-similarities-uk-predicament
Quote:Switzerland has blinked first in a standoff with the EU that mirrors the UK’s Brexit debate on the critical trade-off between free movement and a special trade deal with the bloc.The Alpine republic voted narrowly to impose EU immigration quotas in a 2014 referendum that must be implemented by next February, but Brussels has said any cap would deny Switzerland its privileged access to the single market.With talks between Bern and the EU commission due to resume on 19 September, Swiss ministers have welcomed a parliamentary panel’s plan to give preference to locals in job hires rather than impose unilateral quotas on foreigners.Quote:David Davis was expressing his opinion rather than government policy when he said it would be unlikely for Britain to stay in the single market after Brexit negotiations, the prime minister’s spokeswoman has said.Quote:But a senior Downing Street official sought to distance Theresa May from the statement. “He is setting out his view that [single market membership] is improbable,” the spokeswoman told journalists, adding that the work on the negotiations was ongoing. “The prime minister recognises that people have differing views and … all of this has to be negotiated with European partners. The prime minister’s view is that we should be ambitious and go after the best deal we can. The secretary of state said we want the best deal for trades and services: that is what the prime minister is doing.”They don't know what they're doing.
I heard some suggestion that Davis was "freelancing" in the commons, ultimately, May retains control of the policy. The Canada deal with the EU does allow limited free movement of workers, especially professionals and posted-workers.
Well, as an Anarcho Monarchist, I largely agree with Lbird: truth is only what the King says it is (obviously, advised by the wisdom of ancients from times before we fell to our modern parlous state).
But, the UK is not just negotiating with the EU:http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/sep/04/britain-japanese-brexit-letter-eu
Quote:The fear for Downing Street is that other non-EU countries – under internal pressure from their business communities – will now follow the Japanese example and publicly set out the parameters of an acceptable deal from the point of view of their UK-based companies. China, for instance, is not known for its diplomatic subtlety when commercial interests are at stake. Other countries in east Asia may also make their views known….The Japanese insist they are not telling a sovereign power how to negotiate, but just defending Japanese interests. Japanese firms, after all, employ about 140,000 workers in the UK, with Nomura bank, manufacturing corporation Hitachi and carmakers Honda, Nissan and Toyota all having large bases in the country.http://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2016-09-05/debates/1609055000001/ExitingTheEuropeanUnionDavis seems to be envisaging the "Canada Option" a bilateral deal with the EU (rather than joining the EFTA arrangements):
Quote:The hon. Lady is right, and of course access to the single market is not really up for grabs; it is there for everybody and, frankly, there are many countries outside the EU that do a better job of exporting to the single market than we do, even without a trade arrangement. So of course we want to have access to the single market and we do not need to be a member of it to do that. Indeed being a member of it is what has caused some of the problems of sovereignty that drove this referendum.Quote:I am afraid that I start from a disagreement with my right hon. Friend; the simple truth is that, as I said earlier, the negotiation over free trade with the European Union will be to the benefit of both sides—it will be beneficial to us and to the European countries. The question of immigration and the control of immigration is a very high priority for this Government, as the Prime Minister has made plain on many occasions. I do not agree with the fundamental tenet of my right hon. Friend’s question; I do not think that that is a natural, necessary trade-off. The negotiation has to be very much about what is to the mutual benefit of this country and the European Union—full stop.Quote:It is early days to forecast the negotiation, but the right hon. Gentleman is right—there is a large trade surplus. The one that was cited time and again during the referendum campaign, which I do not want to revisit, was the surplus in cars from Germany alone, for example. With countries of the European Union facing economic difficulties, I do not think they will want to create problems for themselves by creating bilateral arrangements that hurt them, so the way I think it will play out is that over the period concerned—probably a couple of years or so—people will start to focus on what their own national interest is. My experience of the European Union is that the Commission makes a great deal of public statements, but at the end of the day the national interest of individual countries decides the outcome.Quote:I am saying that this Government are looking at every option, but the simple truth is that if a requirement of membership is giving up control of our borders, then I think that makes that very improbable. What we are looking for, in the words of the Prime Minister, is a “unique solution” that matches the fact that we are one of the largest trading countries in the world, and also a very large market for very large parts of very important industries in the European Union. I find it very difficult to believe that over the course of the next couple of years or so we will not be able to find an outcome that satisfies not just our own industries but those sponsored by Japan as well.jondwhite wrote:Sorry YMS, this was what I was responding to when I said we needn't sympathise with persecuted Labour party members or leaders.Ah, well, yes, and you're right, we don't need to defend the democratic rights of Labour Party members, what we can say is how this shows the contempt for democracy in the Labour party higher echelons, bunch of wanna be stalinists and fixers. On the otehr hand, s with Corbyn appointing Chakrobati, refusing to return to an Elected Shadow Cabinet, relying on the Leaders' office to ram through his policies, it shows how the Labour left is not much better.
Nasty Old Engels wrote:Labor is not the source of all wealth. Nature is just as much the source of use values (and it is surely of such that material wealth consists!) as labor, which itself is only the manifestation of a force of nature, human labor power. the above phrase is to be found in all children's primers and is correct insofar as it is implied that labor is performed with the appurtenant subjects and instruments. But a socialist program cannot allow such bourgeois phrases to pass over in silence the conditions that lone give them meaning. And insofar as man from the beginning behaves toward nature, the primary source of all instruments and subjects of labor, as an owner, treats her as belonging to him, his labor becomes the source of use values, therefore also of wealth. The bourgeois have very good grounds for falsely ascribing supernatural creative power to labor; since precisely from the fact that labor depends on nature it follows that the man who possesses no other property than his labor power must, in all conditions of society and culture, be the slave of other men who have made themselves the owners of the material conditions of labor. He can only work with their permission, hence live only with their permission.https://www.opendemocracy.net/paul-rogers/corbyn-crowd-and-its-signal
Quote:Fifteen years ago the ward branch had about 70 members but this slowly declined to just 37 by the beginning of 2015. Immediately after the general election in May that began to pick up, as if some people were so appalled at the result that they thought they really had to get involved or at least show some commitment. Then, when Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign for the leadership began to take off last summer the numbers rose and continued to do so after his election in September, exceeding the Blair era high and heading for 100 by the end of the year.Lobster speculates that there is a Streisand effect going on: the more Labour MPs and the Media attack Corbyn, the more he comes to people's attention as a pole of opposition to the current regime. (I've seen MPs tweets showing how Corbyn has less support among long-term Labour members, but lets not forget, of these joiners, many are re-joiners).
Brian wrote:Which logically means both socialists and workers have to reach an agreement on what these arrangements consist of in terms of engagement through a set of guidelines/rules otherwise such an engagement is a non-starter. With this in mind moderation on the forum is open to suggestions, complaints and appeals by all parties. For if we fail to provide free access to such issues by default we are leaving ourselves open to the claim that equality only applies to party members.The rules of this forum belong to the democratic structures of the party, not any ying or yang who turns up: if conference votes every post here must begin "Forsooth m'lud" then so be it, and guests comply or leave.If the EC instructed the mods to remove the Off/Topic jokes section, out it would go. The moderators can have their say, but I can go to my branch and to cofnerence over decisions I don't like: non-members can't.
We can only use party property and resources to work towards the objects of the party. If people just want a place to chat, they can do it somewhere else on the Internet.
Our house, our rules: very common on the intrwebs. It's more that I object, though, to treating party members the same as non-members: people who have taken the step to join should see some benefit from it (and enjoy the protections of rules 29 and 31). Else why bother having a party?After all, this forum is part of our propaganda, we organise it to get our case across,not as a cosy club for non and ex members.
Of course, that protection for Party members means they are accountable to the membership of the party as well.
alanjjohnstone wrote:To offer an instance of the difficulty – LBird and Robbo as non-members of the Party but are regular posters but neither have recourse to a full appeals procedure eg to the EC, conference and party poll that a party member such as Cde. Maratty can pursue, if he so wishes, and has been urged to do. Such inequality among forum users requires to be resolved and will be in the due course of time.I sincerely hope not. Non members should certainly not have the same rights and privileges as members: the forum belongs to the members of the party.
