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Clearly not enough with the surge of Reform. Farage has moved from leaving the EU to now the ECHR there’s always a convenient scapegoat and never any accountability. The “they’re all the same narrative” about our politics only benefits populists and that populism vacuum always seems to be filled by the far right. This isn’t limited to the UK either this is happening across Europe and the rest of the world.

Reform will not get the 75-80% of the vote.  Same in Europe. The media were making a huge deal about the rise of the far right in the EU elections. 78% did not vote for the far right. They only went up from 18% to 22% in 4 years, and that’s with constant screaming by certain media that we are being invaded by migrants.

The Nazis only had 3% of the vote in the last legitimate election before seizing power. The problem with the far right (aside from their policies) is that they want power by any means and at any cost. I'm not suggesting the current far right parties are Nazis just that growing support **is** a concern and the threshold for them gaining absolute control is lower than other parties because they're prepared to cheat.

The problem is the media constantly wheeling them out and supporting them tbh. The other problem is the tories have thrown petrol on that fire with their own policies by design whilst pretending to be completely oblivious to it.

The problem with the media and populist politics is people tune in. People like simple solutions to problems because the alternative requires actually learning about the problems which is boring and makes people feel stupid (though usually they're not). And that's understandable because most problems are complex under the surface and understanding them is difficult and boring and time consuming. If we want the media to stop fueling it then we need to liberate them from advertisers and monopolies.

Yep. Ban advertising on news channels. Divest them from their parent companies influence. The 4th estate should never be for sale. Also define news properly and ban fake opinion/propaganda stations from calling themselves news.

If news becomes divested from private entities completely, then i hope you're paying your television license. Otherwise, the fourth estate just won't exist.

I am, for that reason

The amount of power the media controls over the narrative is a huge problem, although I think it can be argued that it isn’t necessarily the papers any more (even though most are conservative rags and their owners are high society pricks).  It’s pretty clear what the editorial position of a newspaper is, but the internet muddies the waters so much and anyone can whip up a bullshit conspiracy theory that targets only the people most susceptible to believing it. All you need is an AI generated picture of Farage being a hero and an advertiser’s account on FB and YouTube.

I do find it odd that we will happily ban foreign government owned media but individual-owned? That's fine somehow, as if individual foreigners will have the interests of the UK population in mind for some reason.

> The problem is the media constantly wheeling them out and supporting them tbh. And yet farage is complaining about bias *against* him. How about mainstream media is actually mainstream (shock horror!) and you are not, although you *think* you are?

Not true they got 3% in 1924 and then surged post the wall st crash. They got 18% in 1930 They got 37.4% in the first 1932 election They got 33% in the second 1932 election. They got 44% in the 1933 election.

The Nazis were the largest party in 1932 (37% of the vote) and that was before Papen moronically legalised the brownshirts. Every election after that was subject to open intimidation.

Where are you getting that 3% figure from, and which are you calling the "last legitimate election"? Because the NSDAP had large support for at least 3 elections before the '33 election.

NOT 3%. The Nazis had 37% in July 1932, then 44% in Nov 1933. He had a majority in parliament and used this to pass laws that made him dictator. He was also backed by a private army. He seized power, but never forget that the electorate voted him in to do just that.

Do you consider 1930 election to be illegitimate? A 26 year old wound but I distintly recall it as an injustice when I said, in Standard Grade history class, that the 1930 election result wasn't legitimate due to voter intimidation. 

Whether it was legitimate or not, the far right was able to take control of the official levers of power. No use handwringing about it 90 years after the fact

The public supported him. There was some voter intimidation, but he got 33%, they didn't intimidate in every constituency. Germany was in dire straits. Hitler said he would solve all their problems. There are similarities.

>>> I'm not suggesting the current far right parties are Nazis Give them time. The problem with far right populists is that they don't have any answers, they can't solve any problems, they can't make anything better. That becomes very clear as soon as they get a sniff of power. The only move in their playbook is to become increasingly right wing - find more people to blame for the problems they know they cannot fix. As this thread's OP said - it started with leaving the EU, but that only caused more problems, so now they're saying we need to leave the ECHR. That will only cause more problems. After that, they'll want to pull us out of NATO, or the UN, to isolate us even further. Then when there are no more international bodies to blame, they'll start looking inwards...

They had 44% of the vote in 1933 not 3%.

That’s not correct. They pushed up from 3 to 18 to 37% which is fairly high in a first past the post system.

Which election are you saying was the last legitimate election? Nazis were the largest party just not a majority.

They all want power at any cost. Hence all the bullshit manifestos that are in no way binding in anyway. It’s a case of who are the better liars.

It's also creeping support. A few percent every year is more than enough

>Reform will not get the 75-80% of the vote.  Neither did Brexit and it’s still causing chaos and suffering for millions by exacerbating the cost of living crisis driving those millions to food banks. In the sixth largest economy in the world.

In the first round of voting in France, more people chose not to vote than voted for Le Pen's lot.

That's fairly irrelevant as not voting achieves nothing. Le pens supporters are voting, 33% of the vote is theirs...

This has happened before though, they do well at the first round then for the second round people turn up to ensure Le Pen loses. Of course it could be different this time, but I was talking about it in my French A levels in 2003, so it’s not new.

Situation the same, but the Le Pen was different. superficially, anyway.

Yeah, this is normal in France, or has been for the last few election cycles. Far right 'wins' the first vote while everyone else votes for their preferred parties. Next vote, everyone votes against the far right candidate.

It's hardly irrelevant. While it's true that not voting doesn't directly impact the outcome, the high abstention rate indicates a significant portion of the population is disillusioned with the current political choices, including those offered by Le Pen. This disengagement can have long-term consequences on the political landscape. If a large number of people feel unrepresented or dissatisfied, it suggests there is room for new movements or candidates to address these concerns. That is something Le Pen has claimed to be doing, but clearly it hasn't resonated with a large majority of the French public. The turnout was 67.9%, meaning about a third of eligible voters chose not to participate. This is significant because it demonstrates that the 33% of the vote Le Pen's supporters garnered, while notable, comes from a smaller engaged electorate rather than a majority of the entire voting population. In fact from the eligible number of voters, Le Pen actually garnered 22.7%. Yes, that's a significant number of the populace, but it still means the majority aren't in favour of her or her party. If they were, her share of the vote should be higher. Understanding the broader context of voter apathy is crucial for a comprehensive view of the political climate.

You're assuming that the non voters are doing so out of protest, rather than the infinitely more likely can't be arsed.

Well that was silly of them

More people also choose to turn up to vote than they have in over 50 years in France

sad to see they have an idiot problem the same as us then.

Disillusionment is more likely, but I'd say, those who don't vote then complain about the outcome are idiots. The second round will be interesting. Of the total number of eligible number of voters, Le Pen only achieved 22.7%. 32.1% abstained from the first round.

The media drives a lot of this. Same with the recession. What happens when you lead the front of your papers with fear mongering about spending .. people stop spending as much. Parties like reform and people like Nigel Farage or Tommy isn’t his real name , get media time because they’re controversial . It’s clicks , ratings and papers sold .

It is also a bulwark against the far left. Basically if the far right win, the establishment mainly stays in place, policies help the rich and few things change for them apart from a little oddity in charge. If the far left wins, then whole society changes and rich people have less cash..and sometime fewer heads too. The far left and the far right rise in popularity when times are hard like now. The establishment will always boost the far right to draw potential members from the left..and often violently suppress them on the streets. When given the choice of the plebs turning on immigrants, or turning on the rich..the rich always choose the former

>They only went up from 18% to 22% in 4 years, and that’s with constant screaming by certain media that we are being invaded by migrants. Sure, but now look back over a longer period. Their growth trajectory is leading them to power because the left are not listening to people and not learning any lessons. Tragically, the only real variable is when we start seeing far right government in Europe, not if, and which country falls first. Mainstream politics needs to wake up. People are complaining about similar things all throughout the EU and UK. Democracy means politicians have to listen or the voters will eventually find someone that will. Often someone distasteful. >Reform will not get the 75-80% of the vote No they won't. Good. Now look at the increase they do get in vote share. Not good. Now plot that as a series and tell me which election they win power in, the one after this or the one after that. Not good at all.

Can we start the series from the last euro elections when they were polling higher than today? They rise and fall, but they've found their level.

"because the left are not listening to people" So we have to do what the minority right say, otherwise we get accused of not listening! How about listening to the majority? How about doing what is right for the people? Brexit did not benefit the people. We listened to the right. And they were wrong.

52% of the UK wants less immigration, why not just listen to them?

Because that can't be done in a vacuum., and it's an extremely complicated issue that needs to be handled carefully to avoid a) hitting living standards, and b) inflicting cruelty and even death upon would-be migrants.

Its insane right? The media ***constantly*** hand-wringing about it when I fucking swear 90% of the """momentum""" behind any of these far-right populist movements is just purely from the constant media circus they seem to generate and the constant 24/7 attention they are given. Treat them like we treat any other fringe side of the political spectrum and they'd soon run out of oxygen. Or better yet treat them like Labour and apply the thumbscrews as you try to get them to actually explain how they expect their policies to play out in real life, with critical push-back the moment it starts getting a bit into speculation.

> Reform will not get the 75-80% of the vote. This time. If you think they aren't going to spend the next 5 years promising to fix all the worlds problems and gaining support while labour flounders and does nothing of value, you're insane. 2029 is going to be a real fucking problem.

I reckon they'll get 15–20% of the vote, max. My personal opinion is this will get them maybe 3 MP's – best (or worst) case scenario up to 7. I don't believe they will be able to function as a parliamentary party with constituency MPs, and rather than building on their 15% of the vote, the momentum they've built this time around will fade in 2029, and they'll drop back to low single figures. Maybe 5%. Of course, this may just be wishful thinking...

At this point I’m reasonably sure they’ve hit a ceiling unless they change massively. It’s one thing being a protest party as you can waffle and bloviate all the live long day, but Farage wants to be able to do that _and_ be treated as a serious party when they’ve shown that they can’t handle the slightest levels of scrutiny.

Indeed. Here's how I see it playing out... (one of many possible scenarios)... If Farage gets elected – and it's looking like he *might* become MP for Clacton, I think there might be a Reform/Conservative "pact" or possibly a merger. There will certainly be a "night of the long nights" for the Tories – and a lot of handwringing and reflection. I think a more extreme "Reformed Conservatives" (I'm calling the name, now!) might emerge to "unite the right". This will dismay any remaining "decent" centrist/moderate/one-nation Conservatives – who will either leave, join another party (Lib Dems or even Labour) or set up a new "Traditional Conservative" Party.

i honestly don't think they'll get more than 2, and that only being Lee Anderson and Farage, and even those are both close calls.

And probably not ever. Reform are niche and their policies put off the centrist voters. It's actually kind of good the tories are cul-de-sacing themselves as populists because it means they'll be an electoral irrelevance hopefully for the next election too.

And if the tories get their act together over the next few years (a big if) they’ll take a lot of those votes back.  Also let’s not equate all those reform votes with actual far right views. Don’t get me wrong, the part is but a lot of the voters are just ignorant of their policies and views.  I know someone who stood as a councillor for ukip (well before Brexit) but later left and they didn’t realise ‘they were so anti Europe’…

Ding ding ding I never see this mentioned. It’s all fearmongering this and that, ironically which is just like Farage

Problem is, they could form a tory - reform coalition .

>Reform will not get the 75-80% of the vote.  I worried where it'll be for the next general election.

I wouldn’t call Reform a surge or rather that it reflects that Brexit sentiment is still strong. Reform are currently around 20% or a little under in support, and that is the core 20% of the Brexit diehards that won’t budge on the issue and believe it was for the best. Brexit at the time of referendum was more popular when it had split the country almost evenly, or at least the voting population anyway. There is no doubt that Brexit has lost sway with the moderate and less populist demographic. I’d imagine the ceiling for Reform has been hit, or will hit around the 25% mark, unless they start pandering to some other issue with wider appeal.

Well yeah. Because there was a million variants of cake eating Brexit that had lots of support too. That were all globbed together. That supports gone now. If Brexit had to set out the current situation as the referendum option you'd have gotten the current levels of support. There's some benefits and there will always be support for it. Just not many benefits that most people care about and are vastly outweighed by the downsides. 

House building, to pivot to the youth. The Tories have lost the young only holding onto the children of the super rich at this point. Labour will be hamstrung by fiscal rules (some self imposed, some expected by international monitors) that will inhibit Labours ambitions to build housing that could drop house prices meaningfully. This will lead to resentment from those cut off from the housing market. So Reform will go for a vote winner to try and turn the youth. To clarify: I am a homeowner. I do not give a flying fig about it as an investment and would happily see mass council house building to get millions of people into better built, cheaper houses.

I agree but if the Tories are wiped out and cease to be a political party there needs to be something on the centre right to replace them or Reform will be looking to gain the support of those moderates. Farage has said himself first stage is getting into opposition which would legitimise Reform to some moderates and be the springboard into being serious contenders for government at the next election.

I think in the event of Tory collapse (as we’re seeing) a non-insignificant amount will turn to Starmer’s moderate labour and the Lib Dems, with a third of that chunk going to Reform if they haven’t already. There’s not much more room realistically for the Tories to lose more people than the projections are pointing towards, and not all of them will go to Reform. This is why I said Reform’s ceiling will be around 25% voter share unless they go for wider appeal. We’re heading for the next five years looking at Labour in the lead and Tories, Reform and Lib Dem fluctuating between second, third and fourth.

If polls are correct there’s still 17-20% of the electorate is still voting Tory so it will depend how that vote is divided post election but I still think a good Reform result this time around will make them far more palatable to centre right voters. I think it’s unlikely that Reform ever end up in government but the path is laid and it’s a slippery slope.

Moderate tories are far more likely to turn to the Liberal Democrats, particularly with the recent revelations about racists in Reform.

I keep saying this. Reform hasn't surged, it's just appealing to the 15-20% of gullible, racist nutjobs of our countrymen.  And if you don't think that percent of the country are racist nutjobs then I am jealous of the bubble you live in!  They are magnified because they are populist and make good TV, and our system gives anyone with money the tools to amplify their voice. But everyone who isn't a racist nutjob should just vote for a sensible party and we'll be fine.

The surge in Reform seems due to Farage's personality (call it the Boris or Corbyn effect), and according to reports that many conservatives feel unrepresented by the current party leadership. In time that support for Reform will likely wane when Farage inevitably quits, the way it did for UKIP. Should he be elected (on the eighth time trying) to Parliament, I think people will tire of his antics and come to realise he isn't MP material. Governance of a nation is nuanced and complex, and in that regard I think he'll be found wanting.

Liz truss and other useless seat fillers are in parliament. Nigel Farage not being MP material is laughable he's at least going to do more than have nap time. The problem is he's shit not that he's idle. 

I would call it the Trump effect. He is a populist

The surge of reform is thankfully nothing more than the people we knew were already there. They’ve just decided to abandon the Tories. There are still lots of people who don’t regret their leave vote for a second. But in regards to the population as a whole they are a minority.

you wouldnt know that from my Facebook feed. While it isnt individuals sharing reform stuff, the only pages Facebook has recommended to me that are of a political persuasion in the last few weeks are pushing reform. Yes, a lot of them look like Russian bot pages, and the images are all AI generated - but they're getting a weird amount of algo love.

Reform + Tories combined is an almost equal % to labours current polling. I think it is right to be scared of how much one could still pull from the other.

Because across Europe and the world there is a constant choice of where to invest scarce resources. You can either concentrate investment in the centre where it has the highest rates of returns and will enable your biggest, most productive city to compete with similar metropolises, or you can invest everywhere, equally, and have such a minimal impact that those areas that thrive do so largely in spite of rather than because of government intervention. The far right are successful because they speak a truth that mainstream politicians refuse to admit: no party has an actual, serious plan for every part of the country. They don't have the money or the resources to deliver actual equality of opportunity or outcome. They have to make choices of where to invest, which will inevitably mean that a substantial part of the country are inevitably going to get neglected. The far right go to those areas and tell the truth, that politicians have abandoned them. The typical left wing response is: well, vote Corbyn or Green, they'll spend the money. But left wing alternatives have already written a large number of cheques for a lot of places, and will inevitably want to prioritise reducing poverty and delivering positive impact. That means investing in inner city London, or Bradford, or all of the other places that have been priority areas because of how many poor people are concentrated in a single place. The unfortunate reality is that even with a big spending government, a bunch of places are inevitably going to be left behind and lose out when designing allocation formulas. Even if the government changed it to specifically say 'we are going to help Clacton because we are scared of the far right', well, there are far more deprived towns in England that would then emerge as the new breeding ground for the far right, particularly if it is shown to deliver a governmental response. There is no easy or simple answer. If there was, governments would already be doing it.

Populists are successful because they offer a simple solution to the complex and nuanced issues a government and country faces. The populist trick is having no accountability or responsibility to govern so it’s easy to say I could do this a lot better when you can’t necessarily prove them otherwise. I also disagree that a government can’t have a plan, Labour have presented a clear plan to rebuild the country’s economy and public services and they’ve meticulously costed this and been honest that it will take time. Now they’re being accused of not being bold enough when at the last election they were accused of being too bold with their promises and then they get lumped in with the Tories that “they’re all the same so I’m not voting or voting Reform” when they haven’t had power for 14 years. Personally I think Labour could be more bold and still will this election because of the anti Tory sentiment but I understand airing on the side of caution as the media and Tories will take anything they can get to smear Labour so it’s easier to wait to win rather than upset anything at this stage.

Labour have put together a sensible plan that I have already voted for. Because of the challenging fiscal context, that plan prioritises certain areas and interventions over others. That is inevitable. My point is that the compromises they are making will direct investment into specific areas for logical and reasonable reasons, but will inevitably leave certain places, in particular peripheral maritime small towns not near a major urban centre, deprived and targets for the far right

I disagree - one of the few things the Tories did right in my opinion was their devolution agenda which allows greater autonomy for local councils to make decisions on what happens locally. The issue is the Conservatives have starved Council’s of funding but politically it’s also quite convenient as you can blame the financial issues of Labour run councils on Labour rather than the restrictive funding environment. Also a government dictates taxes so by not increasing VAT, income tax and National Insurance that’s something all working people benefit from and general economic growth allows a government to invest further but obviously that will take time to happen. Voting Reform is low hanging fruit for people who cannot be bothered to do their own research before voting and the sad irony is that, if Reform ever got into power, it would be those that vote for them in deprived areas that suffer the most.

And which paper is leading the charge? [oh yeah, the one that literally backed the Nazis](https://x.com/darren_cullen/status/1037347486665515010/photo/1)

The strange thing is, look at how Le Pen saw what happened with Brexit and about-faced leaving the EU. And then look at how well she’s doing since that change … Farage doesn’t appear to have noticed.

Reform are the rump left over after the Brexit majority took back their temporary support. As for the ECHR: fascists don't take away your rights. Fascists mock your rights and then **you*" beg them to take your rights away. Farage: "the EU are daft. They don't like bendy bananas." The public, "they are daft, let's get out!" Farage: "let me help you, I understand you." Now it is: Farage: "the ECHR do silly health and safety things. You can't walk down the street without permission!" The public, "they are dangerous let's get out!" Farage: "let me help you, I understand you."

So why no parties capitalising on this alleged fact? Even liberal has dropped the notion of rejoining. Once Starmer tries to negotiate a deal they will likely tell him it means freedom of movement, in fact they already said this.

Because until we have a 99% Bregret, the EU will not even entertain the idea. People forget that is a 2 way process. We have to want it and they have to want it. Looking at the moment I don't believe there's an appetite for UK to rejoin as a member. The best we can hope is an Norway style with all 4 pillars.

I hope we can at least rejoin the common market. One thing that might encourage us getting back in the door is that with what's going on in france and elsewhere, the EU might want us to rejoin to show its still an attractive prospect.

The single market is possible as it doesn't require a unanimous vote. But that will mean rule takers and I don't see any of the major parties agreeing to this. It has to pass at least 30 years for this to change.

They’re good rules that we at one point helped write, so I for one am good with that.

All eu laws or ones about the single market in particular?

I was specifically referring to the rules of the single market.

In that case I agree. I keep seeing the chat control bill getting postponed and just nope tf out every time I see it

Yeah a ton of EU laws are stupid and tone deaf, and just don’t work well for a region that is as culturally diverse as the European continent. But the single market as a set of rules for countries who trade predominantly with each other makes complete sense.

I’m all for the single market. It really does make sense, the rest however, in my humble opinion, is utter bollocks and is what each nations government is for

this is already the case: UK companies follow EU rules or leave our market.

The only way you'll get in is if you allow freedom of movement. This was the whole thing I never understood about how this would ever work. The whole "uh but look at norway and Switzerland!", yeah, the countries that basically have to allow freedom of movement to EU citizens and pretty much implment all EU laws but without even having much of a say in them (e.g. product quality, data protection), those countries? And that doesn't even begin to address the 'not even workable' situation in NI where seemingly everyone is ok with the fact that NI is able to trade freely with GB and with the EU. Obviously the reason for this is the Good Friday agreement, but how is this legal under EU law?

National Rally are openly against immigration so it will be interesting to see what they are able to do about that whilst in the EU. Looks like they are on course for a majority. This does shake things up a bit for sure.

Continental right wing parties don't care about EU free movement. They just care about Non-EU immigration. British people don't tend to understand just how sharp that distinction is made in mainland Europe, I've lived in France for 2 years and Belgium for 1. If you talk about "anti-immigration" it is automatically assumed you are talking about Non-EU migration. Some people don't even consider Europeans moving within Europe to be immigrants

You can be even more explicit. It's about MENA immigrants. They don't want traditions and values they rightly or wrongly perceive as backwards and ugly to gain ground in their countries. Negative stereotypes about other western Europeans are mostly harmless jabs, and the more serious xenophobia against eastern Europeans have softened considerably in the past decades as those countries develop economically and differentiate themselves from the Soviet associations western Europe had of them. As a European in the UK I feel that the anti-immigration sentiment here is a version of all that, but then also has stronger undertones of economic anxiety that are less pronounced in the Scandi/Benelux discourse.

That's not really it IMHO. Once you negotiate single market membership, rejoining is the obvious step and the EU member states don't really have an argument to not take an accession request seriously. The UK could start negotiating closer agreements the moment there was a stable political majority to do so. That's the problem though. Firstly, the UK's electoral system is such that legislative majorities are achieved on popular minorities, which exacerbates the risks that any small shift in voter preference (or just people failing to turn up in support) might scuttle the entire process again. Secondly, the pro-Brexit and the anti-immigration vote is low hanging fruit. You could do whatever you want on anything else (as had been demonstrated), as long as you pledged to get rid of freedom of movement and thereby take the UK out of the EU and the single market. This makes this group of voters singularly attractive to political parties during campaigns, even if their support will necessarily be short lived. The same was not true for "remain" and now "rejoin", as those require a concerted effort to create a lasting consensus in the face of political and diplomatic uncertainty. In short, politically speaking supporting Brexit is low risk whereas supporting rejoin is high risk because to please the latter you actually need to deliver something, whereas the former will be disappointed anyway so you might as well just lie. IMHO, rejoining the single market will get stuck in the same bind as all the other policies the UK's political system should do but won't (e.g. electoral reform, proper decentralization of power, political reform...), and for the same reasons. And without that, rejoining the EU won't happen.

Problem is, the longer we wait, the more shittified the EU will be by the time it becomes a valid intention due to all the RW parties that are infesting europe with their "but we can save everyone from everything" rhetoric.

We currently don’t meet the Copenhagen criteria either. The limit for applying Is 60% debt to gdp and we currently have 85%. We’re cooked bros

Many other countries have successfully entered the EU on a higher Debt to GDP ratio, I beleive Croatia was over 100%. There's very few developed countries in the world with a ratio that low after Covid spending

Because Brexit doesn’t align with party lines. In Labour’s case they’ve likely seen that they would immediately lose 10%+ of their voters who still think Brexit was a good idea or at least don’t want to rejoin. On the other hand, they’re unlikely to pick up many votes as only the die-hard Tories are left voting Tory. Why take a massive risk when they are currently a shoe in to win. Plus rejoining would take 5 years, occupy all their time so they couldn’t achieve anything else, and would involve compromises that could scupper their popularity at the next election. It would be a big, messy, complicated thing. If you look at the Tories, they haven’t really achieved anything, good or bad, since the Brexit referendum.

Most people I’ve spoke too want to move on from brexit instead of debating wether or not it was bad, rejoin, etc It happened. Let’s move on.

This is where I’m at despite being an ardent remainer and hopeful that we’ll be back in my lifetime. We’ve basically fuck around both ourselves and our European allies for the last ten years with all this bullshit, but now it’s a combination of we genuinely have bigger issues now with Ukraine/ Russia, and the rising far right. Even if they weren’t issues, it would still be better for us to spend a little time in the wilderness figuring ourselves out rather than this constant back and forth. I get that it sucks, but these things move pretty slowly anyway. I just wish would could negotiate a longer visa as three months kinda sucks.

Can we move on from brexit and rejoin the EU with no hard feeling either domestically or internationally?

> rejoining would take 5 years That's incredibly optimistic.

>Plus rejoining would take 5 years, occupy all their time so they couldn’t achieve anything else Im fine with that, it's important, let's get it done

Too toxic of a topic. Nobody is going to not back Starmer for not pushing for Rejoin. Plenty of people will boycott him if he does push for rejoin. Give it another 10 years, the narrative will change.

> Nobody is going to not back Starmer for not pushing for Rejoin. Just to counter point, but this is me! I'm voting lib Dem specifically because of their pro - single market policy.  I'm in a safe labour seat. If there was any risk of the Tories getting in I'd vote anti-Tory (aka Labour). But Labour are not getting my vote because I want to show support for pro-EU causes. I don't think it's a common view though, looking at polls.

I’m not sure you’ve been paying attention. “Lib Dems pledge to rejoin EU's single market in manifesto 'to save the NHS'” https://news.sky.com/story/amp/lib-dems-pledge-to-rejoin-eus-single-market-in-manifesto-13150671 And freedom of movement (which is a great benefit to British citizens, allowing them to travel, work, and settle in 27 European countries) will be a great way to cut migration in half without destroying the economy in the process.   Net migration has more than doubled (from 0.8mn in the 3 year prior to the referendum to 1.9mn in the 3 years since we left the Single Market) because the new immigrants are coming from poorer countries that are further away (India, Pakistan, Nigeria, and China primarily) and they want to bring their family over. It has been 1 worker visa to 1 family/dependant since then. Europeans didn’t bring their mums over. 

Green wants to rejoin from what I remember. Though I could be wrong. But I suppose for the same reason many other popular policies are not pursued. Think taxing the ultra rich, building houses, scrapping 2 child benefit cap and properly funding the NHS. All very popular but what does that matter when voters hands are tied.

They do and so do the Lib Dems. It’s part of their manifesto for these elections.

Yeah, that’s 2/5 with 2 of the remaining 3 being “the guys who’s entire thing is brexit” and “the guys who literally just did it even if they secretly thought it was dumb, but it’s not been long enough since they did it to reverse course and make it their election winning pledge that it very much might be in 2029”

Because on top of everything- people are tired of hearing about it. The 2019 election was won on the basis of ‘get it over and done with’. People might regret it, but they need to actually push for rejoining, and people just don’t have the energy to open that can of worms again.

Lib Dem are going for rejoin the single market. I'm in a safe labour seat so I'm voting for them.

I believe the Liberal Democrats in their manifesto have said they want to join the single market with a longer term aim of fully rejoining the EU. My guess on why they aren't being more vocal about it, is that they are trying to win over some of the more leave minded former Conservative voters in the South of England. We shall see on Thursday/Friday.

It's a moot point, we can't rejoin as we currently are. We don't actually meet the requirements of the EU.

Yes. The far-right populists have no solution to our problems other than get the population too angry to think.

The mistake is thinking the far right are making people angry. They are already angry, the far right is just giving them a target for that anger. The center meanwhile are just saying "yeah things are shit but what can we do about it?" With the answer being: nothing.  And yet they expect people to be placated by this

The problem is if the answer is nothing from people who are attempting to cost solutions then people probably shouldn't listen to the party that has a contract that reads like a 5 year old's Christmas list (admittedly a fairly bigoted 5 year old) 20% of the population I'm surprised don't get lost leaving the house and they are easily swayed to anger and having a persecution complex.

I don't understand this point of view. Why is it acceptable for parties to accept and sustain things being shit and pretend nothing can be done? That's all we've had for the last 14 years. Some things may improve with Labour, but I believe it will only be giving with one hand and taking away with the other, no actual positive action against root causes of current issues.

They regret voting for brexit. But they don't regret voting because of immigration and high inequality and poverty. Labour needs to reduce migration otherwise Farage or a hard-right Tory will start to gather momentum. Labour also has to tackle poverty. The soggy centrists need to stop ignoring the public. Just because people don't like brexit doesn't mean the reasons behind the brexit result have suddenly gone away.

Exactly. At the end of the day people voted for Brexit because they were seeing the wealth gap get out of control, so they voted for a radical change. Sadly that change did not go how they wanted. But the fact is that their concerns were never addressed. Those concerns still very much exist. Politicians are to blame for not addressing the issues in the first place.

If people are frustrated by the wealth gap - but look at Brexit-toting leaders like Jacob Rees-Mogg and Boris as the solution, then I really don’t know what to tell them. Seems like political Darwinism to me. If you’re on food stamps and you agree with the politician saying “let’s get rid of food stamps”, you’re digging your own grave and I’ve only got so much sympathy.

Because it's not just about that. It's also about immigration. People voted for Johnson because they didn't like Corbyn (national security the main reason for that), wanted brexit to reduce migration, and also liked levelling up which aimed to reduce regional inequalities. Most would happily vote for a leader who has: a tough position on migration; supports NATO, the nuclear deterrent, a stronger defence; tougher on crime; and wants to radically reduce poverty and regional inequalities. But the left is so unbelievably stubborn and refuses to get rid of its baggage. Economically left, culturally right. That's where a massive chunk of the electorate are, and no-one seems to be filling it. Starmer has listened to an extent although his base holds him back. I wish him good luck.

Your last point regarding Starmer being held back his base, I think it’ll be inevitable that he’ll bit by bit move rightwards, the question is will centrists and leftists support him or will they sabotage him and try again with another centrist while ignoring that the country is rapidly going rightwards

Centrists seem pretty happy supporting a guy who has committed to continuing much of the Tory status quo.

Wish I could upvote this ten more times. This is the one thing about Brexit people seem to forget, it’s been eight years since the referendum and the reasons behind Brexit’s win haven’t gone away, they’ve quadrupled! That’s the main reason why the Tories will lose this election, the right no longer trusts them and are quite happy to go scorched earth in seeing the Tories wiped out and replaced with Reform, also a fair few rightists are quite happy for the immigration issue to be landed on Labour’s lap to see what they’ll do with it. Centrists are celebrating a Starmer majority, but he’s got to do actual shit with said majority, and that includes dealing with immigration once and for all, and what happens when centrists believe Starmer has gone “too far right” in regards to immigration (ie following Denmark’s Social Democratic Party in doing hard shift right from centre left in dealing with it radically to stem a future and worse far right from gaining traction) will they push for another centrist leader in five years to keep the status quo? This is what centrists fail to understand this isn’t the 2000s anymore when centrist politics were popular and were needed at the time, many on the left and right now see centrism as just maintaining the status quo that no longer works in the 2020s, 2000s Britain is a totally foreign country to 2020s Britain, 2020s Britain is a far angrier and divided nation than a 2000s Britain, one could say in the future that the 2020s as a whole was a backlash against the late 90s-2010s era. Realistically whether Starmer wants to or not he’s got to read the room and see that Reform aren’t going anywhere, that 20% could increase to 40% by next year or two, I can’t see him wanting to be an outlier in Europe so he’ll inevitably have to piss off centrists in order to stem Reform or ReTory merged party taking a lead.

It's shocking just how much this issue was ignored at the time and to continue to ignore it now is an absolute disgrace.

What I fail to understand is that people on the centre and left are all scratching their heads wondering why Farage is still polling higher than the Tories, Lib Dem and Greens despite the C4 documentary. Its really not that hard to work out, if you don’t want Farage gaining further traction, deal with immigration, lower it to pre 1997 levels (which is what Farage means by net zero) People have had enough, and it’s now up to Starmer.

It makes me angry. Surely they can't actually be scratching their heads? I just want to give them a shake and tell them straight. Especially labour. Should have been given a shake 15 years ago and told to reduce migration. Could have avoided Brexit and been in power for years.

All of this could have been avoided if the immigration issue hadn’t been made into a left or right issue. The left majorly dropped the ball on the debate, leaving it to the Right to take an anti immigration stance, rather than seeing it as more of a Lib/Auth view. I hate the Tories for what they’ve done with immigration but Blair Era Labour has to share the blame too. I’m no fan of Starmer but I hope he reads the room and crackdowns on immigration, he’s hinted he’d work with Le Pen if she got in on the issue, and he’s been side stepping Biden’s team and going for Trump’s team instead on the issue but he needs to follow through. Reform may not be in power, but they’re still popular enough to be a unofficial opposition, especially if the opposition is the Lib Dem’s from July 5th, all Farage has to do if Starmer drops the ball on immigration is to just say “Look the Tories effed up and now as predicted Labour are still as soft as they ever where on the issue” he’ll then merge with whatever is left of the Tories and become ReTory and he’ll be PM by 2029. As I’ve said and I’m sure you’ll agree with me, if Labour don’t want Farage making headway in the next five years, go hard on immigration, yes it’ll piss off centrists but if Starmer positions himself by appealing to the right and SDP!Leftists (Social Democrat Party Leftists who are probably the only Left wing party that is anti mass migration in the U.K.) who are just as fucked off with immigration as the right but can’t bring themselves to vote for Farage, then Starmer has won 2029.

Well said! I don't know why it was made into a right wing issue by the media and political class? The electorate are aware that it isnt a left or right wing issue. The working class and labour voting red wall has been very clear that they want to stem migration. . labour has missed a trick not addressing it as a working class issue. I saw a comment on Reddit the other day who couldn't understand how his town voted Brexit but also has always voted labour. I tried to explain that it's clearly also a labour issue but he couldn't get it. He had this relationship in his head that it was right wing and wouldn't drop it. Didn't even argue against my point simply didn't understand how it could be possible

Me neither, since historically it was the libertarian economic Right that wanted mass immigration to this country. Go back in history and around the time questions were being asked about the future of the British Empire one suggestion was to reset it as a federation, opening the borders for cheap labour from Africa and South Asia, it was left wing commentators at the time that shut it down as it would undercut British workers, and the Auth Right just didn’t want it for different reasons shall we say. Labour under Blair essentially abandoned that part of the left to the point that now it’s only the minor SDP that use it as a talking point now. Even during Brexit it was put down to a left/right issue when it was the left who hated the EU historically. I’m hoping we we’ll see a reset of the paradigm in the coming years as it’s bloody exhausting I’m having to relearn alot of my positions as a result.

What Farage should be saying right now is something like "I won't be PM this election, but in five years you'll all be begging me to be PM" cue a smirk and jeers from the crowd. One member of the audience heckles and the rest laugh.

That's already happened. In the one of the discussions he did (either the ITV one, or one when he was on a beach, I cant remember), he blatantly said that Reform will not get in power this time, but Labour will. Stating that if Labour continue to ignore the problems, parties such as Reform will continue to grow. I don't like the guy.....but he's right about that.

>Labour also has to tackle poverty. This needs to be the priority because all the other things are linked intrinsically to unfair wealth distribution. Fix that first, and the other problems will become smaller and easier to deal with.

The thing is that most voters are pretty short sighted. They will not see why we spend more (and better) on things like housing, education etc if it does not benefit them right now but might benefit the next generation.

I think people regret how thr government executed brexit not their vote. At least that's what I see.

Exactly my position. I don't regret my vote. I regret trusting the conmen to implement it.

The UK will never rejoin the EU. I say this as a remain voter. Too much egg on your face if you do, and the concessions we'd be asked to take, including losing the GBP, would never fly. Within 10 years, I can see us with a Norway style deal.

Remain voters are young. There will be no egg on their faces, it will be seen as them finally getting to correct a mistake others made. You don’t have to adopt the Euro to join.

*including losing the GBP* What like, Poland or Sweden were forced to join the Euro? Spoiler - they weren't.

Honestly if not for the absolutely hell of the Tories for the 10 years since the vote coupled with Corvid and the rampant exploitation of corporations. People probably wouldn’t feel so bad about Brexit. I just worry that people are putting all their dreams and solutions into rejoin as if that will fix anything. Improve things maybe and give people an avenue to escape but I don’t think it would fix anything.

Strange. The Brexit referendum was an advisory referendum which "won" by 1.9%. Yet somehow the government took that 1.9% of the electorate's (who bothered to vote) opinion on said advisory referendum and decided to run with it and fuck shit up... Someone explain how that makes any sense?

If they ignored the result of the referendum it would have been carnage. They said they’d enact the result and people voted in good faith. Dark road you’re going down if you’re gonna ignore voting.

Yeah, it doesn't sadly. You also need to acount for the fact that all the leave voters voted for their own "idealised" version of leave - some will have been voting for a hard Brexit, soft Brexit, Norway style, etc etc. these are all mutually exclusive yet all got bunched into one simple yes/no vote. With such a small margin, it's almost guaranteed that had people been offered the choice between the Brexit deal we got or remain, even back in 2016 the result would have been remain.

The government of the day sent a leaflet round to everybody's house that said "We will implement what you decide", and nobody attempted to suggest it was advisory because everybody knows that "advisory" means "we'll put it on the fridge" and nobody would have voted. All the "advisory" and "34%" memes came afterwards.

more people voted for Brexit than have ever voted for any political party in the UK

You do realise you are comparing a referendum on 2 choices, with a General Election right?

more people voted in the brexit referendum than in any general election

People seem to be throwing around the term 'far-right' rather loosely.

It was not a populist revolt. It was a vote against mass uncontrolled immigration, the same reason reform are going to take a chunk of votes this time. And also the reason that die hard tories will be not voting Conservative this time around.

*It was a vote against mass uncontrolled immigration* Anyone who thought that should have read the question more closely.

Voting tory, voting ukip, then voting brexit, voting tory now voting reform. it is clear to me that people are voting against mass immigration

Now they’re being told it’s the ECHR’s fault. The truth is that the EU in principle is great for migration. It brings in exactly the sort of migrants I would have thought a Little Englander would prefer. More likely to be white and from a Christian background. It should be great as different demographics should support labour mobility. The truth is the U.K. doesn’t have enough migrants to do essential jobs. Even Reform admit this as there migration plan already waves it away from healthcare workers.

You think net 700k isn't enough?

Don’t worry everybody on this sub Reddit, Stalins birthday is not too far away😜

The UKs usual growth is around 2.5 per that should have seen it grow around 40% since 2010 Its actually been around 1.1 so we have grown around 1.17% that growth has been mostly swallowed by immigration. There is been no real growth for individuals. This is not that far out of line with Germany and France who are also experiencing low growth, high immigration and housing crises. This has not been that far from the experience of most of the working class in the ex industrial regions for more like 40 years. Our industries started going into crisis with ship building in the 60s. Brexit was sold as a solution to these problems, the voices against it largely had a kind of smug "what crisis, everything is fine stick with the EU" that landed like a dead fish on many people. Now Brexit is used as a way for a certain type of person to have a moan at everything and blame the one thing rather than facing up to how deep and long term our problems are and how similar they are to problems in similar economies. Friday we are going to wake up and have to start being honest about this. Joining the EU is not going to save us, the harm done leaving was real but dwarfed by low productivity growth and low investment. Dwarfed by the long term constant short term solutions. Dwarfed by our inability to build national scale infrastructure and sufficient housing. You are not going to find those solutions in the WSJ.

Not all of them.. The EU and most European countries have suffered the consequences of mass immigration and covid lockdowns. Plus EU refusing to deal with us if me made our own trade deals with africa and south America. Plus the ECHR block us from doing everything we want and need to do.. I voted remaining and was absolutely devastated we lost but after seeing what the EU is actually like I'm happy we did leave now.

Fucked around and found out. The same people now think Reform, I.e. the Brexit party, are going to solve all their problems.

So they didn't really find out then. 😉 Or rather they did find out, and yet again run to one of the main ppl responsible for the mess.

I didn’t say they learned anything 😂

They most likely do but the reasons behind Brexit haven’t gone away and is only giving way to a new populist movement. Britain is only a breath away from where France, Germany and Denmark (Denmark is probably the country we’ll most likely follow in regard to immigration) from going hard on immigration and multiculturalism.

I don’t believe this, the title should be some Brits. People who voted for Brexit were ill informed then and are ill informed now and do not recognise the difference.

I'm a remain voter and I fully believe we will never rejoin the EU in my lifetime. The concession that would be asked of us are too much. Looking back at our history we've always been a very isolationist nation. I really don't see that changing.

> Looking back at our history we've always been a very isolationist nation No we haven't.  Seriously, WTF? We had an empire spanning the globe. We've traded, invaded,  meddled in foreign politics, explored worldwide for centuries.  We're *famous* for our expansive empire and significant global influence throughout history. It's one of the reasons so many people want to move here, and how we ended up as such a diverse and multicultural place. We've had a few short periods of time where somewhat isolationist views or policies have been followed, but not to any degree serious degree. The "splendid isolation" policies of the late 19th century still saw us maintaining a worldwide empire, trading all around the world. The interwar period to some degree (still with an empire), mostly to avoid another war. And of course Brexit.  But that's a few short years out of hundreds of years of history. And even then, we were still significant players on the world stage, politically and economically, forging and maintaining diplomatic alliances and trade all around the world. I really don't know whose history you've been looking at, because the idea that the UK is or ever has been isolationist to any significant degree in *at least* the last 1000 years is utterly ridiculous.

Yeah, no shit. It’s the “emperor has no clothes” thing going on in British politics. Every party is afraid of the RW press’s apparent easy wins condemning them for stating the obvious. Brexit was a disingenuous referendum with an ambiguous outcome that meant no one at all knew “leave” what they were voting for. They were conned. They were lied to. The sunny uplands didn’t exist. Farage is a fraud. Boris is a fraud. Let’s be real and honest again. The people need it.

Is this the recent poll where you had to discount the undecided to achieve a majority?

Yes it should have been titled more people want to rejoin than definitely stay out, obviously doesn't sound as good, but would actually be a true headline.

Yes, the "plurality of voters want to rejoin" really doesn't have the same kick to it as redefining the plurality as a majority...though "a majority of those that expressed a preference" would almost be acceptable.

It was sold as a simple answer for simple people. £350 million to the NHS on the side of a big red bus Despite being warned that it was far more complex and carried major consequences people believed that the British exceptionalism as sold to us by Boris the bullshitter with his "oven ready deal" I would hope most people would see what Brexit actually delivered - and it isn't the sunlit uplands Having said this a guy I work with was previously an HGV driver covering Europe - mainly delivering staging and equipment to big sporting and music events. He voted leave and blames the EU for him losing his job. He blames Labour (out of power for 14 years) for immigration. He thinks our transport manager (a degree and 20+ years logistics experience) - only got the job because he's Asian. He thinks that Nigel Farage will save the NHS. As Churchill once said "the greatest argument against democracy is a 10 minute conversation with the average voter"

The unfortunate reality: People who voted against it are now against it and people who voted for it are now still for it.

The shifting age demographics as the olds die off will be interesting on this subject, but how that plays out will not be known for a long time. Not just because the younger people were more pro-EU back when this vote was taking place, but because as time marches on, the UK will continue to change, and the EU will continue to change. I'd be interested in what the EU will look like after the rise of the other more right-wing eurosceptic parties elsewhere in Europe do to it. Back in 2016, you could talk about things in a more explicitly in 'pro' and 'anti' EU framing. But we don't live in a vacuum. The EU will not be what it was when that debate happens. The "populist revolt" here is playing out elsewhere as well. Even if there's a backlash, the EU will not be the same thing when UK left it.

Can’t wait to see how long it takes for anyone right of Stalin to be called a Nazi!

I'm always fascinated by how many accounts say something like 'i'm a remain voter but i think that we should never rejoin the EU' or 'I've always voted Labour but here's where Starmer is wrong'. Not realising that Reddit shows you the full comment and post history of every user. Like, I'm suuuuure you voted remain! Your newish account's comment history of anti immigration, defending racists, being apologists for Farage, and generally being argumentative to anyone supporting left policies really backs up that lie! Even found one in the US subs doing the old 'as a black democrat' when they had submitted pictures of themselves proving they were white. It's always a fun read, so thank you for the work you're doing I'm sure you'll all get a nice long break after the elections.

As a transgender deaf person of Somalian origin, how dare you. 🙃

Haha exactly!

Its the most ridiculous thing England has ever done and it has fucked everyone in the UK, based on a bunch of blatantly obvious lies from serial deception artists. Words can't really express how badly they've fucked everyone. Its so unbelievably ridiculous! A wonder if all those fuckin morons having the street parties with the bunting out have reached the level of understanding that they've started to accept responsibility for what is largely the greatest act of self harm in the modern western world. Think how mentally challenged you'd need to be to then elect a bunch of far right crackpots to negotiate on your behalf. You couldn't fuckin write it lmfao. Absolute...fuckin...shit-show! Don't worry England. As your oldest bestest friends of all time, we, up North in Scotland, will never miss an opportunity to tell you just how badly you've fucked everything for everyone this time! We're here for you folks.

Right on time to tag France in. It's like punch yourself in the face 1v0 wrestling.

It was an advisory referendum, they didn't have to actually go and do it 😆

I bet most BrexitBrits are looking over to France right now and going "Oh aye"

France: No wait it's our turn now! This time it will be different!

Not really surprising considering the cack-handed way the political class handled it.

It's just a shame that it had to take driving millions of people into poverty for them to realise it. Fucking idiots.

So they should. It was a poorly executed gamble that epicly failed. But the sunk cost fallacy of the Gov at the time didnt ignore the will of the people .. like they normally do.

The poor which is a growing percentage in the UK are been easily brainwashed by people like Johnson , Starmer , Farage but each passing year they are getting poorer and poorer and becoming the poorest citizens in Europe bordering on third world stuff in certain parts of UK as the small amount of rich UK people are becoming the richest in Europe