A legal opinion on the constitutional position of Article 50 - Is it the PM or parliament that has the final say?

The UK Constitutional Law Association has issued an opinion on whether or not parliament needs to be asked to trigger Article 50 or if the PM alone can do it (HERE).

They conclude that parliament must authorise the triggering of Article 50, not the PM and they offer what looks like reasonable points to back it up. This is important because a majority of MPs in the house are against leaving the EU, at least two thirds are against it, but may vote for it as the democratically expressed will of the people.  However, it is extremely complicated legally and may take a long time to resolve.

Boris stands down - doesn't mention Gove

Boris has ruled himself out of the race to become PM.  It looks like Gove 's earlier statement that Boris cannot provide the leadership is enough to finish BoJo's chances for ever.

However, since Gove has said many times before, he himself isn't equipped to be prime minister I don't know why he's bothering to stand either.

Gove stands for party leader and says Boris can't provide leadership

The terrible two seem to have had a parting of the ways today. With Gove reneging on a promise not to stand for leading the conservative party and at the same tie criticising Boris as being unable to provide leadership, even though he has spent the last few weeks supporting Boris as leader of the Leave campaign.  Amazing.

These two were already a laughing stock throughout the western world for campaigning with no plan for what they were campaigning for (HERE).   

Meanwhile yesterday, in an accidentally leaked email, Gove's wife Sarah Vine, the Mail columnist shows she is actually working the strings since he apparently can't be trusted on his own (HERE). Also Gove has publicly said the public don't want experts to international incredulity.

BoJo is turning us into a laughing stock.

Newspapers are taking comfort from comments by the French finance minister Michel Sapin that everything including freedom of movement (FoM) will be on the table for discussion in the Brexit negotiations (HERE). This is ignoring the very explicit statement yesterday by Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, that the four freedoms are NOT negotiable. Discussing FoM is of course allowed but only if we give up tariff free access to the single market, at huge cost to our economy.

Leaving this aside, many newspapers ignore other comments he made including, “What surprised me is that those who argued for Brexit, and whom the people backed, were prepared for absolutely none of the consequences of this Brexit. They suddenly discovered difficulties and problems. We are discovering them with them. 

"But for the UK of course it’s much more serious. When you take a position you should analyse all the aspects and all the consequences. Perhaps therefore if the people of Britain had known the consequences they wouldn’t have voted the way they did. But the vote is there and we have to deal with the consequences.”

He was echoing comments by John Kerry, US Secretary of State, earlier this week saying the prime minister felt powerless "to start negotiating a thing that he doesn’t believe in” and “has no idea how he would do it”.  Apparently referring to Boris Johnson, one of the front runners to replace Cameron, Kerry added: “And by the way, nor do most of the people who voted to do it.”

They're laughing at us and this is what hurts.

Britain's financial sector faces huge risks

Ben Wright, the Telegraph's Group Business Editor has written a piece (HERE) about the banking sector that is quite scary. For all the opprobrium directed at the City and the disaster that was 2008-9, banking generates a lot of money for the treasury in taxes of all types (income, stamp duty, VAT, etc) and any diminishing of it will hurt the entire nation.

Loss of tax revenues will either reduce public services or cost the rest of us much more in tax.

Mr Wright points out a couple of interesting things.  Firstly, foreign direct investment in 2015 amounted to 18% of GDP with two thirds coming into financial services.  We need this to counter the current account deficit and keep us solvent. He says this is the "kindness of strangers" that Mark Carney spoke of before the referendum, but it is in fact the kindness of foreign banks.  This will certainly be at risk.

Secondly, banks are beginning to move staff into the EU already. They can't afford to wait and see what kind of deal we get and take the risk a rival will beat them to it.  For every 1000 staff moved, the treasury loses £100 million a year in taxes. The stock exchange has estimated 100,000 jobs could go eventually. That's £10 Billion in lost taxation and £32.5 Billion in lost output.  These are big numbers and in our most successful sector. Not easy to replace.

Prospering like never before.

The FTSE and the pound stage a recovery - for now

By last night the FTSE had pulled back all of the losses of earlier this week and was back around 6350 points.  Sterling staged a bit of a rally ending the day at about $1.345 but nowhere near the high of $1.50 reached last week and still therefore 10% down.

I note it is already slipping again this morning.  An expert at the treasury select committee this week said the pounds fall was consistent with a value of $1.20 by the end of the year. This would be a disaster.

The New York Times ridicules BoJo and Gove - they had no post Brexit plan!

We are already a bit of a laughing stock for voting Leave and now BoJo is making himself and Michael Gove even bigger ones.  The New York Times has a piece about Brexit and seem utterly bemused to learn the Leave campaign had no plan (HERE).

The writer says it looks as if they were not prepared to cope with the consequences of Brexit and seem surprised they actually won. 

It was a surprise. Imagine any nation opting for some unknown status, any status at all, provided only that it wasn't the one they had at present. Only North Koreans, one would think, would do the same.

The NYT article goes on to describe their performance as "faltering" and their credibility "undercut". It also mentions the "walking back" of the many populist and exaggerated claims on immigration and the £350m - a figure which both Boris and Gove will have round their necks until the day they die.

The EU confirmed today the freedom of movement of people was non negotiable

One may be able to see why David Cameron resigned last week, He is experienced in Brussels and probably knew that the other leaders on the Council of Europe would not compromise on the four freedoms of movement (Good, Services, Capital and finally - the difficult one, People). see HERE.

If BoJo thought he might get a better deal he may be in for a shock.  It looks like he will have to make a choice between an Australian points style system (which will only reduce numbers by about 100,000) or the economy and the potential loss of a million jobs.

BoJo is like an impatient driver following you down a narrow road in fog. He overtakes you only to find he cannot manage any more speed and is in fact slower than you were.

Vote Leave mysteriously wipe own their website - are they destroying the evidence?

The Vote Leave website has been mysteriously wiped it is being reported in The Washington Post (HERE). There is some speculation that it's being done to hide the evidence and prevent those sceptical of the many promises and commitments given from uncovering them.

However, the Post has apparently got an archived copy of the website that you can find (HERE) if you want to check in a year or two precisely how many of the promises like the one below have been kept or not.

Service exports would be hardest hit by Brexit

Reuters has an interesting point for companies that export services (HERE). A survey of law firms by the Law Society showed many of their members were concerned about Brexit even if we managed to secure a tariff free arrangement to access the single market.

They were worried about non-tariff barriers. At the moment a UK law firm can offer services across the EU, selling this to US customers and vice versa.  But if we leave EU rules about law firm being resident inside the EU will apply and prevent these legal services being offered by UK companies.

Either they will have to transfer to the continent with the loss of export potential or give up the EU work altogether.

Prospering like never before.

Questions raised about the new Siemens wind turbine plant in Hull

The Hull Daily Mail are reporting comments by Mr Juergen Maier, CEO of Siemens that there are now questions about the future of the new wind turbine plant constructed recently in Hull and expected to begin production shortly (HERE).

Siemens planned to use the site to satisfy demand from Europe but fear trade tariffs will impact profitability and may mean their plant in Denmark will produce for the EU market.

UK consumer borrowing hit a 10 year high in June

Reuters are reporting (HERE) today that consumer borrowing hit a 10 year high.  I assume this is a reflection on confidence in the UK economy.  I'll keep an eye on what happens to the numbers in the months ahead.  If there is a big drop it will not bode well.

Bloomberg forecast recession

Bloomberg the financial information provider has surveyed economists after the Brexit vote and found three quarters of those responding thought a recession was coming as a result of the referendum vote to leave the EU (HERE).

Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England and George Osbourne had both predicted this in the run up to the vote but were dismissed as scaremongers by the Leave campaign.  It now turns out they were not.  There is surely nothing more corrosive in public life to find that those we can now see lied through their teeth throughout the campaign (and won) while those who forecast big problems ahead, including a recession, are dismissed.

A day or so ago, after the Leave side had been successful with the slogan "project fear" and airily dismissing any suggestion of a slowdown in the economy, I noted Nigel Farage saying a mild recession was "coming anyway".  Something again he didn't say before the vote.  He really is not very bright.   

Prospering like never before.

Squaring the immigration and market access circle - the fundamental question

BoJo, Steven Hammond the foreign secretary, Sajid Javad the business secretary as well as other leading conservatives and major companies seem to be emphasising how important it is for the UK to retain access to the single market.  Let's speculate that this is the basis for the future negotiations. The EU is unlikely to give us that unless we accept freedom of movement of people, goods, services and capital as well as making contributions to the budget.  This is the Norway option so we know it or something close to it is available.

Article 50 has become a possible self destruct button for our economy

The European Council has confirmed they want article 50 triggered before any negotiations can even begin and to make matters worse the trade commissioner says we must exit before we begin new trade negotiations (HERE).  If this is the process insisted on by the EU it presents a huge problem for the government and parliament.

Ratings agency cuts outlook on UK banking system after Brexit

Moody's has downgraded its outlook on 12 major UK banks from stable to negative (HERE).

They expect lower economic growth and increased uncertainty to reduce the demand for credit.

Barclays, Lloyds and Santander were among the 12.

The whole world knows we were lied to during the referendum campaign

The whole world knows we were lied to by the Leave campaign in the EU referendum. In the European parliament Guy Verhofstadt, a dutch MEP and former prime minister (HERE) told Nigel Farage they had all seen the "lies" about the £350m that did not exist.

Now the Washington Post is telling its readers the Brexit leaders are beginning to "walk back" from their promises (HERE).  I didn't realise how the foreign press had covered the EU referendum until now. It looks as if we, or at least many of those who voted leave, are the last to see that we were lied to and duped.

The terrible thing about this is that many, perhaps even most, of the leave supporters will not care. Ian Duncan Smith claimed he personally never said that £350m would go to the NHS although the press have pictures of him in front of the bus proclaiming this uneqivocally to the entire nation. Daniel Hannan didn't think anyone had been led to believe immigration was going to come down.  Worse are those people on the leave side who are now condemning racist attacks but failed to condemn UKIPs refugee poster with Nazi undertones, at the time, presumably because it was to their advantage.

The parliamentarian Edmund Burke once said, "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do [and say] nothing".  They knew the campaign was lying to the British people but remained silent.  Shame on them.  

Vodafone consider moving HQ to Europe after Brexit

The mobile phone giant has reportedly (HERE) said they may have to consider moving their headquarters into the EU if we lose access to the single markets four freedoms of people, goods, capital and services.

I think this sort of warning must be listened to serioulsy. Vodafone employs 13000 people in total in the UK and although not all would need to relocate, perhaps the corporation tax revenues would also move with them.

Prospering like never before.

The pound sinks like a stone on foreign exchange markets

Even as it began to emerge that a Leave vote was likely overnight on the 23rd/24th June the value of the pound was hit and plummeted down to values last seen 30 years ago.  The fall was greater than that recorded after so called black Wednesday in 1992 after we fell out of the ERM.

The FTSE 100 drops about 500 points on opening on the morning after the vote.

Markets showed they understood Boris' little joke about prospering like never before by sending indexes the world over plunging downwards and wiping £2tn off the value of the world’s stock markets including the FTSE 100 which was down at one point by more that 8%.  Yes, never before has anyone prospered by wiping two trillion pounds off the world's business value.

This is perhaps just a foretaste of what is to come.  Let me know when you've stopped laughing. 

Another ratings agency downgrades the UK

Fitch joined Moody's and Standard & Poor in downgrading our AA+  status to AA with a negative outlook (HERE).  They say research has long shown our economy will slow down without immigration.

Lib Dems to run 2020 election on stopping Brexit after Vote Leave Lies exposed

Tim Farron has announce the Liberal Democrats will run in the 2020 election on a pledge to halt Brexit because of "lies" now revealed from the Vote Leave campaign. See HERE

Not sure how realistic this is since we will have spent years negotiating and will have completed our withdrawal.  Might be a smart move to garner some of the 48% who voted remain.

Boris distances himself from the truth - again

Boris Johnson, the twice sacked liar and potential PM, wrote a column in The Telegraph on Monday in which he claimed that the German employers organisation the BDI had "very sensibly reminded us there will continue to be free trade and access to the single market".

The BBC checked with the BDI later on Monday and they were a bit surprised apparently (see HERE). It was apparently untrue.  The BDI may have been surprised but we weren't.

The BDI told the BBC they had never and would never say such a thing.

Bear in mind that The Times sacked Boris for making things up when he worked as their Brussels correspondent and he wrote a letter to David Cameron during the campaign about exaggerated claims being corrosive to public trust. Outright lies are of course, OK.  Pity those MPs in the house who have to call him honourable.

The £350m per week saving was always an illusion - in every possible way

The widely derided figure of saving £350 million a week by leaving the EU was always an exaggeration.  But even the net figure of perhaps £120m per week needs to put into perspective in two ways.

Firstly, as Paul Johnson of the IFS said yesterday, the British government lost many years (not weeks!) of EU contributions by the amount the share prices of RBS and Lloyds, banks part owned by the taxpayer, fell during yesterday's market mayhem alone!  In other words the £350m a week is actually more like a rounding error in the public finances.

Secondly, speaking on radio 4 yesterday, a German MP, close to Mrs Merkel said we would not be given tariff free access to the single market unless we contributed to the budget as Norway does and because we wouldn't get the rebate, the amount we pay would actually go UP.  No country has tariff free access to the market as Boris was suggesting without contributing.

So, there we have it the £350m a week  saving may end up costing us money.  Money that may end up coming OUT of the NHS rather than going in.  How Boris would spin that will be interesting.

Who is to blame for Brexit? It was Boris wot' done it.

There is a kind of odd symmetry about where the blame lies for the tragedy unfolding before our eyes.  A journalist, Martin Fletcher, has written a piece for the New York Times (HERE) suggesting that one man above all others is responsible and he is none other than Boris Johnson.

It was he, as Brussels correspondent for The Times, who began the trend for writing humorous pieces about the EU's love of what he thought were petty regulation.  No matter that it was actually needed to harmonise things across Europe, Boris found it amusing to write stuff that Mr Fletcher says was grotesquely exaggerated or totally wrong.  

He was sacked for making stuff up but The Telegraph loved it and took him on. More and more newspapers demanded the same until the British Press was feeding it's readers a daily diet of anti-EU nonsense that is not replicated anywhere else in Europe and why we have a uniquely distorted view of the EU.   Boris looks set to lead the battle against a wholly fictional "monster" that he was largely responsible for creating.  We will all be the worse for it. His reputation has reached a high point, from now on it will be all downhill.

FTSE index drops £130Bn in just two days

Reuters are reporting on Monday evening that the UK stock market has fallen in value by more than £130Bn in two days (HERE).

I assume at least part of these losses will be made up again in the future but let's not forget that some of this money is people's future pension funds and any drop is going to make those with defined contribution schemes, as opposed to final salary ones, that much poorer.

The pound begins the day at about $1.33 just a cent or two above the 31 year low it dropped to yesterday.

Another day another downgrade by the ratings agencies

Standard & Poor, the only ratings agency to maintain our AAA status last night downgraded it following the Brexit vote (HERE) saying it would "weaken the predictability, stability, and effectiveness of policymaking in the UK".

It will be interesting to see what this does to the markets today. Yesterday saw the pound slumping to a fresh 31 year low and stock markets around the world continued their tailspin from Friday.

London's FTSE 100 fell by 2.5%, adding to a similar fall on Friday. And in Frankfurt, Paris, Milan and Madrid, stock markets fell 3-4% after closing as much as 12% down on Friday as investors contemplated the ramifications of a EU member leaving the union.   

Some might think the price of Boris' ego is getting a tad expensive.

A legal opinion on triggering article 50

An American broadcaster has interviewed a lawyer in Brussels about Article 50 (HERE) on a page showing UK government 10 year bond yields have dropped below 1% for the first time ever. More on this in a future post.

The lawyer says the EU referendum last week was not a legally binding one. It was advisory only and to give it legal force a bill has to go through parliament and she says ( about 20 secs into the video) it just needs a simple majority but this is not a foregone conclusion. The House has a clear, substantial majority against Brexit and while ignoring the electorates wishes is not going to be easy the government has only a small majority and it would take a few rebels on the conservative benches working with Labour and the SNP to prevent it passing through.

If the bad news keeps coming at the rate it has been in the past few days - for example if a major car manufacturer announced it was halting all future investment and pulling out over a period of time because of Brexit - it can easily be imagined that some MPs might vote against.

An interesting theory that claims Brexit won't happen anyway

Last Thursday night, 23rd June, a group of MPs, including BoJo and Michael Gove, signed a letter asking Cameron to stay on regardless of the result.  I wondered why this was until I read (HERE) about an anonymous post on the Guardian website that claims the Article 50 notice will never be sent.

NFU warning on food prices

The National Farmers Union has issued a warning that the falling pound will impact on food prices (HERE). We import 40% of food products and the weaker pound will be reflected in an increase to may items of food.

This is going to affect those who can afford it least - but paradoxically, probably the people who were more likely to vote leave.

A NFU spokesman described the EU referendum as a "political car crash".  Richard Lim CEO of Retail Economics warned that consumer confidence in the UK will now be "choked" by "volatility and fear".

This is just the outcome that Remain said would happen but were condemned as scaremongers.

Prospering like never before.

The markets contradict BoJo or is it the other way round?

BoJo appeared on television this morning doing an impression of Jim Callaghan during the Sterling crisis of 1976.  As the pound plunged to a new post 1985 low of $1.316 he said it was "stable". Stocks on the FTSE100, especially banks and housebuilders suffered huge falls.

Shares in RBS were briefly suspended following frenzied trading.

The word "stable" has been hijacked by Johnson and it's widely understood meaning altered to be defined as extremely volatile and completely unpredictable.  The OED were unavailable for comment.

Report show the UK areas most in favour of Brexit have the most to lose.

A report (HERE) for the respected Centre for European reform explains why Britain’s regions that depend the most on exports for their income are actually the most euro sceptic and enthusiastic leavers even though they will lose out the most.

The svengali like Boris Johnson was able to convince people who will actually be worse off that this is somehow in their best interests. No wonder his joining Vote Leave was a coup.   I wonder what these enthusiastic leavers will think when they realise Boris' "scaremongers" were not scaremongering at all and actually they have been duped?

Do Turkeys really vote for Christmas after all?

North East Chamber of Commerce Leader cautions against hasty EU exit

James Ramsbotham, the chief executive of the North East Chambers of Commerce, said (HERE) on Friday 24th June,“One [company] has already seen a quite sizeable contract pulled. One is running a subsidiary of a major corporation and is fairly certain that within two years the whole thing will be moved to the continent. But there are one or two who say this is what they wanted and this is what they voted for and are just looking for help to get through it.”

Apparently what Mr Ramsbotham seems to be saying is that some company bosses actually voted for this.  Either they wanted to move to continental Europe themselves or they wanted to get rid of a competitor or simply pleased to see orders and jobs lost.  Amazing, but well done to Boris for showing us how we will “prosper like never before”.

Companies planning a freeze on hiring new staff

According to the BBC, the Institute of Directors have surveyed 1000 of their members and found a quarter plan to freeze recruitment and that two thirds thought Brexit would have a negative impact on their business (HERE).

Simon Walker, director general of the Institute of Directors, told the BBC's Today programme: "Business leaders are very, very concerned. Nearly half of them expect the other member states to punish Britain."

More companies issue Brexit warnings

The BBC are reporting that Easyjet and estate agents Foxtons are both warning about the negative impacts that Brexit will have on the outlook for the second half of the year and beyond (HERE).

Foxtons said, ""Since then recent sales volumes have been slow as uncertainty and higher stamp duty has led many buyers and sellers to sit on their hands. The result of the referendum has increased uncertainty and is likely to mean that these trends continue for at least the remainder of the year."

The company said an expected upturn in the London property market in the second half of the year was "unlikely to materialise".

London’s standing as leading financial centre at risk

The European Central Bank has said the UK should lose it's passport (HERE), effectively the right to do business in the EU, if we exit the single market as Michael Gove has said we should do.

London as a financial centre generates huge amounts of tax revenue and while bankers have been roundly condemned for creating the 2008 financial crisis, we cannot escape the fact that they pay a lot of tax.  If this is diminished taxes on the rest of us will rise.

Vote Leave dismissed this as scaremongering - now it seems to be happening.

Other banks now planning to exit the City

The Financial Times is reporting (HERE) that some major American banks are already starting to take action  to move jobs out of London and into the EU.

“We’ll get on with it,” said a senior executive at one large US bank. “We’ve started to think about how we put people in our existing offices and entities in Europe. We are already rebalancing our footprint.”

Vote Leave dismissed all this talk before the referendum as scaremongering.  It doesn't look as if is was scary enough give that it is happening almost within 48 hours of the vote.  It turns out the Remain side was right and Boris was wrong, as he has been on so many other things.

HSBC to move 1000 jobs to Paris

The BBC (HERE) is reporting that HSBC are planning to move 1000 highly paid banking jobs to Paris.  This will begin the diminishing of London and the loss to our tax revenues of a lot of money.

When it was suggested during the campaign that highly paid British banking jobs would go to the EU in the event of a Brexit, Vote Leave dismissed it as scaremongering. So, now not only are Vote Leave's lies being exposed (HERE), the Remain campaign truths are being revealed!

One has to congratulate Boris. He was able to convince voters that bad was good and good as bad.

Leave campaign admit they never had a post Brexit plan

An anonymous Tory MP in favour of leaving the EU told Faisal Islam of Sky News (HERE) that there was never a plan for the post Brexit vote.  They literally had no idea of what would happen after a leave vote.

Apparently, and Mr Islam says he was not "making this up", the MP pointed to some government building and said it was the government's responsibility to have had such a plan ready.

Since the Leave campaign never clearly set out what it was they wanted and constantly changed their mind with trade arrangements ranging from those of Norway, Switzerland, Canada and Albania being suggested and dismissed by them on a daily basis and alternating between a trade deal and WTO rules it was perhaps not surprising the government had no plan.  Leave never kept to one aim for more than an hour or two. 

Tata Steel rescue bid now at risk

Sky news sources (HERE) are reporting that the rescue bid for Tata Steel is now looking increasingly doubtful as at least one of the potential bidders is likely to drop out following the Brexit vote.  A number of the other bidders are said to share these concerns.  This seems to cast a shadow over the future of steel making in South Wales.

No doubt the steel workers in Port Talbot, at least those who voted leave to “prosper like never before,” will be celebrating another stunning victory in the pubs of South Wales tonight and toasting Boris Johnson. 

To be fair nobody as far as I know in either campaign saw this coming but now it looks completely logical.

New York Times comment warns we are only at the beginning

The New York Times contributor Phillipe Legrain claims we are just at the start of the Brexit economic disaster (HERE).

He says we are already 9% worse off because of the pound's drop in value which affects every asset in the country and that the people who voted for Brexit (and the 48% who didn't) will pay a big price for ignoring economic expertise.

I feel we are on the Titanic and in spite of daily doses of turbulence and bad news, we haven't seen the tip of the iceberg - it isn't even in sight yet.  Brace yourself.

Those who voted for Brexit only have themselves to blame. They can either admit they wanted to badly damage our economy or they didn't realise what would happen although the government and all the experts told them exactly what to expect.

Corrosion and credibility in politics

During the campaign, the Justice Secretary (no less), Michael Gove said the Prime Minister's "apocalyptic warnings" on Brexit would test his credibility if they turned out to be false, as he accused Mr Cameron of having a "corrosive" impact on public life (HERE).

We learned today from Standard & Poor (HERE) that the $2.08 trillion wiped off global equity markets on Friday after the Brexit result was announced was the biggest ever daily loss, beating the Lehman Brothers collapse and 1987's Black Monday stock market crash.  So the warning was actually pretty accurate.

Since it was Mr Gove who dismissed these apocalyptic warnings as "scare mongering" whose credibility was tested?  Incidentally, this is the man, suggested as a future chancellor under BoJo, who does not believe in experts and trusts his own amateurish instincts. Whose credibility is on the line?

China says Brexit will cast a shadow

The BBC are reporting (HERE) that China's Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said the consequences of Brexit were unclear, but that they would be felt for years to come and Huang Yiping, a member of China's central bank monetary policy committee, said Brexit could mark a "reversal of globalisation", which would be "very bad" for the world.

Vote Leave dismissed any suggestion that Brexit would affect anything beyond a few "bumps in the road" as Mr Gove described it.

BoJo begins to make the case for MORE immigration

This morning's Daily Telegraph carries Boris Johnson's "exclusive" column (for which he gets about £300,000 per year and must therefore make him a "stooge" for the Telegraph) in which he says, "It is said that those who voted Leave were mainly driven by anxieties about immigration. I do not believe that is so. After meeting thousands of people in the course of the campaign, I can tell you that the number one issue was control – a sense that British democracy was being undermined by the EU system".  

If he genuinely believes this he must have attended a lot of very different debates to those we saw on the television where so called sovereignty was quite low down the order of importance.  In the east of England, I would say immigration was clearly the main issue.  And since remainers were obviously not too concerned either, one wonders where Nigel Farage's famous poster came from or why Vote Leave focused so much on Turkey's supposed immediate accession.

Mr Johnson has said he is in favour of immigration but simply wants to control the type of person allowed in.  This will have absolutely no effect on school places or the claimed pressures on the NHS and will create endless problems about who will actually make the decision to allow any particular person in.  It looks like a bureaucratic nightmare. 

In an article full of other totally unfounded assertions, he said, "We had one Scotland referendum in 2014, and I do not detect any real appetite to have another one soon".  Really?   One wonders what planet Boris looks like when you see what Scotland's First Minister was doing while he wrote the article (see HERE).

Moody’s Credit Reference Agency cuts UK’s credit outlook to negative

After Standard and Poor, one of the world's largest credit reference agencies, said during the campaign that they would downgrade the UK’s credit rating “immediately”  if we vote Brexit, another, Moody’s (see HERE) has now confirmed they have already reduce our AAA status to negative, meaning the next probable move is downwards.  This will potentially lead to higher interest payments on our £1.7tn debt, already running at £43bn a year or £826 million a week.

Calais Mayor calls for border to come back to the UK

When someone suggested the UK border controls in Calais might have to come back to Dover, Vote Leave airily dismissed it as scaremongering and said it was a bilateral agreement that had nothing to do with the EU.

I am sure this is true but if you poison the relationship between the UK and the EU it is likely to affect everything and anything.

Now the mayor of Calais is suggesting (HERE) the 6000 refugees and immigrants stuck at the Sangatte camp should be able to travel to the UK before being checked.  Who can blame him?  What advantage is it to local French people to have this problem on their soil when they can simply let anyone that wants to travel get on a ferry to Dover?

Gerry Adams calls for a poll on uniting Ireland

The leader of Sinn Fein has called for a poll (HERE) to see what the Irish people think about uniting the 32 counties, leading potentially to Northern Ireland separating from the UK leaving England and Wales to go it alone.

This might have been unthinkable a few years ago but now?  Who knows?

Nicola Sturgeon announces the Scottish government is to look at legislation ahead of a new independence referendum

Scotland’s first minister, after a cabinet meeting Saturday morning (HERE), announces that she will begin framing legislation to lead to a second referendum about the separation of Scotland from the United Kingdom, bringing to an end a 300 year old partnership.

There is every chance that Scotland will this time vote to separate.

Vote Leave dismissed this as unlikely during the campaign but many now fear the break up of our United Kingdom.

The pound tumbles again on Monday 27th June on Asian markets

The BBC is reporting (HERE) this morning that the pound has taken another dip earlier as far eastern markets opened.

We may have to brace ourselves for regular news coverage like this.

There are liars and there is Boris Johnson and Michael Gove

Nick Cohen has written a scathing profile of Boris Johnson and Michael Gove for the Guardian stunningly describing them as liars (read it HERE) and describing how Johnson was twice sacked for telling lies. They have a journalist's (for that is what they were) attitude to facts and experts and consider any suggestion that their opinions might be wrong as tantamount to impertinence.

These two led the official Vote Leave campaign and stubbornly defended the £350m a week going to the NHS even though the government's own statistics authority had condemned it as "misleading". From earlier posts (HERE) we can see it is now all too clear that we were lied to.

Daniel Hannan appears on Newsnight and dismisses the suggestion that immigration will reduce to tens of thousands

The second central plank of Leave’s campaign was the suggestion that getting out of the EU would reduce the level of immigration to tens of thousands. What they constantly told us was that you couldn’t get immigration down to the tens of thousands while we were in the EU with the clear implication that leaving would achieve it (otherwise why link the two points?).  

They omitted to tell us they had no intention of trying even after we left.  A small detail that perhaps escaped some of the Leave voters’ notice.  Mr Hannan said he didn’t think “anyone” thought that they would get EU immigration down to the tens of thousands. Really?  What not even one or two people down the Dog & Duck?

When the voters understand the sheer deceit that has been practised on them I fear for some of the Leave campaigners.  There is going to be real anger.

Nigel Farage admits the £350m per week for the NHS claim was “a mistake”

Almost before his victory had been properly celebrated, Mr Farage appeared on national television and in an interview with ITV’s Susanna Reid, admitted the claim that leaving the EU would free up £350 million pound a week extra for the NHS was a mistake and there were “no guarantees”. Bear in mind this was the central plank of their argument and had been robustly defended by Vote Leave throughout the campaign. I assume Mr Farage thought it had accidentally been painted in 1m high letters down the side of the Vote Leave bus. He obviously forgot to mention this during the campaign whenever the media questioned its veracity.

Today Ian Duncan Smith appeared on Sky News and in connection with the £350m figure claimed, "I never said that during the course of the election [sic]". So although both men knew the figure was untrue they didn't mention it. Remember, IDS was the person who accused the chancellor of being like pinocchio. 

I wonder what those voters for whom the £350m was an important factor think now?

A decent man and a good prime minister resigns

A prime minister who nails his colours to the mast, even if he has logic, rational thinking, thousands of experts and all the arguments stacked up in his favour against those of his unscrupulous opponents has to go after a defeat like Brexit. So we have lost the conservatives’ best electoral asset, and he will almost certainly be replaced by Boris Johnson, which is of course always what was intended.

Mr Cameron will not be the last casualty of Brexit but many others will be ordinary people who will lose their jobs and services as the economy judders to a halt.

Remain voters can perhaps take a little comfort in knowing that as the huge promises are revealed to be completely overblown if not totally misleading, over the coming days, weeks and months we can only hope Boris will eventually become the most reviled politician in the land, closely followed by Michael Gove.

The aftermath of Brexit

Boris Johnson told us that if we Vote Leave we will “Prosper like never before”.  I now get the joke.  Prosper like never before. Get it?  As in nobody ever “prospered” by becoming progressively more impoverished as jobs and business disappear to the continent and the kingdom is divided back into it’s constituent parts, all diminished into smaller, poorer and weaker nations.

How appropriate it would be if he became Prime Minister and had to clear up an unholy mess of his own making while trying to convince everybody who voted Leave that the slow death of a once great country and the potential breaking up of an entire continent was actually a good thing and well worth it if it advanced the careers of two charlatans like him and Michael Gove.  I look forward to the day he finally admits that all his mendacious bluster in the EU campaign was – well just that empty, vacuous bluster.

Since the result was announced, let us look at the steady stream of news coming in of how we will “prosper like never before”