Quote of the day 27th November 2016
Nick Herbert on his visit to flood hit areas of Cumbria
Please note that the post below was published more than ten year ago on 21st November 2009 Nick Herbert MP, shadow cabinet member for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, was in Cumbria this morning to see the areas affected by the flooding. He writes on Conservative Home about his visit. Here is an extract. I’ve been in Cumbria today to see the areas affected by the floods. I arrived early in Keswick where I met officials from the Environment Agency. Although the river levels had fallen considerably and homes were no longer flooded, the damage to homes had been done. And the water which had got into houses wasn’t just from the river – it was foul water which had risen from the drains. I talked to fire crews who were pumping flood water back into the river, and discovered that they were from Tyne & Wear and Lancashire. They had been called in at an hours’ notice and had been working on the scene ever since, staying at a local hotel. You cannot fail to be impressed by the
Comments
As you know for quite a number of years I have wanted to leave the EU, though during the referendum campaign there seemed to me no one more determine to ensure the vote went to "remain" than "vote Leave" (the official leave campaign).
As it happened the Leave vote did win. Well to be honest I still am not convinced Vote Leave won it i just think they were not as good at losing it as were the remain campaign.
During the run up to the referendum, the leave alliance (the only group campaigning for exit who actually did produce an exit plan) repeatedly stated that the lack of an exit plan from the main stream campaign was a fatal mistake.
Vote leave point blank refused to have one, primarily because they could not agree on what it was they wanted.
- though to be fair, neither could the leave alliance - so TLA simply went for what was possible, what was politically doable, and what as a smooth an exit as possible, and went from there.
anyway, vote leave ultimately decided that their job was to win the referendum (as it was and like I say they didn't really do that, they just did not lose it as well as the remain campaign) but exactly how we leave should be a matter for government. This was pretty much the mantra of vote leave.
so now we have voted leave, and the referendum is over and yesterdays news. So are vote leave. But the thing is now the government have been forced to deliver Brexit, no plan was offered (from the official leave campaigners) so the government have to come up with one. Quite naturally the government start by looking at what is possible, what is politically doable, and what gives as a smooth an exit as possible. Guess where they end up?
Marvelous huh? - though now the main opposition to this is coming from a hard Brexit Tory backbench, stating that remaining in the EEA would be a betrayal of everyone who voted to leave the EU.
You see my point, its the "friendly fire" that is the most dangerous to a successful Brexit
It was a terrible mistake on the part of the leave campaign not to spell out more clearly what they wanted Brexit to mean.
You can argue that David Cameron's government should have produced a Leave plan,
The reason I don't buy that argument is that if the government had published such a plan the Leave campaign and pro-Brexit wing of the Conservatives would have gone bonkers about it and said - quite reasonably - that it was for Leave supporters to spell out what leave meant.
So now the government has to devise a plan they can negotiate with the EU which will meet as many as possible of the aspirations of the 52%, as many as possible of the concerns of the 48%, and has a chance of getting agreed by the people who need to agree it. I'm not surprised Theresa May says she is not getting much sleep.