The true responsibility for Brexit

[jaywalker]

Sometimes I think I miss the obvious and am inclined just to lazily follow the self-evidences mirrored back to me by the media. Only the shock of brexit has made me think some more (no doubt not enough) about what led to this.

Apologies if this is obvious to everyone, but one thing that has belatedly occurred to me is that the anti-immigration vote (probably a large part of the brexit sensibility) was stirred up by the REMAIN government. Repeated promises to cut immigration were made (justified as being against the allegedly pernicious effects of immigration rather than to welcome immigration as culturally diversifying and a net gain to the economy). These were then always broken (as those speaking them knew they must): but this ADDED to the message.

It was then the home office (home of what is now the chief 'reluctant remainer') who sent vans round London in 2013 with messages plastered on the side almost as appalling as those deployed by UKIP in the referendum:

http://metro.co.uk/2013/10/22/go-home-illegal-immigrant-van-scheme-to-be-scrapped-theresa-may-admits-4156572/

[malumbu]

Nasty piece of advertising but this was about illegal immigration.

And... despite the failure of delivering promises was it really worth the risk of harm that leaving could result in (ie a disproportionate response to what could still be seen as something that the politicians could do more to sort?).

Good timing of thread as if you don't mind me broadening (and apols as this has no doubt been discussed before)

Did (a) Cameron lie on reducing net immigration

(b) was he poorly advised (my take)

© How was he going to achieve it

[Lordship 516]

Let's not forget that just 2 years ago, Cameron vociferously opposed the appointment of Jean-Claude Juncker as President of the EU commission. He did this all at the last minute when he ought to have foreseen what was happening much earlier and 'oiled' [like a good little Etonian] among the EU electors much earlier & stronger to get someone else nominated. There were plenty of countries not happy to appoint Juncker but Cameron & his buddies left it too late to marshal their opposition. Before the vote Cameron told EU leaders they may live to regret the appointment, warning them of the grave consequences for public opinion in Britain.

This was the man that he had to negotiate with to get concessions which he then based the referendum. Juncker owed Cameron no favours & he got precious little to bring home.

Also Cameron bounced himself into the referendum because he was trying to outflank Farage - that wasn't a problem. But he ought to have refused to hold the referendum on the grounds of national interest & also the timing not being conducive.

Then when he lost, he flounced out of No. 10 like a kid that has had his favoutite blanky stolen.

Not really PM material - all mouth & (no) trousers. I think all of the UK may live to regret the appointment of Cameron as Prime Minister as it certainly has had grave consequences for everyone here & Europe also. Quentin Davies MP, who defected from the Conservatives to Labour in 2007, branded him "superficial, unreliable and [with] an apparent lack of any clear convictions" - how correct he was.

The primary candidate that must bear responsibility for this debacle is the Rt. Hon David William Donald Cameron MP

[Robert Poste's Child]

Yes, but faultlines arguably go back to America's policy in the Middle East. Cameron's a short-term tactical operator and all about the soundbites so was never going to be up to being PM in these times. I'm not sure who is.

[uncleglen]

When Labour were in they removed a substantial number of immigration controls on non-european immigrants perhaps for nefarious reasons- and obviously did not consider the repercussions in their heartlands

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/7198329/Labours-secret-plan-to-lure-migrants.html

The first indication that the people were concerned should have been the 2006 local council elections when the BNP won 12 seats in Barking and Dagenham- but then the people of that area are poorly educated, they are not rich and wtf do they know eh?

[JoeLeg]

uncleglen Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

>

>

> The first indication that the people were

> concerned should have been the 2006 local council

> elections when the BNP won 12 seats in Barking and

> Dagenham- but then the people of that area are

> poorly educated, they are not rich and wtf do they

> know eh?

Did you, or would you, vote BNP? If not, why not?

[miga]

I wouldn't bother with questions JoeLeg, uncleglen is here for statements only.

[Earl Aelfheah]

I personally blame a combination of the press and the politicians who colluded with it. The Express, Mail, Sun etc. have been publishing ridiculous, often completely untrue stories about the EU for years and have also been ratcheting up the rhetoric around immigration and asylum for some time now. Politicians have seen fit to either leave it unchallenged, or to play to the fears being stoked for political advantage. You can't reverse decades of propaganda during the course of a short referendum campaign.

The public disgust at the phone hacking of murder victims and their families, bribing of police and other public officials and general amoral behaviour of the tabloids was a chance for change. The Leveson Inquiry was a chance for change. Cameron, who never seems to look further ahead than next week, decided not to grasp the once in a generation opportunity given to him to challenge Murdoch and Dacre and their destructive grip on public discourse.

[????]

do we have to start another bloody thread - we've about 20. Couldn't this have gone in one of them?

[WorkingMummy]

Feel free not to read.

[????]

i want to read but not in 17 different threads?

[tomdhu]

Lordship 516 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Not really PM material - all mouth & (no)

> trousers. I think all of the UK may live to

> regret the appointment of Cameron as Prime

> Minister as it certainly has had grave

> consequences for everyone here & Europe also.

> Quentin Davies MP, who defected from the

> Conservatives to Labour in 2007, branded him

> "superficial, unreliable and an apparent lack of

> any clear convictions" - how correct he was.

>

I agree 100% and here it is worth mentioning also how he has procrastinated over a decision on the Heathrow third runway. It keeps going back again and again. Isn't it something like 20 years now?

Furthermore, he has tried to mislead us over support for Turkey's EU application. He told us that it would never happen but then on his last visit to Turkey, he assured the Turks that he would ""pave the road all the way from Ankara to Brussels"". Duplicitous? Not half!