Would a referendum offer (I hesitate to use the word promise) be enough to collapse the UKIP vote at the GE sufficiently to get Cammo back in?

Miliband wants to stay in, we will see his smiling face drone on as he does telling us to stay in, or the smiling pair of ears of Blair telling us what will happen, and I think just because of those two I’d vote out.

A referendum which labour says it can win would be a dangerous game, what happens if it says out, would we then have another and another until we are back in, more then likely.

I cannot for the life of me see people listening to politician not now anyway and a lot may well vote no just to show these people we are the one with the power at referendums.

When push comes to shove I think people will vote to stay in the EU. We may not like it much just like most don’t like paying taxes but the consequences of staying out of the EU may not be what people want either.

I would vote for a referndum if someone gave me a poscard with a picture of a goat on t

@ cjcj,

“Would a referendum offer (I hesitate to use the word promise) be enough to collapse the UKIP vote at the GE sufficiently to get Cammo back in?”

In my opinion, no, although it may peg back the UKIP vote to an extent. But the Tories didn’t win the last election, needing the Lib Dems to prop them up, and I can only see the Tory vote sliding. If UKIP do well in the Euro elections, which I expect they will, then the question is; what will this do to the Tories? The grassroots are closer to UKIP in thinking than with Cameron and his metrosexual chums, although they remain tribally-loyal, but what if a handful of Tory MPs finally jumped ship?

Does it matter whether it is disasterous, terrible, brilliant, great, etc. for any political party, so long as the people of this country are given a say?

Should we not be more concerned with political freedom and democracy than stupid vote spinning?

I am amazed that a blog like LC who attests to the importance of democracy would rather this be about party politics, but then it has been said that socialism and democracy have but nothing in common except an ‘equality’ in restraint and servitude.

A couple of points.

Firstly, I don’t think any European referendum would be divisive for the Tories any longer. Except for a few hangovers from the days when dinosaurs roamed the earth, the Tories are pretty settled on an anti EU view. The only division is between the “leave now” and “negotiate for a looser union” factionss, and I don’t think the former would kick up a fuss about an attempt at negotiations, and I don’t think the latter would settle for minor, cosmetic changes.

Secondly the form of any referendum might be critical. There are a number of options:

Pre-negotiation between stay in on current terms, or negotiate and threaten to leave if they are unucessful. This has the advantage of concentrating the minds of the rest of the EU, but might lead to calls for a second referendum.

Several post-negotiation options:

Unsucessful negotiations. The Government says the terms are unsatisfactory and offers an in/out choice.

Sucessful negotions. The Government says the terms are satisfactory and offers an in/out choice.

Sucessful negotions. The Government offers an accept or status quo choice choice. In this case they could recommend either choice or, indeed, neither. This is the only case where the Tory party might kick up a fuss. Theey will insist on an option to leave, perhaps as a third choice.

Sunny

off-topic – but a few days ago you posted a Ben White article that smeared a guy named Patrick Sookhdeo.

You’ve now deleted that thread it seems – at least I couldn’t find it today.

I’d posted a question in it – whether you intended to offer an apology.

But as that thread is deleted – I’ll follow-up that question here – do you and Ben plan to offer an apology?

It looked like a pretty clear case of libel to me – so is not good for LC’s reputation if you allow that kind of article without an apology.

If nothing else, it would stop you taking the moral highground in your regular posts critical of the Daily Mail !

whoops – apologies – the original thread is still on LC…not sure why I’d missed it:

http://liberalconspiracy.org/2012/07/18/why-is-this-bigot-advising-the-british-army/

Mark, you make some good points but the position seems to be either we will be forced to have a refferendum based on a Treaty change related to closer union for the Eurozone, the rest of Europe will want a yes vote or will simply ignore us and do what is needed outside the treaty.

In terms of a UK initiated referendum, the Tories are split, you are right the Ken Clarke pro Euro faction is all but dead, but the rest of the party is split between those demanding a refferendum with an expectation of getting out, and a group who have not thought through the consequences of having a refferendum while they actually want to stay in.

“When push comes to shove I think people will vote to stay in the EU. We may not like it much just like most don’t like paying taxes but the consequences of staying out of the EU may not be what people want either.”

if that does happen, under that rationale, god help my faith in democracy and in the british people to exercise democracy, because after that, it wont exist in any existing form and the people voted to abolish democracy.