[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Chris

Quite.

While I’m sure a few people on here will be taken in by your pomposity, I’m confident most will spot this little segue for what it is. We have only ever held one constitutional referendum in this country with even a quorum clause and it wasn’t the 1975 EU vote. As you’re such a fan of looking stuff up on the internet I’ll leave you to work out which one it was and why it, or anything like it, hasn’t been repeated.

I won't rise to your childish baiting but thank you for proving my point.

---------- Post added at 22:07 ---------- Previous post was at 22:01 ----------

Originally Posted by Itshim

It is rare for any vote to have the majority of the voting population support ie over 50.1% of voters supporting it . Perhaps of those that vote yes but total that could no

Supermajorities do not need to be an arithmetic number they are more varied. See here for examples: https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Supermaj...upermajorities

What they do guard against is the ability of a vocal and well resourced minority hijacking decisions that impact large, nation-sized populations.

Here is a good example:

In 2016, the Constitution of Colorado was amended to require a 55% majority to pass new constitutional amendments by popular vote. It had previously been a simple majority

---------- Post added at 22:23 ---------- Previous post was at 22:07 ----------

Originally Posted by roughbeast

You are wrong. Corbyn would have led us out of the EU if he had become PM, despite the sentiments of the Labour Party as a whole. This makes your Corbyn point a moot one. I supported Corbyn's principled stance of honouring the referendum result, so what is your point about my attitude to democracy? Do I detect binary thinking on your part? If I am not wholly in a agreement with you, I must therefore be wholly against you? There are shades of grey in human affairs you know.

The clause in the policing bill that gives police the right to ban marches that might be noisy is an attack on the right to protest. Noisy doesn't equate to disruptive.
https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/ho...rities-1407386


We have a long tradition of allowing marches, even if they are down main city roads. Police and marchers have, through cooperation usually ensured that marches are orderly and enable alternative routes for traffic etc. The consensus is that democracy is worth a bit of managed disruption. The government seeing the power of anti-Iraq war protests and the support for Remain marches, i.e. over 1 million. has decided that street protest might be a threat to them. They are looking for excuses to ban the lot.

In my experience, all protests are noisy. The word 'noisy' needs removing from the bill, and any word meaning noisy, because in the wrong hands it could be misused. Imagine if Farage's protest marches had been banned beforehand because they might be noisy. We would never hear the end of it.

If, on the other hand, protests involve criminal damage, violence, and even disruption that has not been negotiated between police and organisers, then the perpetrators should accept the consequences. We already have laws in place to deal with that. No change needed. If I joined an Insulate Britain, protest and glued myself to the road, I must accept my punishment for disrupting lives beyond the agreed limits. Banning protests beforehand should only occur if the protesting group is known for consistent law-breaking, criminal damage and violence against people. e.g. most EDL and Britain First marches, some Insulate Britain protests and the fringes of Farage marches and BLM marches.

In my time, the only violent protest I have been on was the one that became The Battle of Grosvenor Square. It was a march to the US embassy protesting the Vietnam War. I, a 21-year old, was one of those. who slipped through the police cordons and got as far as the embassy gates. I ended up in hospital having been whacked on the head by a member of the US military police. I was responsible for what happened to me, not the MP defending US territory. Oh, to be young and stupid again!

But Corbyn was conflicted and deceived many in the lead up the the referendum. He was always anti-Europe and always has been, mainly due to the limits placed on union powers by the EU. He saw the UK, out of the EU, as a place he could deliver his unfettered Socialist utopia. Although his naivety was evident to all except his inner circle of his "Jeremy, you are brilliant" cabal, he succeeded in hamstringing the Remain campaign which he was, on paper, a lead member. His lack of honesty, a common theme at the time, betrayed many of those he lead.

Your points about noisy protests is a good one. The police have said they already have the legal powers to address the issues this new bill pretends to address. The powers are clearly aimed to suppress legal opposition.