Hacker News Reader

Comment by yabatopia | Hacker News Reader

I wouldn't call someone who needs a nationwide referendum to silence opposition within his own party a very good leader.

View on HN

It wasn't just to silence opposition within his own party. It was also to stop the haemorrhaging of support from all mainstream parties towards UKIP.

It was a reasonable gamble that failed.

Yes, people forget that he'd already had two MPs jump ship to UKIP. If he hadn't promised a referendum the party would've split down the middle.

What I don't get, and didn't get with the Scots referendum either, is why on earth they didn't require a super-majority? Surely with something as critical as this, you'd want a bit more convincing than a 2% margin?

It doesn't have to be a 3/4ths or even 2/3rds, but a 60.1/39.9 split would've been nicely convincing that one side is definitely in a minority. Instead we've just proven once again that the UK is fractured politically North/South/Scotland/NI/etc.

> If he hadn't promised a referendum the party would've split down the middle.

And now you have a country split down the middle.

Yep, not Britain's finest hour at the moment. Scotland have already begun the process for a 2nd independence referendum and will probably win it this time. Northern Ireland are likely to follow.

In 5 years time we'll just be talking about England alone. With maybe Cornwall and the North splitting from London and the South East.

Might be time to dig up my Scottish ancestry and get a dual passport...

Don't forget Spain claiming Gibraltar.

The odd thing is that after all the years of being staunchly British, Gibraltar might well accept. They were 95% in favour of the EU. Having that border heavily restricted will be a nightmare for them.

Yes, I think this will happen and likely it will happen on a much shorter time-scale than a Scottish vote for independence and entry into the EU.

I would wait a bit to see how things go for UK because Spain current situation isn't that good either.

Spain will try to block Scotland entering the EU, to fend off Catalonian separatism.

If the Scottish independence referendum had resulted in Scotland gaining independence from the UK (like Spain, then a EU country) and then applied to join, there might be a reason for Spain to worry, as that roughly mirrors the situation with Catalonia.

If there's another Scottish independence referendum, Scotland would gain independence from a NON-EU country (UK) and then apply to join. This is similar to the situation with Slovenia, which gained independence from Yugoslavia and then joined the EU. Spain didn't veto that.

It's also possible that Scotland's independence happens before or simultaneously with the UK's exit, in which case Scotland could remain a EU member by continuity. This would also be a good lifeline for the rest of the UK once they recover from their spell of madness - form a union with Scotland to sneak back in.

Another possibility is that we might have to hold an early general election now that Cameron has resigned. If the Conservatives lose, it's possible that the referendum loses it's legitimacy.

Very slim chance though, seeing as it was mostly the Labour heartland that voted for Leave.

There is already talk about a second referendum and a ton of support is behind it.

> Yes, people forget that he'd already had two MPs jump ship to UKIP. If he hadn't promised a referendum the party would've split down the middle.

Arguably, allowing a partisan realignment wherein people would vote for representatives balancing views on the EU with other policy concerns would have been healthier for the nation (if more disruptive to the elites of the existing major parties) than trying to preserve the existing party structure by splitting out the EU issue to a referendum.

And, it probably would have been more likely to succeed at keeping the UK in the EU.

That's like saying betting the house on one of Germany, Italy, or Spain winning the Euro cup is a reasonable gamble.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com