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Comment by mumblemumble | Hacker News Reader

It seems like it's well past time for a 2nd referendum. And I don't buy this hogwash about undercutting democracy and the people having spoken.

If my partner and I decide together to buy a car, and then find out later that we can only get financing at 20%, then it is no way disingenuous to have another talk about whether we really need a new car. On the contrary, I would be quite peeved if my partner went ahead and blithely signed a 20% loan for a car without further discussion, and defended that decision by saying, "We already talked about this."

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Exactly. The example I like to give is: imagine if the government held a referendum asking "do you want to pay less taxes, yes or no?". Yes wins(who wouldn't want to pay less taxes, right?), And then 3 years later the government says "ok, we'll slash taxes by 90% but we'll close the NHS and all public schools. You can go to the public sector for either, so it's all good. And remember, you voted yes, so holding another referendum to see if that's definitely what you want would be undemocratic now!".

A second referendum would not solve anything. The original referendum should not have been called by PM Cameron. The core issue is one of national English identity. Scotland has its own Scottish nationalist party. Wales has its own nationalist party. Northern Ireland has two nationalist parties for good measure. But English nationalists have had to take cover in the 'broad church' of the Conservative and Unionist Party, to give it its full title. The trouble is that the English nationalists have always chafed under what they see as the heavy yoke of EU regulations. The 'one nation Tories' / Unionists consider keeping the UK together as an important ideal. The two factions have been fighting within the party for decades. It has now come to a head. PM Johnson is going for a break with the EU 'do or die'. Scotland and NI did not have a majority for leaving however. It's a mess. It should not have happened. The UK is not Switzerland, it is a representative democracy, where Parliament is sovereign. As an unintended consequence the UK could break up in the coming years.

Any referendum that changes status quo in such a significant manner should need 2/3rds majority or atleast 60%.

Europe has long been the Conservative Party's kryptonite. I am almost surprised it took this long for the referendum to break them up, but you now have Ken Clarke kicked out of the Conservative party, along with people like Nicolas Soames, Churchill's grandson.

Ken Clarke has also been making statements that he would be willing to back Corbyn in a unity government.

We are in very strange political waters right now. But one thing that seems clear is that the Conservative and Unionist Party seems to be in rather deep existential trouble.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-soames/churchil...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/09/03/rebel-leader...

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/ken-clarke-says-h...

The original referendum in the 70s passed with 2/3rds vote, but they did not vote on what is today the modern EU. That occurred via feature creep. Your national identity and sovereignty should not be done in by feature creep.

The fact that the last referendum was so close should put increasing EU engagement at full stop to the feature creep. A big change should require a super majority vote to proceed, not a series of creeping measures over time.

It's not democracy if you repeat the process until you get the right answer then stop. And the EU has plenty of previous on this.

And you can argue that the facts on the ground have changed, but the powers offering the referendum are the ones changing the facts.

1.4M new voters would be newly eligible to vote.

Why should they be disenfranchised for a long time when they have to face the consequences for much of their lifetime, unlikely the very old?

Not to mention that there is no Brexit in heaven or hell, so the votes of the deceased shouldn't haunt people from their graves.

>And you can argue that the facts on the ground have changed, but the powers offering the referendum are the ones changing the facts

You mean like the 350 million pounds a year for NHS lie? Or the complete failure of the Brexiteers to offer a decent solution to the Irish border mess? How are those remainer's fault again?

What about the fact that the courts have found that the Brexit campaign violated campaign laws, and the reason a new referendum won't be forced is that the vote was non-binding?

Sounds like Brexiteers are actually afraid of democracy.

> 1.4M new voters would be newly eligible to vote.

That is an argument you can make for every election.

That is an argument you can make for every election.

And that is why we hold new elections every few years, instead of just sticking with the people we picked last time.

Holding a vote on a specific course of action when all other methods of deciding have failed is not "repeating until you get the right answer". It's not like the result had been ignored, it's dominated the political world for years now.

There was a vote, we've spent the last 3 years dealing with it and the result (the deal) was roundly rejected. "Ok, what now?" Is not an unreasonable question to ask people.

> And the EU has plenty of previous on this.

The EU didn't have anything to do with the calling of referendum.

The voices calling for a 2nd vote are inside the UK.

>the facts on the ground have changed,

The facts haven't changed, they've just been established for the first time - big difference.

Well can't we argue that the referendum was a flawed idea to begin with?

As commented above, it's like asking the voting public "Do you want lower taxes, yes or no?" That depends on an awful lot! How much lower? How is the decrease in revenue going to be handled? Will there be cuts? If so to what? Will there be a debt increase? Etc...

Do we want political decisions of this level of importance and complexity to be made through a process of vague referendums? Seems like madness to me.

The referendum just gone is the second referendum though. The first one on staying part of the European community and common market was in 1975.

Yeah when you frame it that way, it's one thing. However, what if two people agree to buy the car given all the available information. Then, one person changes their mind and the other doesn't? Person A keeps saying, "well, let's decide later" and keeps kicking the can down the road. Is that fair to person B, who originally had an agreement and never not wanted the car?

Not sure what relevance your metaphor has on Brexit since the voting public did not have "all the available information." Because no one could have possibly known what the terms of Brexit would be, because they would have to be negotiated.

Which was the problem with the referendum. As in the example comment above it was like asking "Do you want lower taxes?" Well that kind of depends on a lot of stuff. Are the lower taxes coming from budget cuts (if so, from what), debt increase, or what?

> since the voting public did not have "all the available information."

What information then was available but the public didn't know?

> Because no one could have possibly known what the terms of Brexit would be, because they would have to be negotiated.

So then it's fair to say that information was not available.

But here you're taking the analogy to making a financial decision within a domestic partnership and stretching it well past the breaking point.

Let's keep people A and B, but also add people C through CZZZZZ. And now we no longer need to frame it as an intractable argument between two people; we can recast it as an opportunity to re-survey all these people's opinion in order to see how everyone's opinion has changed in light of the new information that's been presented.

Your analogy also explains why Britain shouldn't be in the EU in the first place. People voted to join the EEC and then later on the terms of the agreement were changed as it morphed into the EU.

There has never been an explicit democratic mandate to cede sovereignty to the united states of Europe. The current clusterfuck is a result of that.

> On the contrary, I would be quite peeved if my partner went ahead and signed a 20% loan for a car without soliciting further discussion, and defended that decision by saying, "We already talked about this, and 20% is all the dealer was willing to offer."

Losing an election does not equate to not having a say.

Having a say before understanding the deal on offer is another matter though.

People don't understand any more about the deal (or lack of one) than they did before they voted. They've just been subjected to endless Y2K-scale hype for an extended period of time.

> People don't understand any more about the deal (or lack of one) than they did before they voted.

They now know the realities of a no-deal and the implications it will have.

That's a lot more than they knew before the vote.

Since the deal did not exist before the original vote, it would be hard for people to understand less about it now.

That's wrong and also an unnecessarily patronizing view of the intelligence of the people of the UK. People are smarter and have a better ability to learn complex topics than they get credit for. It's more a problem of garbage in garbage out.

That's the thing about any change in governance though...you fundamentally cannot know what will come out the other side.

Nobody wages war or starts a revolution knowing what the outcome will be either. That's the nature of change.

We're fortunate enough to live in a world where we can vote for change instead of kill for it.

None of that means I can't have a second say after two years and a better understanding of the repercussions. In HN speak I need to evaluate my trajectory and either pivot our stay the course. Just not allowing myself that freedom is just bad policy film a personal, business, or political perspective. People can and sometimes should have a chance to change their minds.

A political system has to survive the reality that some voters are stupid. Which voters are stupid is surely a point of contention, but in the climate where everyone is convinced of their righteousness, everyone thinks someone is stupid.

You cannot helicopter parent your voting populace. Otherwise votes just don't matter. If you feel that way, don't give people the right to vote in the first place.

Your political system has to provide an environment where the government (as in the will of the people) can safely fail at doing something important.

IMO, regardless of what is correct, a handful of insane politicians in the UK played a stupid game thinking they could avert a minor crisis and instead created a catastrophe. Those responsible should be pilloried and everyone should learn a great lesson from this. That said, I think that if the UK wants to remain intact, it is forced to take it on the chin and follow through with this.

Afterwards, the country can unite and pick up the pieces and fix it. The EU should also realize the opportunity it has here and be lenient.

The problem is that France and Germany can't stand the threat to their Union and will throw their weight around like the bullies they are. The Scandinavians will be convinced as always that they're just better than everyone else and let the UK suffer. The smaller EU countries simultaneously don't give a shit and also await the conclusion of this so they can see which way the wind blows.

I think if it goes up for referendum again, we'll actually see only 60% of the voter turnout of the last one. Could still go either way. In either case, the UK won't survive it. The only way forward is through.

No, I disagree completely. There's nothing wrong with having a chance to change your mind once you better understand what's at stake. This business of I chose two years ago and now I'm stuck is like if you chose a career and could never change it, or got married and could never get divorced. This is not helicopter parenting, it's just part of growing as a human being.

It's better to leave yourself open to having a different/better thought in the future. Incidentally that's my biggest problem with tattoos.

"you fundamentally cannot know what will come out the other side"

This is a baseless and false claim.

"Nobody wages war or starts a revolution knowing what the outcome will be either"

Even if true, this isn't relevant ... it cherry picks extremely chaotic changes to shore up a completely invalid argument.

"That's the nature of change."

No, it isn't ... well understood, predictable changes are executed all the time.

"We're fortunate enough to live in a world where we can vote for change instead of kill for it."

Not relevant.

>>"you fundamentally cannot know what will come out the other side" > This is a baseless and false claim.

Last I checked it's impossible to predict the future. Please educate me otherwise, because we'll make a fortune in the bond markets.

google "science"

Winning an advisory referendum with a 52% majority, doesn't always equate to parliament having to take the advice.

edit - people can disagree with me all they like, however I am not just making this up, so disagreeing with me will not make this go away.

Here is the 'Referendums in the United Kingdom - Constitution Committee', from the UK House of Lords;

'223. We recognise that because of the sovereignty of Parliament, referendums cannot be legally binding in the UK, and are therefore advisory. However, it would be difficult for Parliament to ignore a decisive expression of public opinion.'

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200910/ldselect/ldco...

I suppose you could try to argue that 52% is 'decisive'.

Non sequitur that has nothing to do with what's being discussed. Notably, a new referundum is about letting those who voted for the winner getting a greater say.

If that is the case, would it not be simpler, If the government simply dissolved the people And elected another?

> find out later that we can only get financing at 20%

Is that because someone decided you had to accept any deal the car salesman made?

Perhaps you should have had the option of walking away.

But in this example, 'not having a car' means that we can't get to our job on time, so we lose income.

Likewise, 'not being in the EU' means spending millions, possibly billions of pounds on lawyers to renegotiate deals (that we already have). We've already had to borrow lawyers from the EU because we do not have the legal manpower to enact Brexit!

The worst thing about this is that the position the UK will be in, means that it does not have a good standpoint for bargaining.

If the US loses trade deals with the UK, that's not terrible because the US still has trade deals with hundreds of other countries. If the UK loses trade deals with the US, that's catastrophic and puts us in a worse position for every other trade deal after that.

The entire reason why Asia sees Brexit as "an oppotunity"[1][2] is because Britain will be on the back foot for all trade deals, they can negotiate harder and we are in a compromising position.

[1]: https://asiahouse.org/india-sees-brexit-opportunity-indian-h...

[2]: https://www.worldfinance.com/home/asia-finds-post-brexit-opp...

And the salesperson loses income. Which is a pity as you buy cars pretty regularly.

It's almost like, I don't know, a bilateral trade agreement.

The UK is using lawyers from Europe, not from the EU, which is a political body. It's a very important distinction: the UK is withdrawing from a body where unelected people write laws, not making a xenophobic statement, despite people's attempts to frame it that way.

> the UK is withdrawing from a body where unelected people write laws

They are elected.

"A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_to_the_European_Parl...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_of_the_European_Parliam...

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/at-your-service/en/be-heard/el...

> not making a xenophobic statement, despite people's attempts to frame it that way.

Please explain why you think Joe Cox was murdered. Please explain why you think so many UKIP members are outed racists[0][1][2][3][4] (Notably, even Farage left UKIP because of the extremism). Please explain what you think the British National Front stands for.

0: https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2018/01/henry-bolto...

1: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/26/ukip-a...

2: https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/henry-bolton-ukip-racis...

3: https://www.itv.com/news/2018-12-04/former-ukip-leader-nigel...

4: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ukip-choking-racism-i...

MEPs don't write laws. You would know this with the bare minimum of research into the topic.

(List of random bad things)

I'll let you explain how those things are relevant. There will always be racists and crazy people. Mass immigration may create more of them if that's what you wish.

You also write about racism yet link to an article about Islam. Islam isn't a race, you can read more about it using an internet search engine.

> I'll let you explain how those things are relevant

I stated their relevance above.

> There will always be racists and crazy people.

Please explain why there has been a noticable increase in 'crazy people' and fascist ideologies in the public eye since the introduction of brexit.

> Mass immigration may create more of them if that's what you wish.

[citation needed]

> You also write about racism yet link to an article about Islam. Islam isn't a race, you can read more about it using an internet search engine.

You obviously haven't done the bare minimum of reading on why Islamaphobia is deeply related to racism and in most forms consititutes racism and systemic bias. There are some good overviews of the relationship between islamaphobia and racism in the following links:

https://newhumanist.org.uk/articles/2512/is-it-racist-to-cri...

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/taking-raci...

http://theconversation.com/why-uks-working-definition-of-isl...

What will the point of a 2nd referendum be?

Is it going to be another yes/no vote? If so, why not have a third, fourth, and fifth referendum, until you get the result you want?

Is it going to be a 'Deal/No deal/No', pick one vote? Why are you subdividing the "Yes" option, then? Why not subdivide the "No" option, too?

Is it going to be a two question vote, with 'Yes/No', and 'If Yes wins, Deal' and 'If Yes wins, no Deal'? I'm going to go out on a limb here, and say that you are not going to like the outcome of that one, either.

One thing I have trouble with understanding that in a normal democratic system all of us (I hope) reasonably expect that democracy and elections are a continuous process, a repeated game (I'd say without this repetition, we're not really talking about a democracy any more). I might vote for a certain party now hoping that they implement what they promise, or at least a substantial part of it that satisfies me as a voter.

They might also not, however. Sometimes voters get disappointed, change their ideas, viewpoints, or their personal life simply changes. No matter, the populace as a whole gets a chance to vote in new people and parties next time around. It's exactly this willingness to change one's viewpoint or political orientation which embodies the responsibility voters carry to maintain this democratic process.

Why is this referendum that fundamentally different? A lot of things have changed, a lot of issues have occurred. I also don't see why subdividing the options would be that harmful. Otherwise, following your reasoning, a two-party system would also be the best system in any democratic country (either this person, or that other fellow).

> A lot of things have changed, a lot of issues have occurred.

Have they?

The problem with this vision of a continuous process is an obvious one. The people (Parliament) who have both the power to call a referendum and to delay Brexit overwhelmingly support remain. There's nothing stopping them from delaying and holding referendums until they get the answer they want. Virtually none have made any effort to design any kind of a Brexit (other than May, who really came back with the most obvious and possible plan that anyone would have expected her to), which looks like they're planning to fail.

That Parliament is trying every possible way to cancel doing something they didn't want to do in the first place seems utterly unsurprising.

Britain had a bit of a sweetheart deal in the EU, anyway, it's no wonder that they aren't willing to give them an even better deal in some sort of half-exit.

The reason repeating referendum questions rubs people the wrong way is because you're changing the rules under them.

In a democracy, we know that an election will take place every 4 years/5 years/whenever the government fails a vote of confidence. Those are the rules, we vote for people with that expectation. (I also believe that representative democracy is rubbish, but that's neither here nor there.)

In a referendum, you are asked a question. Should Brexit happen, or not. Not 'Should Brexit happen, oh, and if we don't like the outcome, should we have another referendum?'

I supposed that technically, nothing about posing a referendum question precludes another referendum from taking place, before the first referendum is enacted into law. But can you imagine if, when we had an election, if the government didn't like the result, they'd just delay transitioning power to the winners, and would instead host another election? And another one? And another one, until they win?

It's also not clear that in the past three years, a single person living on the British Isles has changed their opinion on the matter of whether or not Brexit should actually happen.

"The reason repeating referendum questions rubs people the wrong way is because you're changing the rules under them."

No rules are being changed, and "people" is obviously too broad here.

"In a referendum, you are asked a question. Should Brexit happen, or not. Not 'Should Brexit happen, oh, and if we don't like the outcome, should we have another referendum?'"

Who is "we" here? The folks who want a new referendum are those who regret the outcome of the first one for various reasons, including being lied to.

"if the government didn't like the result, they'd just delay transitioning power to the winners, and would instead host another election? And another one? And another one, until they win?"

It's not "the government" who doesn't like the result. This framing is invalid, and frequently intentionally so.

"It's also not clear that in the past three years, a single person living on the British Isles has changed their opinion on the matter of whether or not Brexit should actually happen."

It is extremely clear that many have. If not, there wouldn't be so much pushback against another referendum.

It makes me think of Prohibition, in the US. We voted for it, then a while later we voted against it because we realized it was a bad idea. Nothing wrong with that. Having a second vote as a "wait, should we really do this?" seems fine to me.

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