UKC

... that the various leave campaigns not only lied, but may have broken the laws governing electoral campaigning by channelling money to each other, thus acting in concert? Does it matter that they engaged the services of Cambridge Analytica, AggregateIQ etc to profile and target voters in am unaccountable way on Facebook?

Indeed it matters not, per Nick Robinson on yesterday's TODAY programme.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09wpmrn (at time 2 hrs 21 minutes into his mission)

when interviewing Chris Wiley he seeks to crush the story with all his might, interrupting and belittling him constantly.  Why did I feel really uncomfortable that he seemed to be suppressing further investigation of what is really quite an explosive story of a subversion of what we think is democratic process, but one that was forced on us by Leavers.  But as one of his favourite words is "Remoaner", - I've heard him use it on numerous occasions and also allow its use by interviewees without any challenge, I should not be surprised.

Been watching Babylon 5 since the beginning on Pick and it is amazing how prescient it seems of today's politics and shennanigans, but then the main actress, Mira Furlan,  had fled from the breaking up Yugoslavia so perhaps the stories were spoken with feeling.

Yes

Dave

If a tree falls in a forest, is Brexit to blame.

Quite possibly...

"Deforestation could become easier although other UK law such as Felling Licences and non - regulatory processes such as certification could limit the impact ."

http://www.confor.org.uk/media/246192/the-impact-of-leaving-the-eu-on-the-u...

Are you saying that these people were casting about looking for a way to commit fraud against democracy and we are therefore blaming Brexit for providing them with an opportunity so to do?  Coz that seemz 2 be ur logik m8.

Join the other bots:

youtube.com/watch?v=WH-ycguHLBU&

Does it matter for the referendum vote and Brexit? Possibly. It's hard to say how much impact all these things had. But it's the wider implications for democracy that are more important. The Observer editorial last weekend said this:

"The Observer has made no secret of its belief that Brexit is not in the national interest. But asking questions about transparency and fairness is driven not by a partisan wish to overturn a referendum result, but the desire for a critical debate about whether our electoral laws, and ultimately our democracy, remain fit for purpose. Left or right; remain or leave: this debate concerns democrats from all political traditions."

I think that's about right. 

Yes.  If you or I break the law and get caught, we are subject to the due processes of assesment and where appropriate, trial, conviction and punishment.  We are all equal under the law and if laws have been broken in this case, then due process should apply to the individuals and companies involved.

Whether this has a bearing on the result of the referendum is an entirely different matter and it would be best if the two were not conflated.

T.

It's rather good, as we lose our European union citizenship and all the other shit, that we can be happy in the thought that we were brought to this by such well meaning people

not conflated ....

You must be Nick Robinson.

Do you really think that if a bad situation  is engineered dishonestly that you can accuse someone of "conflation" by being concerned both with the fraud and the toxic result?

So if someone defrauds you of your savings you should not "conflate" the crime, the act and the intent, with its results, or attempted results?

I know you're being sarcastic, but I'm not sure that 'Fish-chucker' Farage and his cohorts could ever be described as 'well-meaning'!

"Does it matter"?

youtube.com/watch?v=VAag-nlCJQ0&

The Rock doesn't think so.

Are you sure this was an accusation? There is a good case for not conflating the two. That's what the Observer was saying in that quote above. This is not simply about Brexit. There may well be a case for the Brexit campaign to answer, but you can still separate that out from wider concerns about the well-being of democracy. 

It doesn’t matter that they used Cambridge Analtica or Facebook. What matters is that there was more than one organisation campaigning for Leave. If we are going to put a ceiling on the amount of money that political campaigns can spend then leave and remain should have both had the same limits no matter how many organisations each had. 

In a general election could the Conservatives stick to their spending limit but then another organisation called Vote Conservative for instance then spend an equal amount of money thus leagally doubling their spend?

Yes. The referendum had little democratic legitimacy before and almost none now.

No I was saying that nothing negative gets past the UKC; "I must start another Brexit thread" filter for some.

Indeed.

You are right, it shows what an ill conceived, badly planned, unprepared enterprise the whole thing was. David Cameron should take the rap for what has been the most stupid political risk taken in living memory.

Kind of irrelevant. Teethless eu wouldn't act anyway. 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/31/poland-continue-logging-biaow...

So the EU had too much control or too little? I’m losing track now.

Depends where you are seeing it from, the countries which willingly obey every regulation are at a disadvantage to those nations which largely ignore them. The eu then fails to act to enforce their own regulations, be it farming, forestry, refugee quotas..    

The nations which seem to ignore dirctives and quotas are often all net financial beneficiaries of eu funds. I think many law abiding nations which are also net financial contributors are being taken for a ride. 

Enforcing every spit and comma of the regs was our choice. And how many of those 'rules' were actually real. 'It's an EU regulation' is a catchall for  enforcing whatever whim some jobsworth, shopkeeper or cafe owner wants. I've have often found that if you challenge  people over so-called 'EU rules' they pretty quickly back down. A regular was dogs in cafes and pubs- that regularly came up as 'against EU rules'

Any body notice that Remain spent twice as much as Leave?

A bit like your original point about trees then I suppose.  

Not so much toothless as slow:

https://www.politico.eu/article/ecj-adviser-increased-logging-in-bialowiesz...

Do you have any sources for this? Or just a few cherry picked cases?

Just wait till we leave. You’ll know what being taken advantage of really means.

Citation needed.

Where's that s*it Cameron at the moment, I wonder?

According to the electoral commission the various Brexit campaigners spend considerably less (£6m) than they received in donations, or at least they have not provided the required evidence of what they spent it on to the electoral commission. I wonder what they did with that £6m? The Brexit/Leave campaign was marginally better funded than the Remain campaign £16m vs £15m, again based on electoral commission numbers.

Another, around 2 years ago the regulations of pig housing changed. This was decided around 10 years so the lead in time was around 8 years. Many countries including the UK were 95+% compliant on the said date, others were less than 50% despite years of warning. Clearly this makes it an unfair market as the production costs in one country are much higher than another.

The eu answer; fines, less CAP, export ban..... no they moved the date again to pretend everything is fine; whilst farmers who had spent thousands were disadvantaged for years. 

To say the eu is slow would be an understatement. How long will the eu take to get a grip of Poland which ignores regulations left right and centre. 

So you agree that the EU isn’t toothless as you claimed, just slow?

Toothless. It moves goalposts to avoid taking action. When I actually see some form of punishment towards say Poland for all it's many infringements, or with the refugee problems against most of eastern Europe I will change my view. By the time the eu has tried to do anything, the problem will have passed and nothing will happen. 

Surely even remainers are under no illusions that certain countries have shown themselves far less inclined to obey directives. Remain or leave has never been good vs bad, there are plenty of problems with the EU and it's surely a lesser of two evils argument?

Oh, it's definitely work in progress. I just don't think that it's accurate or useful to make massive generalisations like claiming the EU is toothless simply on the basis of a few cases. There is actually data out there that can give a better idea of the position, and the EU works with non-compliance, for example this report:

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-17-1846_en.htm

It's clear from this that there's a lot to be done, but they appear to be aware of the problems and working to address them. And as you say, it's the lesser of two evils. 

The problem is not actually 'it', by which I presume you mean the EU bureaucracy. It's that the EU's structure allows individual member nations a veto. So in the case of Poland's recent court reforms the members of the Visegrad group vowed to veto any attempts at punishment. 

Of course one of the main planks of the Leave campaign was that individual nations were under the thumb of the mighty EU bureaucracy...

HM Government sent "vote remain" leaflets to every voter.  I don't think this expenditure was counted as part of the remain campaign's spending.

While it does look as if the various leave campaigns employed some questionable tactics to get around the spending limits, I doubt they add up to more than the remain + HM Gov spending combined so I don't really see the problem.

That said, perhaps rules should be more tighter and clearer in future campaigns.

The problem is that the Leave campaign is being accused of outright illegal behaviour, as opposed to the Conservative Government's arguably unfair use of £9m to fund its mailshot. This wasn't illegal in that it was issued before the referendum spending guidelines came into play. 

These allegations are so shocking it is clear we should have a full public enquiry and defer any police investigation or public comments until it reports.  First we should spend about a year arguing about which retired high court judge that just happens to live across the road from a minister should chair it.  Then we should hire about 100 high priced QCs who happen to be friends of said retired high court judge and rent some expensive office space in London from one of our property developer mates.  After that we can spend about 5 years getting full testimony from everyone involved and another three years writing a report.  Of course, to be fair we then need to privately circulate the draft report to get comments from all affected parties.and argue to and fro with their lawyers for another 5 years.  By coincidence this allows plenty of time for anyone important who might be implicated to either retire or die.  Finally we can publish a damning report with a huge list of recommendations which can be safely ignored because nobody cares any more.

Punishment is easy. No CAP payment. No development loans, no development grants etc.. until full compliance.

As I said teethless. All talk and no action. 

You've missed the point. The EU can't act outside of its own political and legal structure. There is the approval of individual nations to consider, and there is legal process, via the Court of Justice. 

So what you saying is it's pretty pointless. Law abiding wealthy nations can plough their money in, whilst others milk it dry and there is nothing that they can do about it?

I think it does matter *if* it turns out the laws supposed to protect our democracy are being flouted with impunity, there's little enough respect for the legitimacy of election outcomes already (by design with FPTP) before you have people wondering who cheated to get their place/result. I'm willing to wait for that 'if' to be properly addressed but not willing to shrug it off as just one of those things if the answer is 'yes the rules were flouted'. If that is the case then those who broke the law need to be brought to justice and if that process turns out to be as difficult and ultimately toothless as I fear the law itself needs re-examining to make it both fit for the era in which it is applied and muscular enough to deter future individuals from playing fast and loose in what is a high stakes game with big rewards for cheats.

jk

If you just can avoid the spending limits by just doing it the day before, or setting up another group that spends more money that's not officially associated with the campaign group what's the point in the limits?

The state funding one side being okay, but private citizens spending a much smaller amount the next day being a despicable crime doesn't really make sense.

Having said that the law's the law, and should be enforced equally.

Not at all. I can't see anything in what I've said that could lead you to that conclusion. What's this fantasy about other nations 'milking the EU dry' anyway? What does that actually mean? Is the EU bankrupt and we've never been told? Which nations have milked the EU dry? And what's it got to do with non-compliance with EU directives? 

So poland a net recipient of eu funds, ignores farming directives but still gets CAP. Chops down ancient forest against eu directives.... ignores eu refugee quotas etc.. etc..  

So no the eu isn't bankrupt, but can you name a year where it didn't vote to increase it's budget? It was either 15 or 16 and it had to go to nations asking for extra funds mid term as it couldn't meet it's obligations. 

The connection; why should the eu keep handing over money if countries are not abiding with the regulations? 

You keep shifting the basis of your argument and ignoring what I've already said. Not a very creditable tactic. In several of the cases you've mentioned the EU is in the process of taking legal action. It's not fast enough for you, that's all.

In process!!!. But nothing has happened yet that has forced them to follow the regs. In the case of other older things like cap they moved the goalposts, so again offending nations won't ever be held accountable. They took the money without following the rules and got away with it. Win win for countries like poland, Hungary etc..  

A crime is a crime isn't it? You don't get special dispensation to commit a crime because you're a private citizen do you? 

It's also worth pointing out that the Leave campaign had surplus cash that they didn't spend, so were less disadvantaged than you're implying. (I don't know what happened to that btw. Anyone know?)

This is all evidence-free. I've looked for cases where the EU moved the goalposts to avoid having to prosecute but I haven't found anything. Please give referenced cases.

https://www.compassioninfoodbusiness.com/our-news/2013/01/group-housing-for...

https://www.google.se/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://m.thepigsite.com/news/38788&ved=0ahUKEwjX3aCstY_aAhXOb1AKHQROAv0...

I did say the law is the law.  The government should not have been contributing to either side full stop, so it's much worse their using (my) tax funds to support one side than private citizens doing so.

My point was that this law where contributions/spending on day 0 can be of any amount but contributions on day 1 are limited seems a bit daft, especially when it can be got around by non-official theoretically unrelated campaigns.  Seems like all the accusation is that they failed to follow the right procedures (splitting the groups properly), not that they gained advantage by spending more.

The government is a structure that exists to govern the country in the best interests of the population, not to carry out the Volkswille excepting insofar as they have made pledges in their election manifesto.  Even in that case there is an argument in those not carrying much weight as the manifesto is a bundle designed to have wide appeal and any single element cannot be proved to have the support of a majority of the electorate.

If the government felt that Remain was the option in the best interests of the people then it was indeed right and proper for them to seek to achieve a Remain vote.  An incompetent campaign does not cause a Leave decision suddenly to be in the National Interest.

Do you think, you who say "Bad Losers" (in this "game" whose rules were never agreed), that we should just get over electoral fraud and undermining of our representative democracy as as well as just "getting over" the disaster that has been inflicted on our country?

If you do, Good Luck with that ...

But you have to draw a line somewhere don't you? How would a free-for-all work?

Seems like all the accusation is that they failed to follow the right procedures (splitting the groups properly), not that they gained advantage by spending more.

Failed to follow the right procedures in this case means failed to follow the law (allegedly - the Electoral Commission has yet to decide).

If the procedure is just that X has to spend rather than Y then it’s no real restriction on spending and there is a free for all in practice.  Yes the procedure is law.

My understanding is that government promised a free and fair referendum.  If they use the machinery of government to ensure (granted, they failed) one result they’re not sticking to their promise and it’s no more ok for them to do it than for Putin to do it.

free and fair in process would not preclude acting in the national interest to try and persuade the electorate.  However, with such a useless crowd in power we might have been better off without them.  The Referendum was not even executed sensibly considering it was to be a major constitutional change for a Nation.   We simply aren't up to being in the big league so its understandable that a lot of people probably think we should just leave the game and take our ball home.

Perhaps I was educated in a different era of constitutional law but I felt astonished, ashamed and extremely worried at the improper way everything was conducted and so do many of my generation I've spoken to about it, trained lawyers and otherwise.

First reference is from 2013. No date on the second. Here's an update, undated but after 2016, that says that most countries have complied, and there are three claiming compliance but claims not validated yet.

https://www.ciwf.org.uk/our-campaigns/pigs/about-the-ban/

So, as I said, the EU is slow, not toothless. A good reason for being in the EU with a chance to pressure the Commission, rather than out. 

The trouble is there didn’t seem to be anyone competent in constituting the referendum, why was there no checking on the important ‘facts’ presented by each side, why were leave and remain campaigns allowed to fragment when there were only two voting options offered, why was there no discussion about the majority or turnout required to make such a major change? Why was no detail presented about what we actually voting for viz single market, customs union etc.

It’s because it wasn’t seriously done, it was done by a naïf idiot to silence a certain part of his party that had caused such trouble to many of his predecessors. He thought he’d win, nobody planned for a leave vote, he knew he’d made a massive f*ck up the morning after and decided to just piss off. In my opinion the guy should be convicted of something but I don’t know what.

Because these problems are perhaps more effectively tackled a different way in the long term by negotiation and diplomatic pressure rather than sanctions? One possibility, I'm sure others exist.

jk

Would you be happy for the tories to spend several million leafleting in favour of them being relected before the next election?  It'd be in the national interest (in their view, of course).  Presumably if the party in power had wanted to leave you'd have been happy for them to spend your money supporting that side too?

I do wonder when this was and what our constitution looked like in this golden era.  Care to share?

Who do you imagine would be the impartial body that would check these facts?  Who was going to force the different people supporting either side to work together?  There was a huge amount of information given by both sides and (just like in an election) it's up to us to sift through it and make our decision.  We weren't voting on the new trade agreement we're going to have, we were voting on keeping our membership of the EU.  That people find it difficult to disentangle those things in their mind is their problem.  The likely outcome on the single market (which is all that can possibly be said about future arrangements) was made very clear by the relevant people prior to the vote, no matter how much people try and pretend it wasn't after the fact.

That is quite simply untrue. I recall this very well as I entered the campaign as a very persuadable Leaver but as it progressed it became ever more clear that the Leave side had absolutely no idea, let alone a plan or vision of what they were proposing. It was all waffly Canadian or perhaps Swiss or maybe somewhere else altogether  Micawber-esque 'something will turn up' tosh. The last word you could use for it is 'clear'

EU officials stated repeatedly that if we wouldn't sign up to the ECj (a basic of leaving the EU) then we couldn't be members of the single market.  There's no more clarity you can possibly have.

Edit - if you mean that it wasn't set out what deal would be agreed then, as above, you are asking for impossible, and that's not what the vote was about.

But what they said didn't matter did it  because if there was one thing the Leave campaign actually was 'very clear' about it was the we held all the cards and we would have whatever we wanted

Leave said the same.  Cameron said the same.  In any case what people are giving is their opinion on a thing that will/may happen in the future.  No one is able to tell you with any certainty what agreement will be made because that hasn't been decided yet.

I'm not disputing what people said, merely that your claim that the consequence of a Leave vote 'were made very clear' because, as indeed you now seem to be saying yourself, amid all the claim and counter claim the outcome was as clear as mud

"The likely outcome on the single market (which is all that can possibly be said about future arrangements) was made very clear by the relevant people prior to the vote"

"Nobody is talking about threatening to leave the single market" - Daniel Hannan, MEP and staunch leading Brexiteer

"Only a mad man would actually leave the single market" - Owen Paterson MP, hardline Brexiteer

Does that sound like outcome on the single market being made very clear  to you? Because it doesn't to me

The likely outcome was a Norway-like solution according to many of the 'relevant people. It certainly wasn't kamikaze Brexit. Here's some (more) quotes for you:

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/open-britain-video-single-market-nig...

Do you have any idea when those quotes are from?  I do, and I know what those people have said afterwards, and prior to the referendum.  They're also not from the relevant people.

Cherry picked quotes, no dates, not quoting from the main players.  About the standard that can be expected from the Huffingdon Post.

And some more

https://www.voteleavewatch.org.uk/leave_campaigners_try_to_drop_their_false...

Brexiters are natural liars.  It's like talking to the Russian government currently:  they know their lying, they know you know their lying, but they are going to carry on pretending they aren't  while pretending to have  legitimacy to force though the most extreme policies imaginable.

Remainers are naturally incapable of reading or understanding what's said it seems.  From the top:

"we would immediately be able to start negotiating new trade deals"

Not a promise, not incorrect - edit, actually I suppose you could take that as a promise, a promise not to be a part of agreements (ie the customs union) that block us from negotiating our own trade deals.

"When we Vote Leave we will be able to do trade deals with all of these countries much more quickly."

Not a promise, an opinion.

"Our trade will almost certainly continue with the EU on similar to current circumstances"

Not a promise, an opinion.

"Britain will have access to the Single Market after we vote leave"

access to, and an opinion, not a promise.

Etc, etc, etc.

Who do you think are the relevant people? The article I posted had Nigel Farage and Aaron Banks, Leave EU founder, amongst others. It's obvious from the article that they changed their tune after the High Court Article 50 ruling. 

I've just re-read the pamphlet they funded out of curiosity. After so much Leave and May government bullshit it's refreshingly honest, and indeed prescient. It looks like an artefact from another era

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/5...

It's the government's job to act in the national interest, they've failed miserably since and their mailshot may very well have actually been counterproductive given how many just wanted to 'stick it to that prick Cameron' but I applaud the effort.

jk

Find some quotes supporting your position then.

The article is not worth the non-existent paper it's printed on.  It's not journalism, it's propaganda.

The relevant people are those in charge, those who are capable of making decisions.  Particularly the EU officials who make these decisions and were categorical that membership is not allowed without our being subject to the ECj.  From the UK - Cameron, Johnson, Osborne, etc.  The quotes from Farage that are being used to pretend that he was asking for a copy of the Norway agreement are out of context and don't explain that what he was doing was saying that not being in the EU isn't terrible, it's common.  They could have quoted him referring to Canada instead, he did that quite a lot prior to the referendum.  They didn't quote any of these things because the quotes wouldn't create the story that they want to show.

Same questions to you.  If they were in favour of leaving what would you say about the government spending your money on campaigning for it?

Not really. It's clear that the Leave people quoted were making assertions as to what would happen. They lied. And gratuitous insults make you look like you're losing the argument. 

I can't be bothered with a load of splitting hairs over defining these statements as promises or opinions. More important is that they are all so misleading they are effectively lies.

https://medium.com/@jamesforward/a-rebuttal-to-open-britain-vote-leave-neve...

Here you go.

Given the endless stream of bile from MG I think that's rather gentle.

You can't be bothered with accuracy and truth, and you've made your mind up.  You're free to do as you like, but distorting what someone has said and then calling them a liar based on that distortion doesn't make them actually a liar.

It's based on real quotes from real people. 

If you wanted to direct your insult at MG you should have done so. You didn't. 

Thanks. That's better. I'll let Nige off the hook. Not convinced by all the others, Hannan in particular. But the Leave campaign made a point of not being clear about leaving the single market, as in their use of the phrase 'access to'. This may have been disingenuous on their part but being charitable I think it's because like the rest of the Leave idea it hadn't actually been thought out. 

That does indeed show some quotes are unfairly taken out of context.  Disputing other quotes is just splitting hairs; they can fairly be taken to mean support for remaining within the single market or something so similar it makes no difference.  The list above I linked to however goes far beyond these quotes in showing the devious, dishonest approach of the leaves campaigns.  Money was promised for everything under the sun, which, even assuming the money save from the EU in some fantastic way out weight the losses, is deeply dishonest and amounts to a series of blatant lies that those delivering them must have know where lies.

I recall the leave campaign explaining endlessly prior to the referendum that by access to what they meant was access to, rather than membership of.  The words used were the words meant, not some other meaning that wasn't included in those words.  I really don't see how they can be blamed for others translating them to mean something other than what was actually said.  They were being used in response to a claim that all trade with the EU would end.

Apologies for referring to all remainers, but it gets really bloody irritating being insulted over and over and I responded in kind.

Accuracy and truth are exactly what I'm interested in. Go back to the source data (news coverage from the time). Making mealy mouthed excuses based on ambiguous phrases etc is dishonest and unhelpful.

They didn't have a clue what they could promise so they made misleading statements, they promised stuff even if they didn't have a clue that it was remotely possible. Perhaps lie is too purposeful a word. They were bullshitters instead. 

You've snipped the relevant start and end off that FFS! Do you even believe what you're writing?

In full:  “After we Vote Leave, we would immediately be able to start negotiating new trade deals with emerging economies and the world’s biggest economies (the US, China and Japan, as well as Canada, Australia, South Korea, New Zealand, and so on), which could enter into force immediately after the UK leaves the EU.”

We've voted leave, we've triggered Article50, it hasn't happened. A tenner says none of those deals are ready to be signed a year from now. A fiver none of them are ready after the additional what is it 19months. Of course the EU has beaten us to the deal with Canada and Japan so we might be able to get those back out of the shredder then make some concessions to see if they'll let us re-use the basic frameworks so you might get your fiver but at what cost...

Diminished access would have been an honest prediction. 'Access' is deliberately misleading by omission knowing full well most will look or think no further than the headline. May has been playing the same trick today saying we'll stop sending money to the EU when we leave (eventually and some not all the money) and that there will be money to spend on schools and hospitals when that happens (less, not more by almost all forecasts) but still the soundbite puts a pretty slick spin on the brexit turd.

Do you enjoy being taken for a fool, having to defend this bullshit as if it's a reasonable way of communicating with people, saying often the opposite of what they mean in weasel words that sound right to the casual listener? That really puzzles me, I couldn't, it's badly undermining our democracy and it's demeaning to be the target of 'communication' like this let alone to be the one defending it.

jk

If leaving were in the public interest I'd be all for it. It isn't.

If they'd spent public money campaigning for the party interest and against public interest that'd be a different matter. Likewise had they deceived the public to promote remain.

jk

Yes this makes me sad. And yet it has been branded 'project fear' by the cake and eat it brigade. Seems very restrained to me.

If the government had been in favour of leaving the EU, they would not have needed to have a referendum. Remember the referendum itself was only advisory.

They promised the referendum, but government policy was that the EU is good for you. Out side the the campaign period governed by the electoral commission, in many ways it is no different to public health, pension or consumer information being sent to households.

If I remember rightly the official Leave campaign in particular was very vague about what they meant about access to/membership of the single market. For what it's worth, I don't think the Remain campaign was immune to ingenuousness either. George Osborne's emergency Budget prediction wasn't exactly a high point of truth and honesty in campaigning.

Here's some more porkies, from both sides, for your entertainment:

https://www.independent.co.uk/infact/brexit-second-referendum-false-claims-... 

Was that because the BoE did a bit of quantitive easing instead so he didn't need to and also he quit anyway?

I guess as we haven't actually left yet we don't know. I can't remember when he said we'd need an emergency budget. It may be that the pain will be spread over a few years and not cause a sharp economic crisis of the kind that requires an emergency budget.