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Parliament must vote on whether the UK can start the process of leaving the EU, the High Court has ruled.
This means the government cannot trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty - beginning formal exit negotiations with the EU - on its own.
Theresa May says the referendum - and existing ministerial powers - mean MPs do not need to vote, but campaigners called this unconstitutional.
The government is appealing, with a further hearing expected next month.
- Rolling reaction to Article 50 court ruling
- Kuenssberg: Will this mean early election?
- The High Court's judgement in full
- Brexit: All you need to know
A statement is to be made to MPs on Monday but the prime minister's official spokesman said the government had "no intention of letting" the judgement "derail Article 50 or the timetable we have set out. We are determined to continue with our plan".
Plebiscites only count when plebes vote the way they're told.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by moondrake on Friday November 04 2016, @08:53AM
You seem to think a direct democracy is a good thing. I don't. At least not on a country level. I think most people simply lack the intelligence to decide on the faith of a country. You are right about the abuse thing, but I rather be governed by a politician that tries to enrich him/herself in the process (knowing that he cannot go to far or he'll be axed), than by a horde of morons who have no idea what they are doing (and have no accountability either).
Luckily, the UK is not a direct democracy, and disregarding the referendum would be completely within the power and rules of a representative democracy.
Also, the UK is no republic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 04 2016, @09:10AM
I think there are two major responses to this.
The first is that what you're saying is what everybody thinks because of a typical phenomena that everybody thinks everybody else is an idiot. In most polls of perceived intelligence in the US you'll find a ballpark of 90% of people thinking they're smarter than 50% of people and 50% of people think they're smarter than 90% of people. Look at the polls on actual policy issues. By and large the populace gets it right, quite often when politicians get it wrong. People are certainly subject to propaganda and advertising, but so are politicians, and it's easier to fool a few hundreds of people than a few hundreds of millions of people.
The second point is that politicians don't know what they're doing. I used to be somewhat conspiratorial in that I thought politicians were mostly acting stupid for rhetorical purposes - US popular culture is trending against intelligence and so acting a fool or at least, shall we say 'colloquially', was just a self marketing deception. But now that we have the sort of real access to politicians discussions and plannings that they expected to be held in confidence, it's clear that it's not an act. Our leaders are no better than the mean in terms of intelligence and worldview. In many ways I think their general trends of narcissism likely puts them slightly below the mean as narcissism tends to make objective considerations all but impossible. Even if I don't think highly of the public I'd take 300 million idiots coming to a decision over 300 idiots coming to a decision anytime. It removes the essence of personal corruption and transforms it onto a national in which case we can at least finally truly be held accountable for own actions as they actually would be our actions.
And as a final aside, there needn't be any reason we keep the current majority, let alone plurality, pass systems. Require 70% approval for anything to be passed and it ensure that only things that the vast majority of society, with all of its diversity of opinion and thought, supports would pass.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 04 2016, @10:35AM
Competent people are always a minority, except in the few things where incompetence prevents survival. And the nanny state ensures that those things are ever fewer. The populace's total incompetence is a crop that is carefully raised and nurtured.
To argue for simple democracy in our day, is simple. And representative of majority. ;)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 04 2016, @10:41AM
And as a final aside, there needn't be any reason we keep the current majority, let alone plurality, pass systems. Require 70% approval for anything to be passed and it ensure that only things that the vast majority of society, with all of its diversity of opinion and thought, supports would pass.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday November 04 2016, @02:28PM
Which is better, being ruled by a bunch of people flying by the seat of their pants and not knowing what they're doing, or being ruled by a group of very competent people who are in it just for themselves?
Pretty much the root question in this election, too :P
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 05 2016, @07:11AM
Again, read the emails. Hillary's own staff bemoan her ineptitude. One referencing her "not knowing which planet she's living in" in regards to her general disconnect with reality and lack of practical knowledge. Countless other emails make similar allusions. And Trump also isn't exactly mensa material either. And aside from their own staff finding them incompetent, their positions are far from nuanced or based on what they find objectively best. It all comes down to the fact that you're basing your opinion of them based on the one and only thing they're skilled at - image crafting.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by TheRaven on Friday November 04 2016, @12:39PM
I think most people simply lack the intelligence to decide on the faith of a country
I'm going to assume you meant fate there. I agree that direct democracy is a bad idea, but not for that reason. Direct democracy can far too easily descend into mob rule. The results from the Brexit referendum were a couple of percent apart. If 50%+1 of the population decide to disenfranchise 30%, that's fine in an unchecked direct democracy. You need some checks. If you require larger majorities, say 60%, then you can still be vulnerable to this but you're also vulnerable to whoever writes the question posing them in the way that the answer they want only needs 40%, the one that they don't needs 60%.
More importantly though, it's not about intelligence it's about time. Governing a modern country is hard. Ensuring that you're well informed on the relevant issues is a full-time job. It's debatable that our current representatives do a particularly good job at this, but they stand a far better chance than someone who is also working a full-time job.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday November 04 2016, @02:25PM
From my reading "faith" would also work: e.g. if the country in question switches over to direct democracy and the people start immediately throwing out treaties because "the fuck is this? this doesn't help us at all! get rid of it!" as I'm sure would happen.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by moondrake on Friday November 04 2016, @05:27PM
heh yes, sorry, meant fate. Though faith works somehow as tango says:)
I also guess that you formulated exactly what I meant much better. Perhaps it is frustration, or laziness on my part to equate intelligence with being informed of the situation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 04 2016, @06:31PM
You're not insightful, you're cynical. The general populace is perfectly capable of deciding a LOT of things, in fact we basically do so already every election cycle. I follow the 90/10 rule which says that 90% of human beings are generally decent good people, and 10% are liars and cheats. I would much prefer to bank on the 90% of good people than the politicians who end up almost exclusively in the 10% bucket after corruption settles in.
The US is big on self-determination, but apparently the will of the people makes no dent in actual US policy. Multiple wars the general populace doesn't like? Too bad, lets shoot some college protesters. People want us out of the middle east and to close gitmo? TOO BAD!
Yeah, fuck your idea of politicians being better, they are not held accountable and they steal the ability for our country to be one of conscience. This discussion pairs well with the recent trend in promoting dictatorships, not that I'm accusing you of doing so. There is a very real media campaign to disenfranchise people of their power, to make us feel dependent on government and corporations to keep us safe. Cheran is doing alright http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-37612083 [bbc.com]
I'm not a fan of 100% direct democracy for every little thing, but we need to move closer that direction instead of back towards oligarchy. Again, I'll take the mistakes of the general populace (which could be easily rolled back by another vote if things aren't working out) over the deliberate destruction / selling-out done by the usual politicians.
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Friday November 04 2016, @09:11PM
You're... looking at the proposed system from the wrong angle. Direct Democracy necessarily calls for the end of "countries" as we know them and the return to power of city-states and counties as the political backbone. Doing away with federalism and representative democracy means that decisions are made at the local level, not the "national" level, which would no longer have any real meaning. Also, most people are intelligent enough to decide most things for themselves, and the other questions aren't really a matter of intelligence but long-term thinking which is a cultural trait more than a personal one, and must be cultivated.