MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Hague stepping down as Foreign Secretary; Hammond apparent replacement
William Hague is stepping down as UK Foreign Secretary, the government said on Monday, as Prime Minister David Cameron reshuffled his cabinet in an apparent attempt to build a winning team for the general election in May next year. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesI liked Hague in that role. He is a consummate diplomate and intelligent but he is at odds with the Tory Party's anti-EU policy and was planning to retire at the next election. He has moved to a place where he can finish his career at the top without compromising his future career. And he had a very lucrative career when he took a break from politics last time.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 07:21 am - Link - Report abuse 0Maybe he plans to run away with AJ? :)
I think this article has missed the real point to all of this. Cameron is lurching right and filling his cabinet full of eurosceptics because he now knows that we are not going to get a renegotiaton of treaties, Europe is not going to budge an inch on the main issue of free movement which is the one thing most people in the UK have had enough of.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 07:37 am - Link - Report abuse 0Also UKIP are going to get a massive share of the electoral vote next year which is going to devastate both the tory and labour vote. Labour have no chance with that wierdo Milliband and not offering the British public a referendum on Europe is a vote loser and my guess is the Labour will reverse that decision before the election,
I predict that the UK will be out of the EU within 3 years and I think that we will be followed by a few others in the fullness of time and France will be one of them.
Always thought William Hague was a determined and signed up member of the Eurosceptic wing of the Tory party.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 09:48 am - Link - Report abuse 0@3. Most of the British people are determined and signed-up members of the “Get US OUT” vote. Looking back over 42 years, we are still asking what the EU and its affiliates have done for US? It has loaded us up with laws, directives and so forth, most of which we didn't need. But they are “good” for lawyers. It has forced us to let people stay in OUR country that can best be described as murderers, rapists, hate preachers, paedophiles, drug bosses, gangsters, illegal immigrants and general filthy scum. It is to be hoped that, in the near future, there will be a “clean-up”. The blood swept down the gutters and into the drains for the “animal welfare” of the rats and maggots, and the corpses dropped far out at sea to help regenerate our fish stocks. 75% of our “laws” will be repealed as they weren't made for the benefit of the British people. Many scroungers, of all nationalities, will be swept up and deposited in Ethiopia and Somalia. “Mind you don't break a leg as you get booted out the back of an aircraft”. Saving £55 million a day. And another £16.5 billion a year when we get rid of scotchland. That's over £45 million a day. That's £100 million EVERY DAY. How could that be bad for Britain? We'll be able to double the size of our air force, army and navy. £36.5 billion a year. Enough money to build TWELVE QE-class aircraft carriers. A QE-class is about £3 billion. An Astute-class sub is 747 million. A Type 45 destroyer is about £1 billion. A Eurofighter Typhoon is about £125 million. A Challenger 2 main battle tank is a bit more than £4 million. Very warlike. But what has the EU done for US? When argieland attacked and occupied the Falkland Islands, where was the EU? Assistance came from the U.S. and New Zealand. Britain can do without the EU anytime!
Jul 15th, 2014 - 11:12 am - Link - Report abuse 0I think Hague has been an examplary Foriegn Secretary, my estimation of the man has certainly increased over the past few years. I have found Hague quite impressive in this role.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 11:44 am - Link - Report abuse 0Hammond seems like a good solid choice to replace him.
I don't think much of Dave tho. Theresa May has been good as Home Sec. I believe but Gove is an odious little toad. Good riddance!
@2 Britworker, I agree with your thoughts on Miliband but think UKIP has had its day in the sun. Good bit of fun with the Euro elections, ok, fair enough, but when it comes to Westminster I think the Brits will be far more cautious. UKIP might get one or two seats but no-one seriously wants these people to be running the whole show.
I also disagree that the UK will be out of Europe within 3 years, far too emeshed now.
I would prefer a different approach of accepting it as a means of keeping the peace, and as great economic power. Then teaming up blatantly with the Germans and announcing that from now on UK-Germany will be taking over and everyone had better well do as they are told.
PS to Mercopress, Kenneth Clarke has retired, not resigned, there is a difference! He was discussing this on Radio 4 this morning.
5
Jul 15th, 2014 - 12:19 pm - Link - Report abuse 0A lot of Brits in retrospect think the UK and Germany should have teamed up in 1939...the world would have been a more efficient and better run place....
Even Hitler believed they would have been allies...
Between them Nukes would have been developed quickly the Arab oil would have been available to them both and jet propulsion aircraft to dominate the world and radar to protect them...with the largest naval fleet ever...
The US would have been isolated and would never have become a superpower along with Russia...Japan would have kept China in check, but be kept on a short leash...
There would have been no threats from anyone....
6. I assume you're joking as I've never met a single Brit with that opinion.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 12:38 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@5
Jul 15th, 2014 - 12:46 pm - Link - Report abuse 0You are fundamentally wrong about UKIP, their support is massive and getting larger all the time and not just at the expense of the conservatives. They are working hard on their election manifesto as we speak.
Theresa May has not been a good Home Secretary, the police as we knew them in the UK are now all but demolished with thousands of officers demoralised and disinterested because their pensions have been raided. Many senior police officers have openly said and know that the service is grinding to a halt.
7
Jul 15th, 2014 - 01:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Let's take a look at a UK history website then...couple of quotes should suffice...
“A factor that helped Hitler was the attitude of the English. They felt that Germany had been very harshly treated at Versailles and there was a lot of sympathy for the German actions. The memory of the horrors of the First World War was also still very strong in Britain. They were also very anti-communist and worried more about Stalin.”
The Rhineland 1936
“The British were not prepared to take any action. There was a lot of sympathy in Britain for the German action. Without British support the French would not act. The French had built the Maignot line, a series of forts on the German border and felt secure behind it.”
”Hitler hoped that the news of the Pact with Russia would stop France and Britain from going to war if Germany attacked Poland. He was SURPRISED when Britain and Poland concluded a mutual defence treaty.
I don't need to look at websites to prove my point, maybe you should have studied history a little more...
@5. Have to disagree with you on a number of points. What do you mean by Hammond being a “solid” choice? He's certainly “solid” between the ears. He's an accountant. He has no vision. At Defence, most of what the Chiefs of Staff said went straight over his head. Foreign Secretary? The only good thing is that he seems to be anti-EU. You have a problem with Gove being “odious”? How about ability? Does that figure in your appreciation anywhere? Gove has started to turn Britain's education system around. Away from letting the little darlings “express” themselves and toward making the little animals learn.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 01:47 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The United Kingdom certainly needs to be out of the EU ASAP. Hasn't done anything except take our money. Repudiate treaties, repeal legislation. Argieland does it. Out of the EU in a week. Longer to deport the EU migrants and other undesirables. Sling 'em out of aircraft. Argieland does it.
And there is no way that the EU can “keep the peace” or be a “great economic power”. It hasn't “kept the peace” in 54 years. And don't you think a “great economic power” should be able stabilise its own currency?
@6. Is that a scotch view? No doubt engendered by similarities between scotch clans and German tribes. There is no way that the real Britain would have allied itself with nazis. Although the scotch might have wanted to. But, just like today, we could have crushed the scotch with no problem.
@8. Perhaps the police should think about their actions. Maybe if they were to adopt the motto “To protect and to serve”. Not to throw their weight about in some instances and then, when needed, says it's a civil matter. Is “breaking and entering” a crime? And breaking through a fence/gate and entering land isn't? But then the gypsies/Roma/travellers might fight back. Health and safety. Must have visored helmets, body armour, steel-capped boots, shields and batons, as well as 100 other constabules, before “acting”. “Demoralised and disinterested”? As I am with them!
@8
Jul 15th, 2014 - 01:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Ok, happy to disagree about UKIP. Let's leave it to the electorate, neither of us can predict the future.
As for Theresa May. I accept your point about her behaviour towards the police, she could have handled it better. Maybe I should have written ”she has been good in comparison to. .(various numpties)...
@6 voicey.
I totally disagree with your post. I have never in my life met a Brit who expressed that opinion. Please do not adjoin your fantasy scenarios to my comments.
Never would I suggest the UK should align itself with a Nazi power. I am sure all intelligent posters realised that I was talking about modern Germany, and it fairly lighthearted manner.
Please fuck yourself off to the fuckin back end of fuckin Fuckery you fuckin Nazi fantasist Fuckwit.
10
Jul 15th, 2014 - 01:58 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“@6. Is that a scotch view? No doubt engendered by similarities between scotch clans and German tribes.”
Oh the irony....;-)))
Do you mean like the Germanic tribes of the Angles...the Saxons and the Jutes...?
@10
Jul 15th, 2014 - 02:07 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Sorry Conq you lost me on the 2nd paragraph. I can't / won't debate with anyone who recommends throwing people out the back of aircraft as an actual government policy.
Wouldn't want you to stop posting tho.....
;-)
11
Jul 15th, 2014 - 02:34 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Always knew you were an idiot....
Maybe you too should brush up on your history....it easy to distance yourself from the atrocities of the Nazis....after the fact...
There was support for the Germans by the English and that is a fact...!!!
...read @9
haha...one minute they are Nazis and the next they are Germans.....make your mind up.....so how many of the 69,850,000 Germans in 1939 were members of the National Socialist party....?
If you eliminate the mad genocidal ravings of the leader....they had a sound plan.
You are one of these lukewarm wishy washy sheeple that like to swim with the flow and are frightened to death of appearing politically incorrect.
.....Baaa!
I should nip down to Bells for a new pair of flannel undergarmets before you soil your current ones…
Jul 15th, 2014 - 03:28 pm - Link - Report abuse 015
Jul 15th, 2014 - 03:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0It must be a little embarrassing to make out you are familiar with an area, but then be proved to be a fraud.....
Bells....they retired, shut the place down. Bookpoint moved from the lease they had from the Masonic Lodge below the Masonic Hall...(nods as good as a wink)...to that location....
Do keep up.....;-)
Must be a disaster for you. Oh I forgot, nothing under those skirts… Quite right. Last place I would go.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 04:16 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Don't care...I look good in a skirt....
Jul 15th, 2014 - 04:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 08 yards of wool...very warm, but with a great degree of natural ventilation, kind of feel liberated..like slipping out of your wet swim shorts at the beach and traipsing around in a beach towel....
don't knock it till you try it...
#4
Jul 15th, 2014 - 05:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Where are you going to get all the personnel to man this “fantastic” world beating Navy. The RN cannot get enough people to man their subs. just now never mind 12 carriers. Challenger tanks ? You mean targets for attack helicopters ?
Eurofighter Typhoon ?
Suppose that the Germans, Italians and Spanish decide to close the production lines in their countries,,,bye,bye the Typhoon for England.
Thales is a French company that was heavily involved with the UK carrier build AND missile systems. So you want to got it alone with chants of E -N-G-L-A-N--D.
Get real and come out of your Alice in Wonderland fantasies which can and never will happen.
#6
Have you polled the Jewish population of Britain about this one ?
19
Jul 15th, 2014 - 05:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Of course not...no one in the world condones what the Nazis ideology did....
I am saying that without the extremism there was a lot of close ties between the two nations and it was a surprise that Britain didn't ally with them against their auld enemy the French and communism...
The holocaust only came to light after the war....
Way back I used to hear a lot of old timers saying they couldn't understand an alliance with the French....and that ungrateful De Gaulle shafted the UK first chance he got...
Tell me ...how many of the England supporters would have been cheering the French if they had reached the cup final...?
...and I don't mean Scots....
“I also disagree that the UK will be out of Europe within 3 years, far too emeshed now.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 06:11 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I would prefer a different approach of accepting it as a means of keeping the peace, and as great economic power. Then teaming up blatantly with the Germans and announcing that from now on UK-Germany will be taking over and everyone had better well do as they are told.”
Dream on... Germany is nothing without the Eurozone that will collapse all around it.
Its only France that will remain the only credible power of Europe in the future.
I have suspicions about William Hague standing down, it just doesn't make sense based on how much time is left to the election.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 07:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I sense a scandal in the horizon. !
9. Yes, there was sympathy for the way Germany was treated by the Treaty of Versailles. That doesn't mean that we wanted to join the Nazis on their rampage through Europe and subsequent exile in Argentina though.
Jul 15th, 2014 - 07:52 pm - Link - Report abuse 0#10
Jul 15th, 2014 - 09:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Born in Edinburgh, Gove was raised in Aberdeen and began his career as a journalist. He was first elected to Parliament in 2005 for the safe Conservative seat of Surrey Heath in South East England.
How does that grab you ! My God.you actually approved of a Scot as minister for Education - thankfully in England only. How totally embarrassing for you - I feel your shame !!!
@ 10 Conqueror
Jul 15th, 2014 - 10:19 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The ONLY reason the little shit Gove got ANY job in government was because he is deeply 'into' Camoron.
He really believes that you can take someone from industry and without any training call them a teacher and along the way (with the conniving of OFSTED) has killed a working system of teacher training. It no longer exists and those that were chucked out have gone on to other things.
If you really believe that the children of the UK are ALL animals then I have to disagree. There are reasons why children do not learn, the principal one being they are LECTURED TO BY INEFFECTIVE ‘TEACHERS’ of the type Gove wants.
Try understanding the realities of the world for once, you come over as intelligent then.
Reason why I dislike Gove....
Jul 15th, 2014 - 10:54 pm - Link - Report abuse 0He has axed the American Classic novels...To kill a Mockingbird and Of Mice and Men from the GCSE curriculum...
Denying children the opportunity of studying and learning from the giants of the world of literature....
Who does he think he is.....
“The little man jerked down the brim of his hat and scowled over at
Lennie. ”So you forgot that awready, did you? I gotta tell you again, do I? Jesus Christ, you're a crazy bastard!”
#26
Jul 16th, 2014 - 06:21 am - Link - Report abuse 0I don't think that he had any bearing on education on this side of the border.
I can't comment on what literature is being taught in schools now. In my day it was Dickens, Sir Walter Scott and Shakespeare. To Kill a Mocking Bird had not even been written until after I had left school.
#20
The holocaust only came to light after the war...
.Beginning in 1933, the German government enacted a series of anti-Jewish laws restricting the rights of German Jews to earn a living, to enjoy full citizenship and to gain education, including the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, which forbade Jews to work in the civil service. The subsequent 1935 Nuremberg Laws stripped German Jews of their citizenship and forbade Jews to marry non-Jewish Germans.
The result of these laws was the exclusion of Jews from German social and political life. Many sought asylum abroad; hundreds of thousands emigrated, but as Chaim Weizmann wrote in 1936, “The world seemed to be divided into two parts—those places where the Jews could not live and those where they could not enter.” The international Évian Conference, on 6 July 1938, addressed the issue of Jewish and Gypsy immigration to other countries. By the time the conference was held, more than 250,000 Jews had fled Germany and Austria, which had been annexed by Germany in March 1938; more than 300,000 German and Austrian Jews were still seeking refuge and asylum from oppression.
Culminating in Krystallnacht, I would have thought that by the mid 1930's, the UK government would have had a good idea the way Germany was progressing. The full horrors of the Holocaust were not revealed until the war ended but stories were coming back from occupied countries of the extent of deportations to the “east” of the Jewish populations.
Apparently,
Jul 16th, 2014 - 12:12 pm - Link - Report abuse 0one has to wonder if the MOD has got a good deal with this new appointment or a bad one,
this we will just have to wait and see, the 2015 review and the next election is not far away,
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
some say, the new appointments are more euro-sceptic than the others were,
some say Cameron is playing this close to his heart,
but if he is wrong, then all this change may well be one gamble to far...
just saying like.
27
Jul 16th, 2014 - 01:24 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Well there is an age difference between us...I remember some of mine...Great Expectations...Merchant of Venice....Rogue Male and The Siege of Krishnapur...studying...
...and in my leisure...Mark Twain, Harper Lee, JD Salinger, John Steinbeck for rich American vernacular...
Gove hasn't a clue what constitutes a broad education....
@14
Jul 16th, 2014 - 07:29 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“haha...one minute they are Nazis and the next they are Germans.....make your mind up....”
ummm... 1939 was 75 years ago, to state the bleedin' obvious. You were the first to start banging on about Nazis, not me.
Some of us have moved on, try it some time.
@29
I agree about Gove the Toad, and your thoughts on American Literature. “Denying children the opportunity of studying and learning from the giants of the world of literature....
Who does he think he is.....”
Indeed!
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