Monday 26 June 2017

DUP agree simple deal for Government

So, time to reflect on the DUP-Tory negotiations.


Much harder this time round than 2010 when Clegg and Cameron were clearly such bossom buddies (with hindsight, easily could have swapped roles with one another, so close were they politically).


This time the DUP sensed their chance against a weakened Prime Minister and came up with a very long list of demands, for a party that is not strictly needed to keep the Government in power.


This then drew 2 weeks of avid criticism of May (remember, I was not a fan originally and have sadly seen my view of her come to pass) and her inability to negotiate even this.


The first rule of negotiation though, is to negotiate, to stay at the table. Not to strop off like a child or say 'no deal' like the yanks do all the time. This achieves little. What actually works is patiently sitting there, hearing the otherside out, whilst making it clear you can't give them much but still want a deal.


This takes time, in this case 2 weeks, eventually if your position is sound and a deal makes sense for both parties, then it is done on reasonable terms. Even when one side started out with a hard bargaining position.


So to today, where the DUP have won basically a tiny pork barrel and concession of some policies the Tory's did not want to implement anyway (again, good negotiation tactic to offer the easy giveaways up).


So on balance I would give this deal a good 7/10 - the main drawback being the awkward handling a the beginning causing a longer delay than necessary - but the right answer in the end.


It does not bode too badly for Brexit then, not that you will read that in the mainstream media currently.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bossom buddies?

"Winston Churchill joked, when introduced to Bossom, "Who is this man whose name means neither one thing nor the other?"

Anonymous said...

with hindsight, easily could have swapped roles with one another, so close were they politically

An interesting observation that applies here too. One bunch are racist bigots, who will do anything to stay in power and are not averse to bombing innocent civilians. The other are the DUP.

Anonymous said...

Anon @ 2:23. Agree and it was never said. DUP are of course a much nicer bunch than their partners. After all they must be if after losing £500mn on the "cash for ash" fiasco, they are given more money.

Can't be that they want to buy their votes is it.

CityUnslicker said...

try reading some of the other comments here over the past few days - most are brilliant and insightful, anon above, less so.

hovis said...

Funniest thing I saw was the Reuters headline - "Plaid Cymru demands same deal for Wales" - so Plaid in coalition with the Tories - whatever next ;-)

roym said...

What did you say on here about Scottish labour mps keeping New Labour in office? Funny how May having to eat a huge s*** pie brings out the pragmatic dealmakers!

roym said...

Oh man, British taxpayers paying for the cash for Ash fiasco? Ffs capitalists, come on!

This country......

tolkein said...

10 votes = £1bn. Pretty cheap, really. At that price you could buy a majority for £33bn. In the context of a £1.7tn economy £1bn is not even a rounding error.

Thud said...

Whatever it takes to keep that shiteating commie out of power is fine by me.

Anonymous said...

I think the press should be a bit more patriotic about this deal. The use of the magic money tree to find this £1bn shows it is not for the many but for the deserving few.