UKH

For those of us who value our European Friends and feel entirely fed up with this whole Brexit shambles that is damaging the country we love, please consider signing the petition below to show your support for revoking Article 50.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

The chances of another referendum seem very slim right now, but this petition appears to be gaining some strong momentum.  In the absence of a Peoples Vote hopefully it will provide a way to let the government know that they can't just continue ignoring the 48%.

Please feel free to share the petition with as many people as you can.  Lets do this!

According to a YouGov survey last week it's more like 60%. 

About 150,000 people have signed this since I did an hour ago. This momentum and a good turn out on Saturday might make the difference. 

Worth a punt 

I got a letter from HMRC detailing my taxbreak down. Out of 3ish grand tax paid, about £25 was for eu membership. Not a bad deal really!

And this one...

https://www.change.org/p/theresa-may-mp-give-people-a-final-say-on-brexit-d...

And you can email your MP in just a few clicks here:

https://www.justmakeitstop.co.uk/

Thanks John.  The thread petition is currently being signed by 1,500 people a minute!  Should be half a million people by 8am easy.  Lets try and get over a million

Imagine a scheme where you pay £25 each year and it gives you the ability to travel, study, live work and eventually retire in a chice of 27 other countries. We'll also throw in free mobile phone roaming charges on top of that which, normally,  for two weeks in Benidorm would be considerably more than 25 quid.
Imagine........

E

Yes our UK net contribution to the EU is a mere 1% of the total UK Government spending.  In 2018 our net EU contribution (after rebate) was £8.9 billion.  Total Government spending was £817.5 billion.

Signed, and it's just flown past 500,000 signatures!

signed,

now  561, 501 signatures

Plus if an airline leaves you stranded it has to pay you compensation. That alone has covered my £25 for decades. 

Signed - 582,000!

612250

Signed. 617850

Website down?

Now 617,000 and moving strongly upwards.

It would be great if this number was matched on Saturday's March. That would be somewhat more visible.

For the record Mrs May does not speak for me. Whilst I am fed up with Brexit I remain convinced that the only good deal for the country was the one we had. For starters, it's cheap, we have a say (collective sovereignty) and immigration is not bad for the country (and historically at least half of it can be "controlled" because it is not from the EU.

I was wondering that, won't load up for me!

Website crashed!!!

502 bad gateway.

Firewall probably thought it was under a denial of service attack

I think the link is broken. Can't get in to check the latest scores!

Yes the website seems to have just gone down - sheer weight of traffic or something more sinister to take the wind out of the sails?

I've tried to get to the petition link, Google Chrome is my default, but just get message: 502 Bad Gateway

Any suggestions, please?

Website has gone down, be patient and try again, hopefully back on line soon.

I think there's a glitch in the matrix

I signed the petition, and I have just written to my MP also. I have little faith that it will do any good, but surely we have to try everything. He is a conservative MP in Scotland. Our constituency voted 67% to remain, so he has no remit what so ever to drag us out by voting according to the party line. I have told him so. No doubt he will ignore it, but I would encourage everyone to badger MPs too, there's a chance it might make a difference.

619233

Seems to be working again   . . . .  oh wait, down again!

Don't worry - you can email TM with your thoughts here:

https://email.number10.gov.uk/

Working again, 628,001!

It's back up and cruising at an altitude of 640,000 and rapidly rising. Please let it be 1 million today.

'Petitions is down for maintenance

We know about it and we're working on it.

Please try again later.'

It's down again now. 

If you've not had an email acknowledgement be sure to check back later when they've fixed things to check you were actually counted...

Before I do it, as a foreigner residing in UK, will my signature count?

The site appears to be back up now. Currently at 653,212 signatures.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

At https://petition.parliament.uk/help it says "Only British citizens and UK residents can create or sign a petition."

It's getting at least 100 signatures a second ...

Revoking A50 is a deeply damaging nuclear option that won't end this crisis but as a fallback position it is the lesser evil. Signed with misgivings.

Write to your MPs, these petitions are easily ignored as the People's Vote march will be however big.

jk

But that's a waste of time if your MP is a member of the ERG and a close friend of Rees Mogg, as mine is.

It's never a waste of time - it may not change their mind but its never a waste of time...

696,198

To really impress we need to get it over 17,410,742 (the number who voted to leave)

Well, if it gets to a million in two days we're not going to have to wait very long

Down again.

i reckon it would have got to a million already if the servers had the capacity to deal with the traffic.

Working again! https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

Over 700,000 signatures

Perhaps. If nothing else you eat his time up replying to you and you add to the drip drip erosion of the perception any seat is safe now the axis in parliament has tilted.

jk

Plus you should never let them have the satisfaction of your inaction or lethargy (sad to say principled inaction will always be taken as lethargy). Shit you don't have to be that old to know that a lack of engagement and lethargy brings bad results...

Plus in this case writing to your MP or the PM is going to be especially effective.

TM's "speech" to the nation blamed everyone but herself and was, essentially, her begging you (the public) to write to your MP so say, "enough is enough, stop pratting around and do what the fantastic TM says". 

It has clearly backfired spectacularly and a bag full of letters say, "TM must go", will be a clear signal to the MPs and PM that we (the public) disagree with TM's analysis and do actually hold her responsible for a substantial part of this mess.

If ever there was a time to write to your MP about this subject it is now.

Just tried - said it was going to send me an email to confirm, but nothing yet. Will wait a bit longer then try on the site again.

It was a smidge over 747,000 when I checked, so looks like it could reach 1 million by lunchtime if the technology can take it.

Mine went to the spam folder...

The petition site is down again. Apparently part of the problem is rubberneckers like me counterproductively refreshing the page to see the numbers go up

To shed some light on the intermittent usability of the site https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47652071

Got the mail through at last, and after a few attempts the link worked so I've signed. If you're trying and failing please be patient and keep retrying from time-to-time.

755,879

The petition.parliament.uk domain they're using points into the Amazon AWS cloud. Its should be easy for them to add more resources to cope with the extra load - scaling up and down across different loads is what AWS is for.

I suspect that part of the problem was that the page was automatically updating the vote count every few seconds, which would involve going back to the web servers to get the new total. The more people were viewing it the more traffic this would generate, even if they weren't voting. They seem to have turned this off now and you have to click refresh to see the updated total. So in a sense they crashed (ddos'd) themselves.

Up to 779,718 now. Took a while to receive and then validate my email though.

Back up and seems to be gaining 100 - 400 signatures every time I refresh!

I didn't share this on FB - sometimes people resent having politics scorched into their retinas when they're trying to unwind but I did email it to a select group of (4) family and friends who I know are already sympathetic to this kind of viewpoint.

829,242 now

Down again. You'd almost think it wasn't an accident...

There's a lovely comparison site where you can compare side by side the number and rate of signatures for Revoke A50 and for No-deal defaulting on obligations.

https://brexit-petitions-count.now.sh/

Edit: The instant dislike tells me that someone doesn't like being reminded that leaving without a deal means the UK defaults on its EU obligations and its credit standing would go through the floor unless it came up with a 'deal' to settle its debts in very short order after leaving.

Higher load than they anticipated when they performance tested it, probably.

I’ve been doing a little research on the .gov E-petitions website (looked at the wikipedia page), since it was launched in 2006, the most successful petition (numerically) was one that was started in May 2016, it was a request that if the result of the EU referendum was “less than 60% based on a turnout less than 75%” (neither threshold was met) Parliament should hold another referendum.

The petition was started by someone who was openly supporting Brexit and it received over 4 million signatures. One must conclude that the vast majority of those signatures where from people who would go on to vote to leave the EU in the June 2016 referendum.

Seems strange that suggesting a second referendum is considered by some to be betraying those 17.4m Brexit voters, when at least 4m of were in favour of a second referendum before the outcome of the vote.

I think we might just be having our second referendum after all!

My spirits are rising with the count.

Not so sure of your analysis.

I think the petition only really took off after the referendum and hence was mostly remain voting people.

From what I've read that petition was started by a Brexit supporter before the referendum because he thought they were going to lose and hence he wanted another referendum but once Leave won the referendum lots of Remain supporters signed it because they then wanted another referendum.

The position is that if you win a referendum you consider it final but if you lose you consider it only an aberration and that there should be another one. It's thinly veiled self interest either way.

(My own self interest is that I'd like another referendum because I think Remain would win this time).

922,023 - wow

You are almost certainly right, but it does demonstrate the idiocy of it all. 

As its now nearing 1 million, it could be interesting to see the comparisons between the voting density maps from the original referendum and the signatories of this petition.

Petition: https://petitionmap.unboxedconsulting.com/?petition=241584

Referendum results: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36616028

Yep.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/24/pet...

It’ll be interesting to see if this reaches those numbers - which wasn’t close to those who voted leave but gives a good number on how many just can’t take losing.

That is very interesting, but I suppose logical. Also interesting to see which constituencies have the highest numbers of signatories: Bristol, Hornsey, Brighton and Cambridge, in that order.

941868

'just can’t take losing'. That really is awful wording, and awfully revealing. The game metaphor again, with the implication that this is a kind of personal contest between individuals when, surely for most intelligent people, it's about what they think is best for the country as a whole.

I think the time for that kind of jibe is long gone. We're all losers.

It's now going at about 1,000 a minute, so it could be at a million by about 3 o'clock.

Anyone who the day after the vote is signing a petition to rerun it clearly can’t accept the loss.  It’s accurate.

Not one of the arguments used on here to have a new vote can support their position.  Nothing had changed, nothing had come out about campaign irregularities, they just didn’t get their way.

It’s really not a jibe.  What words should I be using?  “Those who voted for the lowest polling option”?  Seems a bit long winded.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/nov/25/protest-vote-regret-voting...

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/nhs-doctor-brexit-vote-leave-final-dea...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-44856992

If you're going to make brash statements about what has happened, try at least to ground them in some kind of reality.

Edited for spelling.

970,058 and I'm off to work

Keep going!

I’m talking about people who signed a petition in 2016!

Maybe it wasn't being 'bad losers', just widespread disgust at the conduct of the campaign.

Ever considered that many/most of them may have been people who didn't vote due to complacency as the result was widely forecast as a narrow Remain decision? That would suggest quite a lot more support for Remain at the time than the referendum showed. And yes, of course you can't count votes that weren't cast, but you could nevertheless consider keeping an open mind as to the true 'will of the people', particularly three years down the line as shown in the many and ever more clear-cut opinion polls. There's simply no current mandate for any of the Leave options available.

And that's not even mentioning the proven electoral irregularities!

Lovely viewing this https://brexit-petitions-count.now.sh/?fbclid=IwAR049bzpIrkuq3486ad14q_H16U...

Someone should show TM what the "will of the people" actually is right now

Anyone else watching closely as the million approaches

... like it's New Year's Eve!

999,428 ...

999,861

1,000,163!

I've just signed but still waiting for the confirmation  e-mail. 

Loved the little burst of confetti on there as it clicked over a million.

Aye, me too.  No sign of it in me spam, either...

Looks like a lot of people were - it's just gone down again at 999,800!!!

WTF

Lots of people wanted to claim they the millionth petitioner maybe?

edit; looking at the other posts it was probably my attempt to refresh!

We know you think the opinion of remainers counts for nothing. We know you hate democracy, you don’t have to keep telling us!

As if signing an online partition is going to achieve anything other than give people a warm glow satisfaction. Diddling on a computer isn't campaigning.

Me too. 

People who signed the petition to revoke article 50 = 1,088,822

People who signed the petition to leave the EU without a deal = 373,738

I guess the people have spoken

I wouldn't say that. On a cost/benefit basis it costs nothing, 30 seconds. As for benefit today it's been picked up by the national press and reported as the biggest .gov petition ever, meaning the Government was contacted for comment so they know about it, and people are going to be discussing it like we are now. That's decent considering it cost £0. 

Conveniently this is now off-line to prevent more people signing it...

Call me a cynic, but that sounds a bit suspicious, both my husband and myself have signed, but can't get the link to confirm it in email.

Doesn't sound like you're prepared to put your back into then.

Could it be that the CyberWar arm of Brexit, the one that fed us all the crap in the run up to the EU is now doing a denial of service attack on the site?

Or the PutinBots?

Anything is possible..! Probably Russian bots or Maybots 

If they’re Russian bots, they’re VPN’d into the UK...

https://datastudio.google.com/reporting/15yZRGS3lAHpf-wmyDtsWo63yz4qPPIBz/p...

Maybots wouldn't be that effective...

Hahaha

If you've been listening to the various debates in parliament (rather than just reading the headline conclusions) it's fairly apparent that there are a pile of MPs who need an excuse to change their position because they're spineless cowards who can't admit that the position they've been supporting is a mistake.

They're easy to spot because they're the ones arguing for the current deal (and they normally have 'conservative' underneath them on TV) despite the fact that nobody from any side of the debate wants that outcome. They know that outcome has zero propspect of happening, and they also know that no deal can't be allowed to happen - they're just waiting for some external factor to 'force' them to change stance to a realistic delay or revocation of Article 50 so that they can save face.

This petition could be the excuse that the MPs need to start discussing (and 'begrudgingly' agreeing) the option that lots of them want but only if someone else proposes it.

Just got my email link accepted and registered after a couple of bad gateways. 

1.3 million... 

4 hours for my confirmation mail from this morning

All that does is to get your name on a government little black book of undesirable citizens.

Don’t worry, if the petitions website is anything to go by the government isn’t capable of building a system to record that many names. 

The way things are right now, that's a desirable place to be namechecked in. If nothing else, you'll be in great company and you'll be very very very far from alone.

Remember, one day the boot will be on the other foot. That is the way history works, even if it's a rather slow process. Grim subject, but I think it's quite likely that one day, far in the future, there'll be an equivalent of Nuremberg for this Brexit-fuelled evil, for 'peace crimes' rather than 'war crimes'. Please don't think I like the idea; it's about the last thing I could ever have wanted to happen, but justice will have to be done or it really will be the end of civilisation. I've got this horrible feeling that this isn't just an opinion of mine, but a scary fact.

Now over 1.5 million

When asked what she thought of the 1 million + signatures, Andrea Leadsom's response was 'When it gets to 17.5 million I suppose we might need to pay attention to it'.

Now there's a challenge!

It does seem to be speeding up, 250,000 signatures in the last 40 minutes.

Not only that, it can show the lie that she is always quoting, the "Will of the People"

I wonder whether that's the effect of a backlog of delayed confirmation emails finally going out and getting clicked on. Or maybe just all the press attention it's been getting today.

Either way, it's closing in rapidly on 2 million. Just over 1.9 at the moment.

Edit: Only twenty minutes later it's exceeded 2 million. And I'm still awaiting my confirmation email.

We can all travel to London on Saturday too, as well as signing the petition that no one will take any notice of, not that it's stopped me before, or is likely to in the future.

Good luck everyone.

Although I'm certain it will be a disaster for the UK, I think you're being a tad pessismistic here.

I think he is being optimistic actually, the guilty parties will almost certainly get away with it!

News this morning suggests that the grown ups in Brussels are taking charge, maybe the brexiters were right when they claimed we were run by Brussels ?

Although I'm still far from convinced we won't end up with a no-deal brexit more by incompetence & May's stubbornness than by choice

I'm, probably for no good reason, more hopeful than I've been in a while. Next week, May's 3rd Pointless, sorry "Meaningful", Vote will be lost again. We then have two weeks to propose a way forward, which, according to the numbers from recent votes, can't be to walk away with no deal. I expect the proposal to be a long extension to agree some form of Brexit softer than May's, with a ratifying referendum with Remain as an option.

The birds in the spring morning have really cheered me up to the point of delusion, it would appear.

I hope you are right!

Yeah, I've f*cked it, haven't I? Sorry everyone.

I agree. I think that, in the next few weeks we might see ourselves set on course for  a soft or even no Brexit, the end of May as Prime Minister, the well deserved disintegration of the tory party and the show being run by serious people such as Yvette Cooper, Hilary Benn and Oliver Letwin. Things are looking up.

Good morning comrades!

According to Farage the 2.5 million+ signatures are down to the Russians!

I'd have thought the last thing Putin wants is for us to stay in, but then he's a clever bastard and there must be a bigger plan.

Theresa does seem to have trouble with locating her arse, the number of times people have to hand it to her on a plate.

Does anyone know if they are recording unconfirmed signatures in the total?

I signed yesterday when it was at just over a million. It's now at 2.75M but I still haven't received my email.

What about John Mann or Dennis Skinner? Or conversely any SNP MP, as obviously no no one in Scotland voted leave.

Any idea how May is going to get round Bercow's ruling about a third MV? How she can offer anything that will be 'substantially different'?

Gosh, you're being optimistic. I really hope you're right.

No idea, but the extension agreement and general change in circumstances may be enough of an excuse.

Since there are no strings attached to the April 12 extension and no changes to the meaningless political declaration currently being mentioned it is exactly the same agreement. I expect MP's will have to demand the right to vote on it or a new session will be needed. There is now time to do that, it's ugly but what about brexit isn't.

jk

The news from Brussels is good. The pressure has been ratcheted up with some genuinely immovable deadlines now picked, nobody painted into a corner and nothing concrete 'imposed by foreigners'. Couldn't have hoped for better really.

jk

Do it again.  When it has worked you get an email with a link to authenticate your vote, and then you get confirmation on the website saying your vote has been added.  Same thing happened to me.  If you aren't clear whether your vote has been counted, it probably hasn't.

tIn reply to MonkeyPuzzle:

When the vote comes up again the second referendum amendment will be tabled i.e. May's deal is subject to a ratification referendum If the amendment is passed then Labour will abstain from the substantive vote allowing the tories to vote for a second referendum on May's deal or Remain.

There will be other amendments as well so next week's vote could be decisive.

... and if it has been counted already, you'll get an email saying you've already voted.

3 million by 1 o'clock?

How did you discover that, Gordon?!

On some previous petition, when I wasn't sure if I'd voted on it or not. I was fairly sure I had, but tried it just to see (I was really hoping they have a way of ensuring you can't vote twice, and they do.)

I've tried twice and haven't had either!

The system is overloaded just wait and you will get an email.

Passed that just now.....

Yes, I've just seen: 3,008,594.

3,008,595. The extra one was me.

Interesting, I could sign the petition but couldn't vote in the referendum. A curious world!

Other way round for me.  I can vote and pay I taxes in the UK, but as I'm not a resident I can't sign the petition.

Have you checked your junk email? 

Now at 3,047,041.

40 thousands votes in half an hour....

Why not ? I thought it was open to any British citizen ? I said I lived in France but was able to sign

Are you a british citizen? If so you can vote.

Still at that now, looks like they've given up on updating it regularly (or it's being cached).

edit 3,100,779 now (13:01)

No. 3,100,000 now.

I didn't know you were such an optimist!! Let's hope you are right!!! 

Someone higher up said only British Citizens AND residents can sign petitions.  It took that to mean that you had to be a resident Citizen.  I signed it anyway.

Tick box says: "I am a British citizen or UK resident"

The UK map showing the distribution of signatories of the petition, not suprisingly is virtually the same as the distribution of remain voters in the 2016 referendum with the exception of Northern Ireland

OR - ignore disinformation

I've signed it too, but I fully expect it to be used as a kill list by the post-Brexit government.

That's a helluva big kill list - currently almost 3.35 million

slight aside, are you able to stay in Brussels ? or have you become Belgian?

I'm in the process of getting French nationality by marriage though not for an,other 8 months - the consulate guy said the small team in Nantes that deals with this are a bit more overrun than usual

I should have no problems staying in Brussels even with hard Brexit. Sorry to hear your situation is more precarious

In the Journal Official that announces naturalisations you can see just how many they deal with. In the one that came out 22 Feb there were some 2200 of which only 27 were Brits. 

It's just passed the 3.5M point.

The people's vote people are emailing the link too.  Young people might be helping turning the tide as some University cities appear to be hotter spots

I hope that Remainers who stood back last time from voting at least register their heads

Yes, just about all the hottest spots are either places of learning, or places of non-menial business work. The whole thing is just so deeply embarrassing and shocking, and a terrible comment on our divided society and its very divided education system. Just awful.

I mean, for example, if you live in the Fens, have had a lousy education, and are out of work, just what do you do? Then some apparent saviours come along (extreme right wing in disguise of do-gooders) and tell you it's all Europe's* fault.

(*Using the term Europe in common inaccurate parlance, because of course we are part of it and still will be even if we leave the EU.)

Given that you only need an email address to sign a gov. petition and most people have at least 2 the actual numbers on any given topic are very likely to be grossly over counted.  I don’t expect any of us here on ukc would stoop so low as to sign more than once but not so sure about the rest of the population, opinions are running very high atm and any chance to swing it is being grabbed by both sides.

just saying.. 

Clearly the ones o  the other side of the debate haven't grasped this important point...

https://brexit-petitions-count.now.sh/?fbclid=IwAR049bzpIrkuq3486ad14q_H16U...

3.6M by Friday evening.

200k signed this evening while I was having a pint.

Yup interesting

 it probably just shows that these petitions don’t accurately reflect public opinion and a second vote would be an awful lot closer than these figures are suggesting. Those that are likely to sign this gov petition are probably more engaged in the current political debate and more smart device savvy than those that that may sign a petition to the opposite.

I have friends that are passionate on both sides of the argument and haven’t come across any of them that have changed sides yet..  interesting times... 

This a terrible weakness, it is true. But then, this flawed apparatus is exactly the same for all referendums, on both sides. Also: how many people have more than one email account? It always sounds like a good idea until you have to live with it (it doesn't work well in practice for multiple reasons). My second email is a backup for the rare occasions when my main email goes down,

That is why a second referendum will be essential (but only once we know exactly what the substance of the question is). You've also put your finger on the biggest problem - far bigger than some people having two email accounts - that many people who would vote in a referendum are not, as you say, 'engaged in the current political debate' ... many of them being completely detached from it in any detailed way, because they don't read the broadsheets, for example, and their only exposure to it is a wall of propaganda from the gutter press and media, and emotive nonsense spouted at them by their peers.  Hope that doesn't sound too harsh.

The weird phantom disliker strikes again. He/she presumably dislikes me for being a Remainer (unless it's just a psychiatric thing of disliking me per se). Yet I agree with someone that the anti-Brexit petition could be flawed, and I get a dislike. All I can do is laugh, actually.

For the purpose of subverting the petitions 'authentication' (ha!) system, anybody - or any bot - in charge of a mail domain could have as many as he/she liked.

There are checking mechanism is place. Various things online about it.

Don't worry. I've got one too. Share him?

You're not quite right about this: they have various ways of trying to prevent bots (you have to give an authenticatable [ouch] name, don't you?) Anyhow, I live in a fluffy world in which I'm quite convinced that the vast bulk of Remainers are NOT cheats, by nature. 

I'm right insofar as it is, from a technical point of view, trivially easy to subvert the petitions system, and to organize mass submissions. Whether or not that is happening in this case, I have no way of knowing.

Gordon, the broadsheets don't exist anymore. Only the Torygraph is a 'broadsheet' anymore. Broadsheet doesn't mean quality as you infer.

Fake news! There's still the Yorkshire Post.

OK, I'm using outmoded jargon. We have a truly shocking range of 'newspapers', most of which are no longer genuine newspapers at all. I don't know what you'd call them: propaganda organs. Only three that are in the range of acceptable to half decent (Independent, Guardian, Times)

Sorry, falling asleep ...

You are living dangerously Gordon, l you've now collected a dislike for laughing at the phantom disliker !

Technically it's trivially easy for the phantom disliker to set up a fake account on here and dislike a post twice, or any number of times

Even more reason to scrap the whole system

Why, I've even disliked a couple of my own posts with my other account just to get the ball rolling.

It's all a bit H. M. Bateman to me: "The man who discussed his own dislikes."

I am the phantom liker. The phantom disliker is a Toidi from the dark realms of anti-matter. We wage a continual battle across time and space and multiple dimensions. They are really evil they even dislike cute kitten pics

Yes, but I think you're being overly dismissive about how much of an obstacle having access to large numbers of suitable email addresses would pose to any such campaign. Yes, somebody in control of a domain has a vast number of addresses automatically under their control but a large grouping of addresses like that from domains not known as email providers would be trivially easy to filter out. Especially as, at the scale of this petition, you would need hundreds of thousands of bot submissions to make a significant difference. If you wanted to avoid easy detection, you would need a group of hundreds of people, each with control of hundreds of domains and all being quite sophisticated in their approach to automating the process. It strikes me as implausible.

The last petition on a scale like this didn't have the email verification step. Security experts seem to agree that the email requirement is too big a hurdle for bots to be having much impact this time around:

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-47668946

I’m open to accepting you’re right about this, as I’ve not really thought about it all that hard, but I would be interested to hear you explain why you think that is so?

Given that each individual signature requires email confirmation that means you’d either need a lot of signatures linked to the same email address which would be very obvious in the results (if not blocked outright), or you’d need a *lot* (to have statistical effect) of unique looking disposable mail boxes. 

Small numbers of votes from ineligible voters are easy to organise, but I’m not so convinced mass votes are.

Obviously these sorts of things are available to state agencies but you did specifically say ‘trivially easy’ - I’m just interested if there’s some mechanism I haven’t thought of.  

Snap!

It just crossed the 4 million mark!

Just passed 4m

Also, if this were the case – and the Brexiteers appear to be remarkably expert in their knowledge of how to fiddle the system – did they not do the same with their rival petition which only garnered a relatively paltry 300,000?

Well let's just give in and deny any voice to the people who want this stinking shitty mess that was foisted on us by dishonest cheerleaders ended.  Let's deny the opinion that this whole escapade was a very inappropriate response to a badly set up referendum that still managed to indicate an almost split opinion in the country unlike the 2/3 majority that the first referendum gave us for membership to continue.

Let's just give up now.  What point is there in trying to right a stupid wrong that is going to harm all of us?

Has just passed the 4M mark

Keep those votes coming in!

I have spent a bit of time doing this sort of stuff for a living, though I'm no expert, lets see if we can jot down the process we need to go through.

To make a substantial difference to the results we need to either have or to create ~half an million email addresses a day without leaving an obvious trace. That likely means no controlling the domains involved, and if you do control them not using junk domains easily identified in the logs. The majority of our signups for personal accounts come from one of about a dozen email prviders (gmail, btinternet etc.) so i that's not the case here then that would be obvious in itself. I suppose the easiest way for a state actor to do it would be to have compromised one or more of the UK's larger email providers.

Having several hundred thousand domains sat around dormant for this kind of use would be a bit weird and expensive but possible - registering new domains would be blindingly obvious.

You then probably need to create some UI automation and run it millions of times in a way that doesn't raise an obvious pattern. It's one thing to have a botnet set up to ping a url and DDOS it, it's another thing to have it run selenium and an smtp client to handle the end to end flow. I feel like there're clever ways to avoid the need for automation but they'd all depend on how and what the petitions site is using for behaviour tracking.

Then finally you need a distributed system for ensuring that the bots are using postcodes in line with the expected voter profile. This isn't that hard either but you're probably looking at some sort of centralised postcode service and that's going to generate some suspicious traffic.

It's definitely not trivially easy, it requires a lot of infrastructure and I doubt I could do it in a way that wasn't traceable, even if I had access to a suitable botnet. Other people are much cleverer than me though.

I doubt it's been substantially gamed to be honest, I'm not sure why you'd invest the resource..

I see I missed off a crucial 'why' before 'did they not' in my last post.

I think the point is that it might be possible, which is enough to get lots of people believing it because they are predisposed to the idea, in very much the same way as a Brexit milk and honey outcome might be achievable. Dismissing either as unlikely almost to the point of impossibility, even with clear and detailed explanations why, seems unlikely to convince those who are determined to believe. 

Yes, this was my thinking too. I don’t doubt that there are entities in the world who have the resources to do it, but I don’t think it’s plausible that any of them would squander then on a web petition  

Sadly it seems that the lady who started the petition has been receiving telephone death threats. Nothing extols a love of democracy like threatening to kill people with a different view.

On a brighter note, I just heard that one of my most Brexity friends has had a significant change of heart and signed the petition!

The counter flipped over 4.5 million while I was checking it just now.

I never got the confirmation email, still waiting for manual validation.

It's not showing any signs of easing off, is it? Nearly 4.6 m now.

Presumably it never occurred to any of the scum making those threats that they could, you know, start a petition of their own if they thought the arguments in favour of their viewpoint were so strong.

Aspects have already been touched on by subsequent posters, but what I meant was that it is technically trivial for anybody who controls a mail domain to automate as many petition submissions as they like.

That doesn't mean it's happening; nor does it mean that anybody doing so wouldn't eventually 'get caught.' But getting caught after the event doesn't necessarily matter in the potential timescales we're talking about: that's a modern political lesson which I hope we're all learning.

Since that was directed at me, I'll say that I have no idea why you made the comment. I was merely pointing out the obvious technical inadequacies of the gov.uk petitions website: namely, that there is *zero* effective authentication.

It's trivially easy to make as many submissions as is wanted. Whether they're picked up sufficiently quickly (which is crucial) - or at all - by the petitions system is another (non-obvious!) question.  The fact that the petitions system has only now - years after its origination - implemented this further layer of checking doesn't fill me with confidence.

However I'm not involved with the petitions system, so I don't know the internals.

PS: would you trust access to your voting rights in a general election - or, say, access to your bank account - to the  levels of 'authentication' in the gov.uk petitions system? I certainly wouldn't.

He either hasn't read my earlier post:

/forums/off_belay/had_enough_of_brexit_-_sign_up_here-702173?v=1#x8961998

or he's preferring to ignore it!

Edit: the 'link to this reply' doesn't seem to be working properly. Try this one: https://www.ukhillwalking.com/forums/t.php?t=702173&v=1#x8961998

But they did have a petition of their own about a week ago, and it was rather feeble, garnering a relatively small 330,000, iirc.

As has been pointed out, there is quite effective authentication. It is possible to get around it to a certain degree, but unlike the issue in 2016, to get around it and actually influence the numbers would take a huge amount of resources held in reserve by (more than likely) a state player and then you would have to ask why. Even if the resources were in place, it is still likely to be reasonably detectable.

In practice, it has zero value. Would you trust your bank account to that level of authentication?

Whether abusing the system is worthwhile in any particular case is a separate question.

Funnily enough many things linked to bank accounts are set up based on exactly this level of authentication.

A valid question, which would be somewhat remiss to ignore.

The fact is DDoS to restrict people’s ability to sign is much more likely than large numbers of fake signatures.

Well that's a weird non sequitur. Its value is that it makes it harder, slower and more resource intensive to mass fake in a non trivially-obvious way. That doesn't mean that it's perfect, it means that it's good enough for this application. Are you under the impression that security is a binary thing?

No bank would accept access to an account on the basis of  the 'authentication' provided by the gov.uk petitions system. Nor (obviously!) should they.

In practice it's a minor (and easily subvertible) choke.

you can keep repeating that but I’d be genuinely interested to hear how you’d make it work in practice.

4,923,235 now.

According to his own statement at 21:26 on Saturday, he doesn't know how it works right now:

"I'm not involved with the petitions system, so I don't know the internals."

https://www.ukhillwalking.com/forums/off_belay/had_enough_of_brexit_-_sign_up_...

5 million!

Just gone over 5 million, obviously it’s started to slow down, but interesting to see how it grows over the next week!

When it passes 17M will it be QED!??

It's certainly proving the lie of the Maybot's claim that "everyone just wants to get on with Brexit". So far, 5 million people have said they don't.

May has consistently ignored the 48% of those who voted, who voted for remain, never mind those who weren't allowed to vote.

Yeah, but we aren't "The People", just vermin perhaps?

ITN Evening News just this minute said the petition had broken the record for signatures, sadly not people!

Got a link to that?  Not that I want to be able point and laugh, or anything  like that...

I'm having trouble tracking it down now. I think it may have been this one: 'Leave the EU without a deal in March 2019.' https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/229963

But it’s 523,181 signatures, and the motion is not as I remember it.

Or it may have been this:

'Brexit re article 50 it must not be suspended/stopped under any circumst'
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/224908

But that’s only 116,484 signatures.
 

5.1 million and ticking away nicely. 

Keep them coming.

Help people who have no electronic infrastructure to sign.

It's interesting looking at the Petition Map on the site as the number of signatures continues to grow.  The contagion seems to be spreading out from the obvious metropolitan centres.

Looking at the numbers involved in some individual constituencies might give any MPs who are hanging on by a small margin pause for thought on their stance on Brexit...

If that's all this petition achieves then it's achieved something.

It's a bit morbid, but since the original vote, roughly 1.5 million people have died (statistically 2/3 were brexit voting) and probably a similar amount are now eligible to vote (of which roughly 4/5 voted to remain).

Assuming 70% turnout, then that's -700k old leave voters, -350k old remain voters. +840k young remain voters, +210k young leave voters.

Leave: 17,410,742 -700k +210k = 16.92M
Remain: 16,141,241 +840k -350k = 16.63M

This would put percentages (assuming everything else is the same) of 50.4% and 49.6% - the most razor thin of margins at best. Give it another year and it's swung to remain, with nobody having to change their mind. It annoys me to no end that this reality isn't acknowledged.

Nope. My bet is it's over 12 by the time we leave.

Jk

Have you considered the possibility that, as early 60-somethings turn into real OAPs, those soft metropolitan remainers harden into immigrant-fearing socially conservative quitters?!!

No, almost like another vote to settle things is needed

Good point. They're probably worrying about who is going to pay their pensions, once all the young, fit, tax-paying European workers are shipped back home...

This link shows both petition live counts side by side:

https://brexit-petitions-count.now.sh/

https://www.livefrombrexit.com/petitions/241584?fbclid=IwAR2-Dr7gDJYazkxZCu...

This is interesting....details of how constituencies voted, their mp & numbeer of signatures...

~(not sure what it means, but could result in some mp's feeling lent on..)

https://www.livefrombrexit.com/petitions/241584?fbclid=IwAR2-Dr7gDJYazkxZCu...

This is interesting....details of how constituencies voted, their mp & numbeer of signatures...

~(not sure what it means, but could result in some mp's feeling lent on..)

You do know that to vote in a general election all you have to do is give a name and address?

There's no authentication at all, you don't have to prove you are that person.

Sorry Gordon, definitely not personal. Probably because you always put your points across well that I can find the time to read them. Not that I always agree with you though. 

Unfortunately that table lets itself down a bit by including the rather misleading "Percentage of Electorate"  as you do not have to be a member of the electorate to sign the petition.  This does not reduce the meaning of the petition at all as it allows interested youth to register their opinion and also EU citizens from other states who are resident here but they should have omitted that column as it renders the table vulnerable to attack.

Voting in general elections isn't done on-line. Apart from abusing the postal voting system, it's therefore a much more difficult system to abuse en masse.

There is no authentication needed in order to vote, there is some authentication (only of your email address) for a petition, so neither really authenticates who you are and hence your right to vote.

If they are not comparable (and I'm not arguing they are, why would you have the same level of authentication for a general election and an online petition?) why did you bring it up in the first place?

More to the point, why would he be trying to discredit the petition when the experts at the cross-party HoC Petitions Committee don't believe there's been any widespread abuse of it? Those pesky experts spoiling the narrative again?

If it doesn’t get close will that be?

The 48% plus all those bregretters, non voters and children should be 20+

I was making the point that the 'authentication' in use for the petitions system would not be acceptable for a general election, were balloting for that ever done on-line.

Sigh. I am not trying to discredit this particular petition; I am pointing out the obvious weakness of the 'authentication' system in place. Arguably it's sufficient for petitions; it's certainly not sufficient for more important votes.

In any event, it's not a very logical approach to turn a blind eye to the weakness of the system just because the current outcome might suit your particular purpose.

I think I'll leave it at that.

I've just signed the revoke article 50 petition. In the referendum I voted leave but I've changed my mind because of the complete incompetence of politicians.

I would still like the things I voted leave for, but not at any price, and currently, remaining looks better than anything offered or promised so far 

Thank you.

jk

There was a substantial group of Leavers who had become Remainers on Saturday's march.

Well done, Michael, for admitting that especially in this shire which is very pro-remain. I was a close remain and thought long and hard about leave.  I am now very pro-remain.  My wife voted leave and would vote remain now.

Please let me know however, what these things are which you voted leave for.  I have had many discussions with leavers since the vote and on the whole, the responses have been pretty poor so I am keen to learn from you why you voted leave and why you have changed your mind, despite still holding the same values.

Have a like for your intelligence and ability to assess the situation and change your mind. It was only an 'Advisory' referendum anyway...

I did hear that enough had died already that it would be remain now.

But people can change their mind anyway. This was 3 years ago.

Democracy is about changing ones mind.

I cannot see any argument for getting a deal then going back to the people and just say, now what do you want?

... which, by expert appraisal, isn't a weakness significant enough to substantially affect the petition outcome.

Nobody has been doing that. They've been open to the potential for weakness in the system. But they have been reassured by the pesky experts that the petition outcome has not been substantially weakened.

That's very different from it being because the outcome suits their purpose (which is a convenient coincidence). Indeed, I suspect the only reason you're apparently so keen to continue trying to cast doubt on the validity of this expert opinion is precisely because it suits your own particular purpose to do so. 

Check out the petition live signature count and graph! Inspiring!

https://splasho.com/petitions/index.php?petition=241584

Thanks Michael, can I ask what your opinion on the Customs Union and Single Market is, are you in favour of coming out of the EU, but retaining some or all of those trading relationships and free movement?

Thank you, sincerely

Without taking any time to understand what it's there to do and how it functions

Umm... well noone said it was

No, it's a good idea to analyse that weakness and look at whether it has any chance of impacting the system and if you don't have the knowledge or experience to do so, listen to people who do.

Mainly I wanted legislative sovereignty to rest with parliament - they're actually doing a reasonable job reminding politicians that they only have power whilst parliament lets them.

I don't think the European Union is very democratic. Probably my main gripe is that the MEPs in the European parliament are almost an irrelevant add-on. I suspect the EU would hardly notice any difference if its parliament disappeared just leaving the commission and council of (prime) ministers.

I wasn't taken in by the propaganda and realised that leaving would mean taking an economic hit. I was ok with that even though it would almost certainly affect me.

However, as I effectively said above, I'm only happy to achieve this for a reasonable price. At the moment the words reasonable and Brexit make a rather strong oxymoron.

Quite happy to stay in customs union and single market even if that means freedom of movement.

My pragmatic approach would have been to soft Brexit, see how that goes for a few years (1 term maybe). Then debate and/or ask the question: back in, stay soft, go hard.

Oh one other bit, immigration.

Actual immigration, not an issue with me. But what I would like to see debated etc is questions like, how many people can the UK have before it's overloaded, if our population increases by 10m in the next 20 years (birth, immigration, cloning, whatever) then what does that mean for infrastructure, services and standard of living.

Once those kind of questions are answered (obviously there's no single answer), then immigration policies that are rational, fair and minimise any strife can be (relatively easily) worked out because there would be a coherent end point for the policies to aim at.

That may mean restrictive immigration or it may mean open immigration, but at least the country might have some idea what it's trying to achieve in that area.

Thanks Michael.  I actually agree with you in all those areas.

It’s impossible to predict as it depends on future circumstances which are unknown.

You want the immigration issue solved ? What you need is not a top-down statist approach, but a bottom-up approach. It needs to be devolved to regions and/or nations.

If having high immigration suits London, let them have it, if it doesn’t suit Lincolnshire, let them not have it. Everybody gets what they want.

Im not sure how you would police this.

It would be up to the regions and/or nations to police it whichever way they want.

Of course, if for example, a region adopts a particularly restrictive immigration policy, policing it will be harder and more expensive for them, but that’s a choice they’d have to make and take responsibility for.

Rather than looking at immigration as an issue or problem, I feel we should look at it as a range of potential solutions.

But, we as a nation need to have a better understanding of the problems that immigration (or lack of) can solve.

I don't think regions would fully work whilst there is freedom of movement throughout a nation state.

Where it might work is in different regions having different criteria for immigration which can then be totalled in sum way (couldn't resist that one ) across the nation.

I.e. one region needs 3 doctors, another needs 7 mechanics, etc. Or maybe one region only needs people for a particular work area at a high level whilst others need all levels.

Problem is, we don’t understand it, and we can’t predict what we will need in the future.

Regions would be free to stop freedom of movement with the rest of the UK if they wished to do so. As long as they pay for it.

What is so tragically sad is, if the Lincolnshire Fens 'get what they want', with a vastly reduced number of EU fruit and vegetable pickers, they're going to be really f***** economically ... a lot worse than they already have been.

If that’s their choice I’m fine with it as long as

1) they pay for it

2) don’t impose it on others.

5.7 million and still going up.

Appears to have slowed to a crawl though (ta for the graph), and today would have to match yesterday to hit 6m so you’re not on course at the moment.  As things stand from the petition people signed the day after the vote you’ve convinced less than 2m extra to join you...only 10 million plus to go and you’ll equal the leave vote.

Well, seeing as the leave vote is almost static and struggled to make 10% of the remain, I'd say you're talking bollocks...

https://brexit-petitions-count.now.sh/?fbclid=IwAR049bzpIrkuq3486ad14q_H16U...

I see no reason to sign that, why would I?  I voted.

Leave or Remain, you've got to admit that the whole affair is a total f*cking farce.
It's about three years ago since the Ref was announced, and it's now come down for us (them, the MPs) to decide and agree what we want and get it past the EU within two and a half weeks!

Pull A50 and stop it all now!

Certainly don’t think it’s going swimmingly.

No, do what you promised to do MPs, or go back to the electorate if you aren’t willing to.

Absolutely... with the relevant question. A GE doesn't answer the question MPs are struggling with, not least because neither big party will be able to stand united behind an unambiguous and deliverable manifesto.

Still, it's the more likely outcome posing marginally less risk to the tories than a being seen to facilitate a referendum to actually address the issue at hand.

jk

I bet you have though, you little tinker!

I’ll take that, much are you betting?

The one thing the million plus march and the 6,000,000 petition should tell the politicians is there's going to be an awful lot of very angry people if this Brexit shambles goes ahead on the same trajectory and there will be a very bloody (figuratively speaking) reckoning for the Tories and Labour .

Look at the Farage march, (does anybody know where they are?), look at the Leave with no deal petition. The Brexiters have had their moment and they really haven't got the heart to keep their hopeless project going.

During the referendum I had a tiny Remain poster in my window because I didn't want to upset the neighbours.The mood has flipped. Next time I won't just walk away from the guy who calls me a traitor. Putin and Trump want Brexit. One because he wants a victory in his asymmetric war on the West, the other because his whisperers want to destroy our agriculture and take over the NHS. If you're for Brexit I ask you  who's the traitor ? 

One thing we need to be wary of is the same complacency that probably landed us in this mess in the first place. I happened to see a Facebook comments thread for a Portsmouth newspaper covering the people’s vote March and the pro-leave sentiment was full of all the same broken, discredited reasoning and meaningless patriotic drivel as usual but was also overwhelmingly dominant. 

I voted remain but if I get the chance I'll be voting leave after seeing the eu leaders true colours ! Gangsters and children running the uk !

Better off with just the kindergarten we've got here running the show , at least we save 39 billion quid by leaving ! 

Gangsters?  What, for asking us what we want before they decide whether they can agree? 

Would you care to articulate an example of such gangster or infantile behaviour so we can assess whether your perception tallies with the reality as we perceive it?

That's what the march was about on Saturday.

The trouble is, in order to have time to prepare and hold another 'meaningful' referendum (ideally, this time with a proper representation of the consequences), we'd either have to get another extension, or revoke A50 to prevent a default no deal.

If we went back to the EU and asked for an extension on condition of holding a second referendum, I think we might get it. Especially if another condition is that the EU are allowed to make the Remain case, with facts to counter the lies...

What is it about the "eu leaders true colours" you have taken a dislike to?

My impression is they have a plan and are powerful negotiators which are examples of the benefits of EU membership.

<sigh>

No we don't. Our NET contribution last year was 9.8 billion.

Citation to support that: https://fullfact.org/europe/our-eu-membership-fee-55-million/

I hope Tim Jones, with his dislike of the term ‘magical thinking’ is reading this thread, because I suspect he’s about to see one or more rabbits pulled out of an entirely fictional hat. 

Other posters have dismantled the 39B rubbish, but to try and inject actual facts in to the other size of the equation, the CBI say:

A CBI literature review suggests that the net benefit of EU membership to the UK could be in the region of 4-5% of GDP or £62bn-£78bn a year – roughly the economies of the North East and Northern Ireland taken together.

http://www.cbi.org.uk/insight-and-analysis/our-global-future/factsheets/fac...

But what do they know, eh? Better to trust that greying troll doll who owns Wetherspoons. 

Thanks.

fullfact.org really ought to be compulsory reading for BBC interviewers, so they can slap down the bollocks spouted by interviewees.

Actually, I'm sure there ought be be a nice AI application that does voice recognition, creates a suitable search string, parses the results, and displays a 'Bolloxometer' on screen, in real-time, during interviews...

Oh god, no we don't save that, at most we exchange deferring paying what we owe for a massive hit to our economy, the erosion of what little good will remains with our negotiating partners in Brussels and an ugly stain on our national reputation that will make the difficult and costly business of digging ourselves out of that hole more so.

Anyway, vote as you see fit, I just hope you get the chance and don't grow to regret your choice.

Jk

Yeah they suggested ! Speculation is a funny thing when used negatively 

Yes just watch all the live footage of them making demands at their euro meetings - not prepared to negotiate / they can't otherwise they loose their control over all the other countries ! Also the eu you has just started the censorship of the Internet assuming they are in charge of what we see , say and hear 🤔  just saying , not very friendly behaviour if you ask me .

I said we save 39billion if we leave not every year .

Err no , for just about evrything else they've done whilst lining their pockets . 

How do you calculate that, then? Considering we would save about £10bn a year, every year, from when we leave.

Who *exactly* is they in this context because you're making serious sounding allegations?

Jk

Is £39bn a big number and what are the costs of your policy proposal?

Jk

Ah. You're talking about the bill to leave.

It appears we may have to pay that, deal or no deal:

https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-can-we-avoid-paying-the-3...

You say Putin is at war with the west.

How do you work that out?

Did he start the economic warfare or was that the "West"? 

Did he start a Banderov fascist coup in Ukraine or was that the "west" that started it? 

Was it Putin that started the problems on 8.8.08 in South Ossetia by bombing civilians or was that the "west", and their grovelling tie munching mafian puppet Saakashvili that started bombing men, women, kids and old folk? 

PS. Is it the Russian Federation that is surrounding the "west", with missile bases and military bases or the Russian Federation surrounding the "west"?

Pps. Is it the RF making up fairy stories about British MIsix going to Russia and "poisoning ", two British people or the other way around ? 

You know Putin is a Capitalist, Russia is not longer a Marxist / Leninist utopia, you are no longer obliged to defend their every action.

We’re in a crap position in time, granted (partly due to the fine efforts of Hammond and co in blocking good preparation for the other option).  That doesn’t mean we should go back.

The EU have said that they’ll only grant a longer extension if we vote for the deal.  If you believe them there are two options and we need to pick one.  MPs are wasting time instead of getting on with picking from the options they left us with.

Going back on article 50 is not acceptable to me, and I don’t think you have a majority - certainly not numbers so great it should be done.  Nationwide coverage for the petition - the last chance for people to ask - gets 6million (it’ll grow, granted, but it’s looking like the rush is over).  Looks like polls don’t support a referendum either https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47693645