advertisement


Brexit: give me a positive effect (2022 remastered edition)

Status
Not open for further replies.
I'll tell you how it happened with me. On the morning of the confirmation of the Leave result, I was filled with an awful sense of dread. I've never felt so apprehensive about a political outcome, ever. I think it was quite a while later when I saw the speech by Corbyn, but in my anxious, stressed, and somewhat fearful state, seeing him announce the immediate trigger of Article 50 had me shouting at the TV. I was bitterly disappointed, and thought he was better than that. It just added another thing to an already bad day.

I'm sure a lot of Remainers were in the same boat as myself and my wife, and I'm willing to bet that he lost a lot of potential supporters after that speech. First impressions on handling something as huge as Brexit last, and I'm afraid this one is on him.
Yup. I resigned instantly from the labour party, which I had actively campaigned for at the previous election. Also wrote him a substantial email explaining my decision, which I'm sure he read with much disquiet...
I could see very clearly what brexit was, and if ever there was a time to stand against the right's machinations, it seems to me this was it.... apparently not though.
 
I've always felt that one of the greatest intellectual failings of remain is that the freedom to vote for - and to sanction - at the ballot box the people who raise and spend our taxes, is somehow seen as antithetical to notions of collaboration, goodwill, peace and prosperity, and that the people who voted for self determination in 2016 must, by extension of their rejection of the EU project, be small-minded, xenophobic and reactionary. This speaks more of the extraordinary success of the EU propaganda machine in associating itself with those notions of peace, progressivism, tolerance and co-operation than it does of many of its more anguished proponents of actually having any real understanding of the specific institutions and governance frameworks of the EU, and also of course of the belligerent tribalism of brexit itself.

Your sentence above confirms this failing yet again. You speak of the EU in utopian terms, and seem only able to acknowledge any negative traits in our own (current) government. Just to take your own example of 'overly aggressive posturing towards out-groups', I see no mention of grim, allegedly abuse-afflicted EU sponsored migrant camps in Libya and Turkey, or of razor wire fences erected across the EU's eastern borders that keep brown-skinned refugees from the wars in the Levant and Afghanistan out, but let white-skinned refugees from the war in Ukraine through.

An aside, but in the context of collaboration and co-operation amongst neighbours, I was delighted to read yesterday that a serving French general has just taken command of the 1st British Division.



Amongst the objective threats of continued EU membership one might include the progressive and very real dilution of democracy, the dilution of control of the economy and of sovereign currency, the dilution of control of foreign policy, and the loss of control of national borders. In foreign policy and geopolitical terms I feel that the EU has been astonishingly naive, and has directly and demonstrably contributed the current threat to peace in Europe. What's almost worse is that it continues to do so. I do not entirely see that point as an 'us and them' one either, for we were members of the EU too in the relevant period.

I see the Euro as an objective threat to prosperity, its design flaws and built-in iniquities actively favouring the industrial/exporting centre (primarily an overtly mercantalist Germany, which has built its manufacturing might on a disastrous model of cheap Russian gas) at the expense of the periphery. I see the CAP and the CFP as vehicles for environmental devastation.



I didn't say that it had. I merely said that austerity was an EU-wide policy. More specifically, it was an EZ-wide policy.
I totally agree with you on the CAP and CFP, but the notion that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy is flimflam of the highest order. Brexit, astonishingly predictably, allowed Rees Mogg, Boris Johnson, the ERG and their cohorts to marginalise any decency in the Conservative party and turn it into something nasty and autocratic prepared to hold on to power by gerrymandering and remorselessly vilifying the poor and the weak. They have done far more to corrupt British democracy than the EU ever did.
 
I totally agree with you on the CAP and CFP, but the notion that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy is flimflam of the highest order. Brexit, astonishingly predictably, allowed Rees Mogg, Boris Johnson, the ERG and their cohorts to marginalise any decency in the Conservative party and turn it into something nasty and autocratic prepared to hold on to power by gerrymandering and remorselessly vilifying the poor and the weak. They have done far more to corrupt British democracy than the EU ever did.
Clearsighted.
 
I'll tell you how it happened with me. On the morning of the confirmation of the Leave result, I was filled with an awful sense of dread. I've never felt so apprehensive about a political outcome, ever. I think it was quite a while later when I saw the speech by Corbyn, but in my anxious, stressed, and somewhat fearful state, seeing him announce the immediate trigger of Article 50 had me shouting at the TV. I was bitterly disappointed, and thought he was better than that. It just added another thing to an already bad day.

I'm sure a lot of Remainers were in the same boat as myself and my wife, and I'm willing to bet that he lost a lot of potential supporters after that speech. First impressions on handling something as huge as Brexit last, and I'm afraid this one is on him.
I get that. I was livid on that morning. Much more vocally livid than I should’ve been.

However, once a democratic decision had been made, denying that decision, looks rather Trumpishly undemocratic. Delaying A50 was an option, but to what end? Reversing the referendum was never on the cards, a second referendum would require a mandate which never came and Brexit fever was at a high and support for Brexit if anything seemed to grow after 2016. Personal experience of talking to people in my local was that even those who voted remain thought the result should be accepted, and although I live in a very Tory area, such a view seemed to be reflected in various vox pop pieces on national news.

Given that there was no mandate to reverse the referendum result and no appetite for a second referendum, going for a deal that included the SM and the CU was the only sensible option. Unfortunately there was no support for that either, which is why we are where we are.

A sensible, coherent, well formulated and well funded Remain campaign was not organised before Brexit, and any sensible alternative to a No Deal Brexit did not attract sufficient support afterwards.

The only option now is to organise a campaign to rejoin the EU, but that too has scarce support.
 
I totally agree with you on the CAP and CFP, but the notion that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy is flimflam of the highest order. Brexit, astonishingly predictably, allowed Rees Mogg, Boris Johnson, the ERG and their cohorts to marginalise any decency in the Conservative party and turn it into something nasty and autocratic prepared to hold on to power by gerrymandering and remorselessly vilifying the poor and the weak. They have done far more to corrupt British democracy than the EU ever did.
Did EV say that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy?
 
I get that. I was livid on that morning. Much more vocally livid than I should’ve been.

Hardly surprising - it played more on our emotions and around our personal beliefs than just the objective truth of being in or out of the EU.
 
“Advisory”. “Representative Democracy”.Six years after that referendum, Brexit, ie the UK has still not settled its relationship with the EU. IMO, Article 50 should not have been invoked until the public knew exactly what they were getting. Instead they handed the Tory Party a blank cheque and they are seeing now what that means.

Welcome to Kigali.
 
“Advisory”. “Representative Democracy”.Six years after that referendum, Brexit, ie the UK has still not settled its relationship with the EU. IMO, Article 50 should not have been invoked until the public knew exactly what they were getting. Instead they handed the Tory Party a blank cheque and they are seeing now what that means.

Welcome to Kigali.
No. The Referendum was defined by Cameron as ‘ IN OUT’ and ‘binding’. No blank cheque either. Retaining membership of SM and CU was on the table but it got no support. It got no support at the time and all other options got no support in two general elections.
 
I totally agree with you on the CAP and CFP, but the notion that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy is flimflam of the highest order. Brexit, astonishingly predictably, allowed Rees Mogg, Boris Johnson, the ERG and their cohorts to marginalise any decency in the Conservative party and turn it into something nasty and autocratic prepared to hold on to power by gerrymandering and remorselessly vilifying the poor and the weak. They have done far more to corrupt British democracy than the EU ever did.

And they shall be held to account for the sum of their failings, by the British voter, at the ballot box. The EU will not be, has never been, and probably never will be, accountable to the European electorates.

I think the British democracy is a cranky old thing. I am seeing a government more exposed than I believe I have seen in my life, and I feel that the grassroots surge in fury at their conduct will be overwhelming. This might not be democracy as we expect it to be, but it is democracy now.

I do however believe that we should be alert to the fact that neoliberal capital will engage in a fightback to restore the 'correct' power balance of capital/workers. Inflation, and consequent unemployment, may well be their weapon of choice.

This country desperately needs an opposition, and one with a policy plan. Labour is a vacuum.
 
Have found a positive. The UK is doing better at exports than the rest of the world. Providing that you: a) think exports are bad and should be discouraged; or b) you turn the graph upside down and look at it in a mirror.

FVrXrxKXEAAHJsZ
 
Have found a positive. The UK is doing better at exports than the rest of the world. Providing that you: a) think exports are bad and should be discouraged; or b) you turn the graph upside down and look at it in a mirror.

FVrXrxKXEAAHJsZ
It’s an economic miracle. I’m not sure Mogg is able to see his reflection in a mirror, Cpl. Francois can’t reach the mirror and Owen Paterson is no longer able to access it.
 
Things like this will be more than a little disruptive - https://www.modernpowersystems.com/...-north-sea-will-be-a-giant-power-hub-5836496/ and then - https://doggerbank.com

Regards

Richard

The title of this thread being, 'Brexit: give me a positive effect', I linked this article because the Guardian stated: 'The protection of Dogger Bank is that rare thing – a Brexit dividend.'. If you want to complain about wind turbines, and we all use electricity, might I suggest you start a separate thread?
 
No. The Referendum was defined by Cameron as ‘ IN OUT’ and ‘binding’. No blank cheque either. Retaining membership of SM and CU was on the table but it got no support. It got no support at the time and all other options got no support in two general elections.
But only advisory so the safeguards usually attendant on a referendum - required supermajority, void if corrupt etc could be torn up.
 
  • Like
Reactions: PsB
I've always felt that one of the greatest intellectual failings of remain is that the freedom to vote for - and to sanction - at the ballot box the people who raise and spend our taxes, is somehow seen as antithetical to notions of collaboration, goodwill, peace and prosperity, and that the people who voted for self determination in 2016 must, by extension of their rejection of the EU project, be small-minded, xenophobic and reactionary. This speaks more of the extraordinary success of the EU propaganda machine in associating itself with those notions of peace, progressivism, tolerance and co-operation than it does of many of its more anguished proponents of actually having any real understanding of the specific institutions and governance frameworks of the EU, and also of course of the belligerent tribalism of brexit itself.

Your sentence above confirms this failing yet again. You speak of the EU in utopian terms, and seem only able to acknowledge any negative traits in our own (current) government. Just to take your own example of 'overly aggressive posturing towards out-groups', I see no mention of grim, allegedly abuse-afflicted EU sponsored migrant camps in Libya and Turkey, or of razor wire fences erected across the EU's eastern borders that keep brown-skinned refugees from the wars in the Levant and Afghanistan out, but let white-skinned refugees from the war in Ukraine through.

An aside, but in the context of collaboration and co-operation amongst neighbours, I was delighted to read yesterday that a serving French general has just taken command of the 1st British Division.



Amongst the objective threats of continued EU membership one might include the progressive and very real dilution of democracy, the dilution of control of the economy and of sovereign currency, the dilution of control of foreign policy, and the loss of control of national borders. In foreign policy and geopolitical terms I feel that the EU has been astonishingly naive, and has directly and demonstrably contributed the current threat to peace in Europe. What's almost worse is that it continues to do so. I do not entirely see that point as an 'us and them' one either, for we were members of the EU too in the relevant period.

I see the Euro as an objective threat to prosperity, its design flaws and built-in iniquities actively favouring the industrial/exporting centre (primarily an overtly mercantalist Germany, which has built its manufacturing might on a disastrous model of cheap Russian gas) at the expense of the periphery. I see the CAP and the CFP as vehicles for environmental devastation.



I didn't say that it had. I merely said that austerity was an EU-wide policy. More specifically, it was an EZ-wide policy.

Some of that is worthy of Tucker Carlson - peak conflation. Dilution though is an apt projection - Britain is weaker after Brexit. It's quite a depressing read: up at the top is democracy (helped along by your man Boris; Priti, Liz and our wonderful AG), followed by the economy (projected to sit just above Russia's next year) and sterling (much stronger and sought after whilst we were in the SM, now weak and floundering). Other notables include the Union, trade, rights, farming, fishing, education, travel, employment, wealth, standards, the NHS, small business, our international standing; trust, tolerance, friendships, families and communities - on and on we could go. And let's not forget how much of the nation’s financial resources we’ve depleted to keep Britain in this weakened state. Still, we've enjoyed an uptick in tribalism and right-wing politics (your man again). A quick read of European history tells us where all that leads.

And what of control? The typical Brexiter seems rather fearful, angry and insecure so it makes sense that Take Back Control resonated: control - or at least the perception of control - being the balm that helps soothe uncomfortable feelings. They also seem to dislike being told what to do by people from different lands so again it makes sense that sovereignty, flags, jingoism, Empire and posters about immigrants also worked - wall-to-wall dopamine and serotonin for the masses; however, it turns that Take Back Control is really nothing more than reproducing EU regulations in our own format, and sovereignty is just an unnecessary, expensive and convoluted game of trade-off - between our shiny new rules, which are largely MIA as no one can agree on what Brexit actually means, and access to Europe.

Can’t compare our foreign policy as I’m not sure what it is exactly apart form cutting the international aid budget (rather small-minded I’d argue) and copying EU trade deals. Ukraine wants to join the EU, not the United Kingdom, just to be clear. As for peace, we are much better at war than the EU - and we weren’t in the Euro so that’s a moot point. CAP has helped numerous famers and rural communities, and helped protect food standards but it has also encouraged intensive farming which damages the environment but then again so has every other major country’s agricultural policy but that doesn’t make it right. It’s not all milk and honey in Brussels you know. The comment about out-groups btw refers to the exaggerated (and misplaced) hostility and posturing toward the EU (the out-group in this case) by leave voters. Despite all the copious copy you've not really elaborated on what continues to fuel your hostility for and antipathy toward an organisation that has brought peace and prosperity to so many six years after the referendum. And why are we still the only country to have left the EU? Maybe the EU is not the existential threat you think it is, or maybe it's because our friends and neighbours see Brexit for it is: a failure, and abject humiliation for the British State.
 
Have found a positive. The UK is doing better at exports than the rest of the world. Providing that you: a) think exports are bad and should be discouraged; or b) you turn the graph upside down and look at it in a mirror.

Good article on the economic effects of Brexit in today's FT here : https://www.ft.com/content/7a209a34-7d95-47aa-91b0-bf02d4214764

Contains this graph showing UK investment over time and you can see the effect of both the Brexit referendum and then COVID.

Z1Mnpzo.png


So far we have seen about half the OBR predicted (March 2020) effects. If we see the full amount , as seems likely, then "That level of decline, worth about £100bn a year in lost output, would result in lost revenues for the Treasury of roughly £40bn a year. That is £40bn that might have been available to the beleaguered Johnson for the radical tax cuts demanded by the Tory right — the equivalent of 6p off the 20p in the pound basic rate of income tax".

For the record "Downing Street insisted this week it was “too early to pass judgment” on whether Brexit was having a negative impact on the economy, which could be heading into a recession. “The opportunities Brexit provides will be a boon to the UK economy in the long run,” Johnson’s spokesman said."
 
The kebab shops give you a receipt saying you have won an agreed amount based on you putting an agreed amount in their machines. You can then take your 'winnings' and put it in your bank account. And when your bank asks where the cash came from you have a receipt from a German registered business declaring it as winnings. It is therefore cleaned and there is no tax to pay.

I am intrigued by this. Are you suggesting that kebab shop fruit machine money laundering is a significant effect?

Or like one bloke who has done maybe £100k and is about to get arrested for tax fraud?

Also who is using this facility? Criminals? Small business owners?
 
I am intrigued by this. Are you suggesting that kebab shop fruit machine money laundering is a significant effect?

Or like one bloke who has done maybe £100k and is about to get arrested for tax fraud?

Also who is using this facility? Criminals? Small business owners?
Just to be on the safe side I’ve forwarded Richard’s post to the German tax authorities.
 
Did EV say that Brexit has gifted the UK a purer democracy?

"Amongst the objective threats of continued EU membership one might include the progressive and very real dilution of democracy"

Although I'm sure the old windbag would have piped up himself by now if he disagreed with me.
 
No. The Referendum was defined by Cameron as ‘ IN OUT’ and ‘binding’. No blank cheque either. Retaining membership of SM and CU was on the table but it got no support. It got no support at the time and all other options got no support in two general elections.

Just because David Cameron says something doesn't mean it's true...
 
Some of that is worthy of Tucker Carlson - peak conflation. Dilution though is an apt projection - Britain is weaker after Brexit. It's quite a depressing read: up at the top is democracy (helped along by your man Boris; Priti, Liz and our wonderful AG), followed by the economy (projected to sit just above Russia's next year) and sterling (much stronger and sought after whilst we were in the SM, now weak and floundering). Other notables include the Union, trade, rights, farming, fishing, education, travel, employment, wealth, standards, the NHS, small business, our international standing; trust, tolerance, friendships, families and communities - on and on we could go. And let's not forget how much of the nation’s financial resources we’ve depleted to keep Britain in this weakened state. Still, we've enjoyed an uptick in tribalism and right-wing politics (your man again). A quick read of European history tells us where all that leads.

And what of control? The typical Brexiter seems rather fearful, angry and insecure so it makes sense that Take Back Control resonated: control - or at least the perception of control - being the balm that helps soothe uncomfortable feelings. They also seem to dislike being told what to do by people from different lands so again it makes sense that sovereignty, flags, jingoism, Empire and posters about immigrants also worked - wall-to-wall dopamine and serotonin for the masses; however, it turns that Take Back Control is really nothing more than reproducing EU regulations in our own format, and sovereignty is just an unnecessary, expensive and convoluted game of trade-off - between our shiny new rules, which are largely MIA as no one can agree on what Brexit actually means, and access to Europe.

Can’t compare our foreign policy as I’m not sure what it is exactly apart form cutting the international aid budget (rather small-minded I’d argue) and copying EU trade deals. Ukraine wants to join the EU, not the United Kingdom, just to be clear. As for peace, we are much better at war than the EU - and we weren’t in the Euro so that’s a moot point. CAP has helped numerous famers and rural communities, and helped protect food standards but it has also encouraged intensive farming which damages the environment but then again so has every other major country’s agricultural policy but that doesn’t make it right. It’s not all milk and honey in Brussels you know. The comment about out-groups btw refers to the exaggerated (and misplaced) hostility and posturing toward the EU (the out-group in this case) by leave voters. Despite all the copious copy you've not really elaborated on what continues to fuel your hostility for and antipathy toward an organisation that has brought peace and prosperity to so many six years after the referendum. And why are we still the only country to have left the EU? Maybe the EU is not the existential threat you think it is, or maybe it's because our friends and neighbours see Brexit for it is: a failure, and abject humiliation for the British State.

Some well considered points, some not so much, a fair bit of your own conflation - most pertinently that of repeatedly comparing an elected and accountable government with an unelected and unaccountable set of technocratic institutions, (I haven't the faintest who Tucker Carlson is, incidentally) some recourse to the usual tribal pejoratives, and a continued weakness for the usual EU platitudes (peace, prosperity etc), but a decent enough post. I accept your best points, even if I don't necessarily agree with them, whilst I agree with some of your worst points, by which I mean those that aren't relevant to the debate.

We are the only country to have left the EU because we have served as a vivid demonstration to les autres as to how bloody the EU will make it, because most members are currently happy with their status, and because leaving it is effectively impossible for those members which are also in the EZ. Despite all of that, the French President expressed his relief that there hadn't been an in-out referendum in France back in 2016, as we wasn't confident that the result would have been 'the right one'.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.


advertisement


Back
Top