Brexit matters

[Dave1987]

I'm not convinced either, but then after only 11 days of the new dispensation I would not expect to be! No gain without pain and all that. Ask again in 10 years time, about the time it took for any meaningful advantages to come through from joining in the first place. However, I'm not that convinced either that the 'enormous' and 'massive' benefits that you refer to were anything but a pretty mixed bag anyway.

Whatever, the die is cast. We can either go through the rest of our lives bitter, constantly and boringly telling everyone how the country would have been better off if the referendum had gone the other way in 2016, or we can get on with, and make the best of, life under the new dispensation, however that may pan out. You never know, it might even be better?

The problem is is the whole thing got far far too nasty and bitter for their to happen. Brexiteers are determined to rub salt into to wounds of anyone that voted remain and try to force remainers to say they were wrong all along etc and remainers are determined to prove that Brexit was an extremely bad decision. This is going to take a LONG time for this to all be forgotten about and for everyone to “get on with our lives”. Even Gove admitted to Brexit debate got very nasty and has heavily divided to nation. That bitterness is not just going to disappear overnight.

 

[Journeyman]

The problem is is the whole thing got far far too nasty and bitter for their to happen. Brexiteers are determined to rub salt into to wounds of anyone that voted remain and try to force remainers to say they were wrong all along etc and remainers are determined to prove that Brexit was an extremely bad decision. This is going to take a LONG time for this to all be forgotten about and for everyone to “get on with our lives”. Even Gove admitted to Brexit debate got very nasty and has heavily divided to nation. That bitterness is not just going to disappear overnight.

Exactly. Brexit supporters have been complaining bitterly ever since we joined. It would be just a little hypocritical if they expected remainers just to be happy now.

 

[nlogax]

The problem is is the whole thing got far far too nasty and bitter for their to happen. Brexiteers are determined to rub salt into to wounds of anyone that voted remain and try to force remainers to say they were wrong all along etc and remainers are determined to prove that Brexit was an extremely bad decision. This is going to take a LONG time for this to all be forgotten about and for everyone to “get on with our lives”. Even Gove admitted to Brexit debate got very nasty and has heavily divided to nation. That bitterness is not just going to disappear overnight.

My guess is that as a result of Brexit, the UK will be a much smaller (both physically and of outlook), poorer, more bitter country than it already is.

 

[najaB]

It might be better. But so far all I can see is what we've lost forever. Freedom of movement, Erasmus, visa-free travel, protection of European courts, opportunity to fully participate in the running of one of the most powerful organisations in the world, shopping and business complicated by customs procedures, small businesses struggling...all the supposed gains seem tiny in comparison.

At the moment, I can only see downsides as well but since it is the situation we're in I have to hope for the best possible result in the long run.

Also, of course, the divisive effects of the vote have massively destabilised the UK, and made Scottish independence far more likely, which personally I think will be a disaster on both sides of the border.

Agreed. I was bitterly opposed to independence in the 2014 referendum but I've more or less come around to the position that it's better the disaster that you choose, rather than the disaster that is thrust upon you.

 

[alex397]

My guess is that as a result of Brexit, the UK will be a much smaller (both physically and of outlook), poorer, more bitter country than it already is.

I share your worry. We seem to be becoming very close minded and bitter as a nation. Well, even more than before. There are some saying we need to ‘pull together and make the best of it’ and similar. That would be a positive thing to do, but very difficult in a bitterly divided country.

 

[edwin_m]

Really?

"EU chief warns members cannot negotiate separate vaccine deals​

Warning comes after Germany agreed with BioNTech to supply 30 million additional doses in a side deal.

Your post relates to supply of vaccines. The post of mine you quoted relates to approval. If you choose to quote me, please have the courtesy to reply to the point I actually made.

 

[Senex]

I share your worry. We seem to be becoming very close minded and bitter as a nation. Well, even more than before. There are some saying we need to ‘pull together and make the best of it’ and similar. That would be a positive thing to do, but very difficult in a bitterly divided country.

I think that's inevitable. The Brexiteers won, and having fought against the EU-idea for a long time they want to rejoice in their victory. They are also (or many of them are) happy to pay the price of higher costs, reduced opportunities, and so on. The Remainers feel that the referedum was won on lies and that it was advisory only in any case. And since then we have had a government that instead of trying to find some sort of reconciliation in the light of such a tiny winning majority has gone out of its way to give the Brexiteers the exit they wanted and to avoid making any gesture at all towards the Remainers. Absolutely nothing has been done to stem the feelings of bitterness and the strengthening of those feelings. And if Brexit does go well, we shall have the crowings of the Brexiteers "We told you so", and if it goes badly, we shall have the Remainers proclaiming the same. No recipe there for reconciliation! I think we're stuck with a bitterly divided country for a good few years to come (with many other grounds for division, of course, and not just the focal point of Brexit).

 

[21C101]

While I'm willing to acknowledge that EU tax policy isn't great, and that on occasions member states' hands can be tied in a way that doesn't help, I'm yet to be convinced that the small freedoms we're taking advantage of are worth the enormous cost in lost trade, and the massive loss in rights, protections and democratic participation we've suffered. Certain things being fractionally more expensive feels like a small price to pay for what we gained as members, and I feel like some of the absolutely tiny gains of Brexit are very scant compensation for what we've lost.

This debate is at last onto sensible territory.

Which side of the fence you are on as to the benefits and constraints membership brings and how you weight them decides your vote.

I always have prized the ability of the UK system to provide a secure majority to a government and allow it to act on it, without being constrained by a written constitution.

Yes it carries risks, but it also means that major, even revolutionary change can be made rapidly and democratically, preventing pressures building up and turning into a powderkeg ending in voilent revolution, as has happened so often in mainland Europe and may yet happen in the US where the checks and balances enshrined in the US constitution and enforced by the constitutional (Supreme) court prevent any meaningful reform of anything.

Had the powers of the House of Lords been enshrined in a constitution, preventing Lloyd George passing the parliament act, we in the UK would 112 years ago be where the USA is now.

Your post relates to supply of vaccines. The post of mine you quoted relates to approval. If you choose to quote me, please have the courtesy to reply to the point I actually made.

Your original post was posted in a discussion on supply of vaccines and said:

"Every EU member state has the authority to approve medicines for emergency use within its own country without waiting for EU-wide approval - and indeed we were still under EU rules when that happened."

And then went on to say:

"So the UK could have started vaccinating in exactly the same way if we'd still been a member."

Which relates to supply as well as approval.

So it seems to me reasonable that my post quoting yours does reply to the point made.

 

[edwin_m]

I always have prized the ability of the UK system to provide a secure majority to a government and allow it to act on it, without being constrained by a written constitution.

Yes it carries risks, but it also means that major, even revolutionary change can be made rapidly and democratically, preventing pressures building up and turning into a powderkeg ending in voilent revolution, as has happened so often in mainland Europe and may yet happen in the US where the checks and balances enshrined in the US constitution and enforced by the constitutional (Supreme) court prevent any meaningful reform of anything.

Had the powers of the House of Lords been enshrined in a constitution, preventing Lloyd George passing the parliament act, we in the UK would 112 years ago be where the USA is now.

So you consider that a government can get power on a minority of the public vote, and without checks and balances implement radical measures that even its supporters might not have voted for (for example, having preferred that party to an even worse alternative as many appear to have done in 2019). That to me seems a sure way of building up grievance that could ultimately result in extra-Parliamentary action.

"Every EU member state has the authority to approve medicines for emergency use within its own country without waiting for EU-wide approval - and indeed we were still under EU rules when that happened."

And then went on to say:

"So the UK could have started vaccinating in exactly the same way if we'd still been a member."

Which relates to supply as well as approval.

So it seems to me reasonable that my post quoting yours does reply to the point made.

Your views might carry more weight if you quote the part you are replying to.

 

[RT4038]

I think that's inevitable. The Brexiteers won, and having fought against the EU-idea for a long time they want to rejoice in their victory. They are also (or many of them are) happy to pay the price of higher costs, reduced opportunities, and so on. The Remainers feel that the referedum was won on lies and that it was advisory only in any case. And since then we have had a government that instead of trying to find some sort of reconciliation in the light of such a tiny winning majority has gone out of its way to give the Brexiteers the exit they wanted and to avoid making any gesture at all towards the Remainers. Absolutely nothing has been done to stem the feelings of bitterness and the strengthening of those feelings. And if Brexit does go well, we shall have the crowings of the Brexiteers "We told you so", and if it goes badly, we shall have the Remainers proclaiming the same. No recipe there for reconciliation! I think we're stuck with a bitterly divided country for a good few years to come (with many other grounds for division, of course, and not just the focal point of Brexit).

You are quite right. However, I don't see what kind of reconciliation could possibly have been had - the crux of Brexit was leaving the single market and customs union (and the economic, legal and social obligations that are part and parcel of membership of that union). It was not about technical membership of the EU or not. Unfortunately the EU (understandably) were not going to have the UK cherry picking the advantages whilst escaping the obligations, which we already had some concessions, and have probably done a fairly reasonable reconciliation job with the Trade agreement.

There are other countries that have had to deal with bitter divisions (indeed in our own country between Cavaliers and Roundheads, or of the six counties of Northern Ireland) and sadly it can take generations to heal. Not sure that Brexit is quite on the same level though?

 

[edwin_m]

You are quite right. However, I don't see what kind of reconciliation could possibly have been had - the crux of Brexit was leaving the single market and customs union (and the economic, legal and social obligations that are part and parcel of membership of that union). It was not about technical membership of the EU or not.

The question was:

Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?

Anything else is your interpretation, with which other voters may disagree. And if only a few of them didn't get what they wanted, then that 52% becomes a minority.

 

[nlogax]

It was not about technical membership of the EU or not.

Quite the opposite. As you can see from the specific wording of the referendum question above it was exactly that. Everything else was up for negotiation.

 

[WelshBluebird]

the crux of Brexit was leaving the single market and customs union (and the economic, legal and social obligations that are part and parcel of membership of that union). It was not about technical membership of the EU or not.

Except that just is not true.
The referendum question did not mention the single market, or the customs union. It only mentioned if you the UK should be a member of the EU or not.
Hell, multiple leave groups campaigned on voting leave but staying in the single market etc.

 

[RT4038]

The question was:

Anything else is your interpretation, with which other voters may disagree. And if only a few of them didn't get what they wanted, then that 52% becomes a minority.

Correct, it is my interpretation of the referendum question. And so it turned out that leaving the single market and customs union was the crux of the matter for the Brexiteers.

Quite the opposite. As you can see from the specific wording of the referendum question above it was exactly that. Everything else was up for negotiation.

The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union. What would be the point?

 

[edwin_m]

Correct, it is my interpretation of the referendum question. And so it turned out that leaving the single market and customs union was the crux of the matter for the Brexiteers.


The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union. What would be the point?

If that's so then they were uncharacteristically shy about letting on, at least until after they got the vote they wanted.

There's a perfectly legitimate position of being in the single market and the customs union but not formally a member of the EU, therefore opting out of the political stuff that some object to. Many who voted to leave probably wanted and expected that to happen, either not caring about the economic stuff or considering it to be a benefit.

Given the closeness of the result it might have been a sensible compromise between those who preferred to leave and to remain. But instead the UK's stance was ratcheted more and more towards the more radical position that ultimately came to pass - one notch short of the ultimate extreme of WTO terms.

 

[WelshBluebird]

The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union.

But at least some of the leave supporting politicians said differently and are quoted on video saying so (including the now infamous Daniel Hannan quotes).

I think it is obvious we aren't going to agree here - but at the very least given that some Brexit campaigners are literally on video saying the very opposite to what you are claiming, I think the reality is that the question meant different things to different people.

 

[simonw]

Correct, it is my interpretation of the referendum question. And so it turned out that leaving the single market and customs union was the crux of the matter for the Brexiteers.


The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union. What would be the point?

Plenty of evidence out there of brexiters saying leaving the European union didn't mean leaving the single market and or customs union. The fact that brexiteers now claim this was not so, further undermines their position.

 

[najaB]

The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union.

Then why did they say otherwise? Were they.... lying?

 

[nlogax]

The referendum question might have been worded like that, but the Brexiteers never meant anything but leaving the Single market and customs union. What would be the point?

Please stop with spouting this fallacy and retrofitting pre-referendum Brexiteer comments with today's reality. Regardless of their subsequent opinions this is what referendum voters were told by pro-Leave supporters.



http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/michael_gove_the_facts_of_life_say_leave.html
Michael Gove, April 2016:

'There is a free trade zone stretching from Iceland to Turkey that all European nations have access to, regardless of whether they are in or out of the euro or EU. After we vote to leave we will stay in this zone. The suggestion that Bosnia, Serbia, Albania and the Ukraine would stay part of this free trade area - and Britain would be on the outside with just Belarus - is as credible as Jean-Claude Juncker joining UKIP.

'Agreeing to maintain this continental free trade zone is the simple course and emphatically in everyone’s interests.’

https://twitter.com/arron_banks/status/682125949245206528
Arron Banks, Dec 2015

Increasingly the Norway option looks the best for the UK

C4 interview on YouTube
Daniel Hannan, May 2015

"To repeat, absolutely nobody is talking about threatening our place in the single market".

 

[RT4038]

Please stop with spouting this fallacy and retrofitting pre-referendum Brexiteer comments with today's reality. Regardless of their subsequent opinions this is what referendum voters were told by pro-Leave supporters.



http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/michael_gove_the_facts_of_life_say_leave.html
Michael Gove, April 2016:


https://twitter.com/arron_banks/status/682125949245206528
Arron Banks, Dec 2015


C4 interview on YouTube
Daniel Hannan, May 2015

And you really thought that the economic, political and social strictures that membership of the Single Market and Customs Union entailed were ever going to be acceptable to the Brexiteers? Without some pretty seismic movement by the EU to accommodate us? Really?

I am spouting my own interpretation of the Leave campaign in 2015/6, whatever wishful thinking or hoodwinking they may have engaged in. It was fairly clear to me what Leave meant, and it wasn't particularly pretty.

 

[najaB]

I am spouting my own interpretation of the Leave campaign in 2015/6, whatever wishful thinking or hoodwinking they may have engaged in.

So you accept that they lied. Good to know.

 

[nlogax]

I am spouting my own interpretation of the Leave campaign in 2015/6, whatever wishful thinking or hoodwinking they may have engaged in.

May / did / it's right there. Thank you for that.

 

[RT4038]

May / did / it's right there. Thank you for that.

Looking at your quotes, I suppose the answers to these are:

Michael Gove, April 2016:
The agreement we have negotiated with the EU is one of Free Trade, and puts us in a Free Trade Zone. There is no mention of the Single Market or Customs Union.

Arron Banks, Dec 2015:
The Norway option increasingly looked well, but was then rejected by the EU, (and the UK for being too restrictive).

Danniel Hannan, May 2015
We are not threatening our place in the single market, providing the EU make some seismic concessions. If they don't, then it is them threatening our membership of the single market.

One person's lies is another's wishful thnking or politic speak (hoodwinking) !

 

[najaB]

We are not threatening our place in the single market, providing the EU make some seismic concessions. If they don't, then it is them threatening our membership of the single market.

Bull****. It was the UK government that destroyed any chance of us remaining in the single market because they never even tried.

Note that they managed it for Northern Ireland.

 

[37424]

Bull****. It was the UK government that destroyed any chance of us remaining in the single market because they never even tried.

Note that they managed it for Northern Ireland.

Well indeed we also had Farage talking about a Norway/Swiss style deal before the referendum which you can find on You Tube, but after the referendum that changed to 'Well that's not really leaving the EU' and we need a Canada style deal and that then moved on to No Deal. Watching Preston before Christmas this was put to him about once supporting a Norway style option, but he flatly denied it. It is this moving of the goal posts after the referendum to a different type of Brexit which I think has been the real issue for many Remainers. Boris of course also thought he got a mandate of his hard style Brexit at the last election, when what he really got a mandate for was 'Your bad but not as bad as Jeremy Corbyn'

 

[YorkshireBear]

BBC news reporting Dutch border officials confiscating lorry drivers sandwiches for containing animal products. Obviously, its now part of the rules but I don't see how that has increased our freedom.

 

[RT4038]

Bull****. It was the UK government that destroyed any chance of us remaining in the single market because they never even tried.

Note that they managed it for Northern Ireland.

I thought that the EU had made it pretty clear that membership of the Single Market and Customs Union was conditional on accepting the economic, political and social strictures which come with such membership. The Brexiteers did not want these strictures, or at least only a very watered down version which was not acceptable to the EU. The gulf was far too wide for there to have been any meaningful negotiations.

Of course we could have left the EU and remained in the Single Market and Customs Union, but this would never have satisfied the underlying reasons for Brexit.

The situation for Northern Ireland was a particularly special case, revolving around the Good Friday agreement and the agenda for an eventual united Ireland.

 

[edwin_m]

I thought that the EU had made it pretty clear that membership of the Single Market and Customs Union was conditional on accepting the economic, political and social strictures which come with such membership. The Brexiteers did not want these strictures, or at least only a very watered down version which was not acceptable to the EU. The gulf was far too wide for there to have been any meaningful negotiations.

Of course we could have left the EU and remained in the Single Market and Customs Union, but this would never have satisfied the underlying reasons for Brexit.

In the opinion of the Brexiters in question. Not necessarily in the opinion of anyone else.

 

[simonw]

I thought that the EU had made it pretty clear that membership of the Single Market and Customs Union was conditional on accepting the economic, political and social strictures which come with such membership. The Brexiteers did not want these strictures, or at least only a very watered down version which was not acceptable to the EU. The gulf was far too wide for there to have been any meaningful negotiations.

Of course we could have left the EU and remained in the Single Market and Customs Union, but this would never have satisfied the underlying reasons for Brexit.

The situation for Northern Ireland was a particularly special case, revolving around the Good Friday agreement and the agenda for an eventual united Ireland.

Not real ly. The Eu offered us various different options as per the slide in this link

Slide presented by Michel Barnier, European Commission Chief Negotiator, to the Heads of State and Government at the European Council (Article 50) on 15 December 2017

Slide presented by Michel Barnier, European Commission Chief Negotiator, at the European Council (Article 50)

ec.europa.eu

PowerPoint showing various options for future relationship between UK and eu.
We decided we want to be on the right hand side of the graph.

 

[edwin_m]

We decided we want to be on the right hand side of the graph.

Not "we".