Brexit: A New Era for the UK?

I woke up this morning for the first time in 47 years in a country that is no longer part of the European project that was launched in 1957 with the Treaty of Rome. The trade deal with the EU that was signed before Christmas is over 1,000 pages long and contains a 'wealth' of detail that I am sure will emerge as the year rolls on. We know now that producers of Sausage and minced meat will no longer be able to export their products to the EU chilled -they must either be deep frozen, or cooked -in both cases incurring extra costs, on top of the customs forms that must be filled in. Indeed, while there is 'tariff free' trade with the EU's Single Market, the extra costs of the paperwork alone suggest that while they might not be tariffs on goods, the UK must pay in another way to export to the EU. And Northern Ireland remains in the Customs Union with regard to goods.

Again, free movement has come to an end, yet the Common Travel Agreement that was first signed with Ireland in 1923 remains unaltered, and at the last minute, the UK and Spain agreed to allow Gibraltar to remain in the Schengen Zone with free movement in an out of Spain, though as with other aspects of the Trade Agreement, including fishing quotas, these are all subject to review over the next five years.

If one were to try and be positive, the argument would look like this. The UK opted out of the Treaty of Rome in the 1950s but by the 1960s the simple economic fact of life was that with industry in decline, the UK needed to join trading blocs to expand its opportunities. It was thus a founder member of the European Free Trade Area in 1960, and by 1972 this bloc had recorded increases in growth for its members, so the step forward to the EEC in 1973 was a logical conclusion of this trend.

The difference now, is that with the service sector accounting for 80% of the UK economy, the reasons that led the UK into the EEC/EU no longer retain their importance. Moreover, because the City of London has retained its status as a major financial hub, the argument is that it will not only retain this over the next ten years but that it gives the UK the potential to become a Singapore off the coast of Europe. Or, the City will retain its status, but not become that Singapore, because the decline of financial passporting will not make London an attractive and practical gateway into the EU for non-EU states with investment capital directed there. One the one hand growth, on the other, decline.

Every potential benefit also contains a potential threat.

Another difference, is that while manufacturing has declined, it has not disappeared, and if, for example, we see a transition over the next 10-20 years away from petroleum based energy to renewables, and notably the growth of UK based electric vehicle manufacture, there is no reason why we should not be making a new generation of vehicles in the UK. Or, the fact is that automation means that even new start ups in vehicle manufacture do not create thousands of jobs. And, Ineos proposed to build a new generation of 4x4 vehicles in Bridgend in Wales, but have since pulled out to make them in France.

So on the one hand the UK is a diferent country, economically, than it was in 1973, and has its services sector plugged into the Global economy from which it should still benefit without being in the EU. But, the profile for jobs does not suggest the benefits will be wide-spread, the profile for income might be better but the Government will not want to impose high taxes on the few successful industries we have, and the UK enters a new era with a colossal debt problem exacerbated by the costs of Covid which must result in an increase in income and secondary taxes some time soon rather than never.

I therefore suggest that it will take time for the full impact of Brexit to be felt, that pre-existing problems related to debt and the costs of Covid-19 will undermine any economic growth that might result from Brexit and that at the very least the word 'disappointing' will dominate the news this year.

But the UK was never in favour of the 'Ever Closer Union' that has been at the core of the European Project and is in the first sentence of every treaty agreed since 1957. In the end, the irony of this Brexit project, is that it was primarily political rather than economic, but that the result mght be a decline in the economy relative to the EU, and a legacy of bitterness and division that threatens to end the very Union that defines the United Kingdom.

Other views are available.

From a short statement, the fact that with Brexit, the UK has lost access to the EU's Galileo satellite system, in which it had invested £1.2 billion, with its replacement, OneWeb, collapsing into insignificance at a cost to the taxpayer of £500 million.

This is what the Government website stated last week:

"The UK no longer participates in the EU Galileo or EGNOS programmes.
...
Areas where UK involvement has come to an end

The UK:

• does not use Galileo (including the future Public Regulated Service (PRS)) for defence or critical national infrastructure
• does not have access to the encrypted Galileo Public Regulated Service
• cannot play any part in the development of Galileo
• cannot play any part in the development of EGNOS
• from 25 June 2021 UK users will not be able to use the EGNOS SoL service and the EGNOS Working Agreements (EWAs), which will no longer be recognised by the EU

This also means that UK-based businesses, academics and researchers cannot bid for future EU GNSS contracts and may face difficulty carrying out and completing existing contracts."
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/uk-invol...pace-programme


To compensate for this loss, and to create its own alternative, the UK goverment invested in a firm called OneWeb (with thanks to super-high-tech genius Dominic Cummings). As reported in the Financial Times in July this year-

"Downing Street pushed ahead with an investment in a bankrupt satellite operator as part of its post-Brexit independent space strategy despite a top civil servant warning the “unusual” deal could see taxpayers losing the entire $500m with “no wider benefits accrued”. The UK won the auction for satellite broadband operator OneWeb with a joint $1bn bid with India’s Bharti Enterprises earlier this month. Under the deal the British government will invest $500m for an initial stake of about 45 per cent in the unprofitable company, which is building a low-earth orbit satellite broadband network."
https://www.ft.com/content/d0721bad-...c-b11500f6bb6a

That this investment was sanctioned without the formal scrutiny one expects from HM Treasury, that other experts were incredulous that the UK would not seek to re-negotiate access to Galileo but invest in a dud firm, is exposed to ridicule with the classic comment from Business Secretary Alok Sharma-
"“I have been informed that even with substantial haircuts to OneWeb’s base case financial projections the investment would have a positive return,”".

Some haircut. OneWeb went the way of most internet bubble companies, taking £500 million of taxpayers money with it and leaving the UK outside the very system that works which it contributed to for years in terms of money and brains, the latter being absent in the government of Boris Johnson. Well, at least it helped show Dominic Cummings the door -but should anyone else be accountable?

A comprehensive account of this fiasco is here, and highly recommended to all-

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/06/30/u...-brexit-farce/

Last I heard they were grovelling to be allowed back into the Galileo program. That was a few months ago though and I've not read anything about it since.

We've royally fucked ourselves...The END!

Congratulations to BBC journalist Faisal Islam for identfying some of the bizarre details in the EU-UK Trade Agreement -it relates to tariff free trade, but the way in which 'tariff free' is defined when specific goods are challenged on a 'Rules of Origin' agreement so that they are not, in fact, tariff free...

He has identified Grated Cheese, the Shelling of Nuts, the Assembly of a Table, and Doll's Eyes which, if exported to the EU, could have tariffs imposed if the products violate the 'Rules of Origin' agreement that the EU and UK have signed. Thus

“if the only operation that is performed on (imported EU) cheese is grating in a manner that does not require special skills” - [it] won’t qualify..."

"Nuts from the EU can contribute towards something qualifying as made in Britain, and this for zero tariffs, only if sufficiently processed. “All shelling of nuts is an insufficient process, even if machinery is used” as this is too “simple”..."

"A wooden table that was assembled in the UK from non UK desktop and and leg “will not be considered originating in the UK” even if both were sourced from the EU as “bilateral cumulation could not apply”.

"If eyes of a doll made in Britain did not come from the UK or EU, then doll could not qualify for tariff free trade with EU. But if the eyes and all other non originating material in same tariff category were less than 10% of value, Govt would tolerate it."

Faisal Islam provides the detail in the detail which either makes for hilarious reading, or anxiety for exporters....or just Why? from people like me.

Get stuck into the use of the word 'Simple' in his exposition-
https://twitter.com/faisalislam/stat...25083803787267

Another day, another lost sandwich...

"Dutch TV news has aired footage of customs officers confiscating ham sandwiches from drivers arriving by ferry from the UK under post-Brexit rules banning personal imports of meat and dairy products into the EU.
Officials wearing high-visibility jackets are shown explaining to startled car and lorry drivers at the Hook of Holland ferry terminal that since Brexit, “you are no longer allowed to bring certain foods to Europe, like meat, fruit, vegetables, fish, that kind of stuff.”
To a bemused driver with several sandwiches wrapped in tin foil who asked if he could maybe surrender the meat and keep just the bread, one customs officer replied: “No, everything will be confiscated. Welcome to Brexit, sir, I’m sorry.”
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...ritish-drivers

The Scottish Fishing industry, depending on who you are and where you are, is either on the point of collapse (Scotland) or merely having to deal with the 'teething problems' (England) that are part of thet transition away from the EU. Fish and live seafood that used to be landed on the coast and shipped to the Continent within 24 hours have been rotting away because the new regulations require significantly more paperwork per delivery than was the case before, while the delay has meant the catch has led major distributors to ask Scottish fishermen to stop fishing until the backlog of cases has been cleared, thus-

"The prices of some Scottish seafood are down 40 to 50 percent this week, dropping 80 percent in some instances. "This is because processors and intermediaries are not buying, as they are not guaranteed to be able to sell seafood on to EU customers because they can't get it out of the UK," said industry body Seafood Scotland in a statement. They call it a "seafood crisis."
"Issues from computer failure to lack of clarity on paperwork have rendered some Scottish companies' efforts to export seafood all but impossible," they added. Last week, they pointed out, a Scottish seafood company that usually sells £1 million worth of seafood into the EU each week was only able to sell £12,000."
https://www.politico.eu/article/brex...-happier-fish/

The Scots are blaming the English, not least because the Fisheries Minister admitted she had been too busy organizing a Nativity Trail last Christmas and thus had not actually read that part of the EU-UK Trade Agreement dealing with fishing, while the English have blamed the SNP Government-

"A UK Government spokeswoman said: “We are working closely with the industry to help understand and address the issues they are experiencing, including contacting exporters, their representatives and transporters to advise on the requirements for keeping their goods moving.
“The Scottish Government cannot abdicate their responsibilities to Scottish businesses. Over the past 18 months they have assured the fishing industry that the systems they were putting in place would be adequate. They clearly are not.
“The Scottish Government need to step up and ensure there are no delays to food exports being checked at hubs in their area.
“We have given the Scottish Government nearly £200m to prepare for leaving the EU, to minimise disruption and guarantee business readiness.”
https://news.stv.tv/scotland/more-de...-to-europe?top

Meanwhile, Boris Johnson has pledged £100 million in compensation (is that all?) for the failure of his Brexit Project, while the Leader of the House of Commons, said the Government was 'tackling' the matter, but that

"The key is we've got our fish back. They're now British fish. They're better and happier fish for it.”

Hmmm...Yesterday I interviewed a Langoustine, Auld Lang Stein, and he told me he was fed up. "I have been yanked out of my bed to sit here in a box freezing to death on a miserable, wet Scottish afternoon when I shoud be all dressed up and on a plate in Paris- I mean, I promised the wife..."

As described above, the Scottish fishing industry is in crisis. But not accordig to the Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab-

"Faced with warnings that the Scottish fishing industry is “drowning under red tape” and that generations-old firms could collapse in a matter of days, the foreign secretary claimed he was “not convinced” that the chaos was a result of Brexit."

“I think this is a great deal for the fishing industry, both short-term and long-term. We get control over our fisheries back, full control as an independent coastal state. There’s an immediate 15 per cent uplift in terms of our access to fisheries for the UK sector in the first year. That rises to two thirds in the five-year transition period, then we have annual negotiations.
“And of course, the fishing industry is going to want to increase its capacity to take advantage of those increased stocks, and that’s why we’re putting in £100m to shore up, to strengthen the fishing industry right across the whole of the UK to make sure that this really important opportunity of leaving the EU can be properly grasped.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...=3#post-410271

Dominic Raab is a contributor to the Libertarian pamphle Britannia Unchained which heralds the UK's exit from the EU as an opportunity to eliminate red tape, EU regulations, and return UK financial contributions to the UK. Yet not only has leaving the EU created more layers of regulations for exporters than they had when the UK was a full member of the Single Market, Raab defends the £100 million injection of funds into a market that in Britannia Unchained he says the Govt neither needs to, nor should interfere with. The reality is that if he were Libertarian in practice as he is in print, the Govt would not be giving the fishing industry a hundred pence, never mind a hundred million quid. From where I am sitting, the market has failed, and Raab is a blithe spirit in the 'throw money at the problem' claque in Downing St, which is another way of saying he doesn't really care about the problems Scotland has, which in any event are now dismissed as 'teething problems', as if our friends in the North were toddlers.

To say the UK's fishermen now own more of their stock is beside the point, when the primary market for the fish is next door on the Continent, and some of the most lucrative seafood is expected to go from coast to cutlery in 24 hours, or perish and be worth nothing. Perhaps Mr Raab should go to Scotland and talk to the fishermen and the workers in the packing and processing plants many of whom could lose their jobs, for he is Foreign Secretary. Think of it as a dry run for a future when Scotland is no longer part of the UK - and in present circumstances, who can blame them for going solo?

The Brexit Levies continue to wreak havoc to British business. Either the incompetent fools we call 'The British Government' swallow their pride and re-negotiate the Trade Agreement, or more jobs and livelihoods will go.

It beggars belief, but the Department for International Trade is recommending to UK Businesses that they seek entry into the EU Single Market that the UK has left!

Here-

"British businesses that export to the continent are being encouraged by government trade advisers to set up separate companies inside the EU in order to get around extra charges, paperwork and taxes resulting from Brexit, the Observer can reveal.
In an extraordinary twist to the Brexit saga, UK small businesses are being told by advisers working for the Department for International Trade (DIT) that the best way to circumvent border issues and VAT problems that have been piling up since 1 January is to register new firms within the EU single market, from where they can distribute their goods far more freely."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...-up-shop-in-eu

The Brexit Levies do not just affect Fish or Ham Sandwiches, but also Cheese, tourisng Musicians -and Bananas, there must be Bananas in this farce.

Bananas
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-b1791225.html

Cheese
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...00-brexit-hole

William Keegan's article today
https://www.theguardian.com/business...shing-industry

Another robust article by Rafael Behr, for example-

"Were it not for the pandemic, loose ends and lost jobs would be making more headlines. Whether they would also be changing public opinion is a different question. Some enthusiasm is surely dropping into the chasm between Brexit as liberation theology and its real-world incarnation as rotting fish undelivered to a Calais market. But British political culture contains deep reserves of stoical resignation to adversity (especially other people’s adversity). There is no simple road back, no better deal on the table, and it is easy for ministers to spin the pain mandated by their deal as aggression by vengeful Europeans.

Leavers will be attracted to that story because it spares them the discomfort of admitting that they voted for a con, and then made a prime minister of the con artist."
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...itain-brussels

But as the UK faces the prospect of emerging from the Lockdown in stages, the day must come when Brexit, far from being 'done', is back at the top of the news cycle, with the excuses running out of crediblity.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stavros

I woke up this morning for the first time in 47 years in a country that is no longer part of the European project that was launched in 1957 with the Treaty of Rome.

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You must have had a long sleep as the UK left the EU on 31st January 2020. Not 31st December 2020.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

You must have had a long sleep as the UK left the EU on 31st January 2020. Not 31st December 2020.

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He said no longer part of the European project launched with the Treaty of Rome. It participated in the single market and the customs union until the end of 2020.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

You must have had a long sleep as the UK left the EU on 31st January 2020. Not 31st December 2020.

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I was wide awake, and as for the intricacies of the relationship, allow the UK Govt to clarify-

"The UK left the EU on 31 January 2020. The transition period that was in place – during which nothing changed – ended on 31 December 2020. The rules governing the new relationship between the EU and UK took effect on 1 January 2021."
https://www.government.nl/topics/bre...european-union

Meanwhile, the former French Ambassador to the UK has said some sharp things about Mr Johnson

"Boris Johnson is “an unrepentant and inveterate liar” who feels he is not subject to the same rules as others, Sylvie Bermann, the former French ambassador to the UK during the Brexit vote, says in a new book.

She also claims some Brexiters are consumed with hatred for Germany and gripped by a myth that they liberated Europe on their own, describing Brexit as a triumph of emotion over reason, won by a campaign full of lies in which negative attitudes to migration were exploited by figures such as Johnson and Michael Gove.

Johnson, she says, comes from an Eton and Oxford University class that believes they are entitled to use language to provoke. Describing him as intelligent and charming, she says he uses “lies to embellish reality, as a game and as instrument of power. The ends justify the means. He has no rules.”

Asked at a Royal United Services Institute thinktank event about her description of him as an unrepentant liar, she said: “He would not object to being called that. He knows he is a liar. He has always played with that. He was fired from his first post for that reason.”

Full report here-
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...-says-diplomat

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stavros

I was wide awake, and as for the intricacies of the relationship, allow the UK Govt to clarify-

"The UK left the EU on 31 January 2020. The transition period that was in place – during which nothing changed – ended on 31 December 2020. The rules governing the new relationship between the EU and UK took effect on 1 January 2021."
https://www.government.nl/topics/bre...european-union

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The UK ceased to be a signatory to the Treaty of Rome on 31/1/20 - but I'll let you get back to your solitary thread to post to yourself.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

The UK ceased to be a signatory to the Treaty of Rome on 31/1/20 - but I'll let you get back to your solitary thread to post to yourself.

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I post items and create threads which interest me, as others do, and as you have been a member for 13-14 years with 67 posts I think you will agree that a lot of members read, but do not comment on posts, which is their choice. It is up to others to join in a thread if they want.

I could thank you for joining the debate on Brexit, but so far you have only expressed an interest in my evident confusion over when the UK 'left the EU' depending upon which pinhead you wish to dance. If you feel that my error renders my posts invalid and of no interest, that is a consequence of the way I present things, and is entirely my fault, whatever it is that the Govt says.

What is clear so far, is that you do not appear to have an opinion on Brexit, and may not reveal it to us at any time, happy as you are to condemn me to this isolation, shaped as it is by your own apparent indifference to engage with the topic.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stavros

I post items and create threads which interest me, as others do, and as you have been a member for 13-14 years with 67 posts I think you will agree that a lot of members read, but do not comment on posts, which is their choice. It is up to others to join in a thread if they want.

I could thank you for joining the debate on Brexit, but so far you have only expressed an interest in my evident confusion over when the UK 'left the EU' depending upon which pinhead you wish to dance. If you feel that my error renders my posts invalid and of no interest, that is a consequence of the way I present things, and is entirely my fault, whatever it is that the Govt says.

What is clear so far, is that you do not appear to have an opinion on Brexit, and may not reveal it to us at any time, happy as you are to condemn me to this isolation, shaped as it is by your own apparent indifference to engage with the topic.

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OK, apologies for being pedantic and wanting to correct what you wrote - and I am sorry if you are struggling with Brexit.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that I have had enough of people (not necessarily you) who still want to moan about a referendum with a clear result that took place almost five years ago. They would be better concentrating on their own lives, when the true affects of Brexit will only have any long-term meaningful affect on the lives of a very, very small handful of people.

For the vast majority, virtually nothing material will change for them...

For a good example, a large part of the moaners can't even tell you when we left the EU - yet they want to claim that life worsened markedly when we did! It's pathetic.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that I have had enough of people (not necessarily you) who still want to moan about a referendum with a clear result that took place almost five years ago.

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I feel like that when I hear certain quarters twanging on about the "blitz spirit" .

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

when the true affects of Brexit will only have any long-term meaningful affect on the lives of a very, very small handful of people.
.

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Yeah, I imagine that second billion will be very 'meaningful' to 'em!

As for the "vast majority", I don't give a fuck about them.
All I know is, I can no longer just jump in the car and bum around Europe for a couple of weeks any time I feel like.
And as for my plans of retiring to Portugal...
But no, that's all up in smoke because "the vast majority" were too stupid to know any better and followed a bus driven by a liar, over a cliff edge.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that I have had enough of people (not necessarily you) who still want to moan about a referendum with a clear result that took place almost five years ago. They would be better concentrating on their own lives, when the true affects of Brexit will only have any long-term meaningful affect on the lives of a very, very small handful of people.

For the vast majority, virtually nothing material will change for them...

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It's interesting that back in 2016 the Brexiters claimed there would be great benefits from leaving the EU. Now their best argument seems to be that most people won't notice any difference.

I'm willing to bet that most people's lives were unchanged in 1973 when the UK joined the EU. Is there a difference between people moaning about Brexit and people who previously moaned about the EU?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by filghy2

It's interesting that back in 2016 the Brexiters claimed there would be great benefits from leaving the EU. Now their best argument seems to be that most people won't notice any difference.

I'm willing to bet that most people's lives were unchanged in 1973 when the UK joined the EU. Is there a difference between people moaning about Brexit and people who previously moaned about the EU?

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The most immediate change that was notieable when the UK entered the Common Market/Euroepan Economic Community in 1973, was the repacement of the old 'Sales Tax', by VAT. Decimalisation that meant the UK making calculations as they did in the CM became law in 1966 and in effect since 1971 so had nothing to do with membership of the Common Market/EEC.

I was able to work in the South of France in the mid-1970s because seasonal, temporary work was exempt from labour/residency laws that required work permits, which meant that from May to October coach loads of Spaniards would pick their way through the season frm Cherries to Olives without any need for work permits. In that sense, the free movement of people under the Single Market Act merely made it easier for people from member states to work in the EU, but in all forms of work, qualifications being the most obvious criterion.

Yes, it was gradual. When I was living in North London before the aborted move to France, the supermarkets did not sell a variety of cheeses, other than the staple English cheeses -the only challenger to Stilton was Danish Blue, which smelled and tasted as if it had been made from petroleum. If you wanted Camembert or Brie and could not get to a shop in Ambleside in the Lake District (their clientele I was told, were the nuclear scientists who worked at nearby Windscale), or Paxton & Whitfield on Jermyn St off Piccadilly, there were a small range of delis in places like Chelsea and Hampstead, or there were the Italian delis -at one time in Soho alone there were at least five that I can recall, and all of them have no gone. I had never heard of goat's cheese until working in France, but then in those days if you wanted Houmous and didn't know how to make it, you either had the -mostly Cypriot- tavernas in North London (Greek in Camden, Turkish in Islington), or a trip to the Eastern Med.

These days the UK or rather London is spoiled for choice, though someone I know was taken to an Ethiopian restaurant a few years ago and says the food was, in a word, 'horrible'....other establishments are available (but can't recall the name of the offender...)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by obslam

OK, apologies for being pedantic and wanting to correct what you wrote - and I am sorry if you are struggling with Brexit.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that I have had enough of people (not necessarily you) who still want to moan about a referendum with a clear result that took place almost five years ago. They would be better concentrating on their own lives, when the true affects of Brexit will only have any long-term meaningful affect on the lives of a very, very small handful of people.

For the vast majority, virtually nothing material will change for them...

For a good example, a large part of the moaners can't even tell you when we left the EU - yet they want to claim that life worsened markedly when we did! It's pathetic.

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The 'pedantry' is really due to the fact that the UK transitioned out of the EU and at any one time between 2019 and 2021 many people were confused as to what our status was- some, including members of the Govt, are still not sure where the international boundary between the EU and the UK is, given that is has not been demarcated, but appears to exist.

I also think the irony of your post is that it is not so much the 'moaners' who have a point, but those who voted to Leave and who, if they are in the fishing industry, see their live exports and other goods rotting away, or prevented from making a smooth exit to the EU as a result of the technicalities that were approved in the EU-UK Trade Agreement that has more or less trashed most of what Boris Johnson, Michael Gove and the other 'vilains' promised us in 2016. From being told the UK would not be leaving the Single Market to being told we have to, there lies the not so mysterious fact that Johson and his crew never bothered to finesse the detail because they didn't care about it. Not so long ago, Lord Lamont even insisted he was not bothered about the economics of Brexit because for him at was the politics that mattered.

I think the fact is there has been a double dose of lies comparing 2016 to 1970. In their 1970s manifesto, the Conservatives said they would open negotiations on entering the EEC, but that the final decision would be made by the British people -this did not happen until 1975 when Labour was in power but I have not seen any evidence that Heath intended to bring it to Parliament or a referendum in what would have been his first term as PM. Crucially, for the politics, Heath never mentioned 'Ever Closer Union' which has been in the first sentence of every 'Euro' Treaty since Rome in 1957 because it defines the purpose of the relationship that member states enter into. We were told we were joining a 'Common Market', and not a Federalist project, indeed, Federalism was never mentioned until it became a matter of contention between Margaret Thatcher and Jacques Delors in the 1980s. And though Blair said in 1997 he wanted the UK to be 'at the heart of Europe', he never believed in 'Ever Closer Union', indeed if that phrase meant anything to him, it was a description of the UK's Atlantic relationship.

The UK was never fully committed to the EU project, indeed, I think we needed to make a decision on that, and regret the one that was made though I can't do anything about that. But it also begs the question of Scotland's view that if it were independent, it would apply for EU membership, because that not only requires Scotland to adopt the Euro, it must surely sign up to 'Ever Closer Union' because I can't see the EU giving Scotland all the 'opt-outs' it gave to the UK given the small size of the economy.

As for the impact, yes indeed, there are long term consequences, but now we have the long term impact of Covid to add to the exit from the EU. Because the Single Market imposes the sort of rules that were not there in the 1970s, I doubt even seasonal labour is open to young people who want to do something different somewhere outside the country but not so far away, and Jericho's point abut Portugal is important too, though Portugal may pass laws making residency easier, but not sure about that.

We have yet to know if the Brexit Levies that have created a crisis in the fishing and export industry are 'teething problems' or long term realities, and it is not clear to me if the Govt is attempting to re-negotiate the Trade Agreement to sort these problems out. The situation with Musicians and Performing Artists is aso one I don't think will change, because, again, the rules now are different from what they were before the Single Market Act, and as I don't see any change over the next 10 years Brexit has been a catastrophe for the arts in Britain.

Thus I am with most experts who say that the UK will adjust to the reality of being outside the EU, but that the economy will not grow at previous levels -I don't think it will exceed 2% a year- and that money saved from the EU budget will not be enough to compensate for losses from trade, and so far that is mostly in goods, as we have yet to see how the exit affects Financial Services in general, and the City of London in particular.

How Covid affects work itself, such as commuting to an office, with knock-on effects on transport is still too early to tell. But what also matters is that the lies keep coming from Boris Johnson, with little or no imaginative let alone the practical alternative from Keir Starmer. But for Dominic Raab to dismiss all the current woes on the basis we need 'ten years' to deal with Brexit is a stab in the back and an insult to all, as it is rather like telling an 18-year old, the next ten years of your life have been cancelled, get over it!

We went from being part of a stable order, to disorder. We had access to the largest single market in the world on our doorstep, now we are not part of it. Looking back is no longer an option but to the question, what does the UK want? -there seems to be no coherent answer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by filghy2

It's interesting that back in 2016 the Brexiters claimed there would be great benefits from leaving the EU. Now their best argument seems to be that most people won't notice any difference.

I'm willing to bet that most people's lives were unchanged in 1973 when the UK joined the EU. Is there a difference between people moaning about Brexit and people who previously moaned about the EU?

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I voted leave, but I never thought or claimed it would make our lives better. My opinion was and remains that staying in would have made our lives worse in the decades ahead. I don't see the EU existing in its current form 20 years from now.

And the inherent dilemma is the fact that we never solved the relationship between politics and the economy in the EU -many Leave advocates claimed they were happy to be part of the Single Market, but could not accept Ever Closer Union, and that at some point in the future the UK would not be able to opt out of that. It is a fair point, though in defence I would argue had we had the debate on Ever Closer Union before 2016 we would at least have been able to make a judgment based on a more open and wider understanding of what the EU is all about, though even then I think Leave would have won the Referendum -the English think they are better than the Continentals, it is that crude, and that stupid. Indeed, had Ever Closer Union been discussed at the beginning, I doubt even Heath could have taken us into the EEC. But it has been important for Europe because of the Continent's bloody history and the fact that France and Germany have been key players in its origin and development with the smallers states such as Belgium and the Netherlands keen associates of the project.

The dilemma for the UK has always been that alone, the UK economy is worse off when it is not part of a European trading bloc, as was clear from the membership of EFTA which the UK helped to create in 1960. Indeed, the UK created one European trading bloc, and was a prime developer later of the EU's Single Market, yet Daniel Hannan and people like him claim the UK would be better off on its own when all the evidence suggests the opposite is the case, even with the major changes that have taken place to the economy since 1979.

Lastly, the sovereignty issue is the oddest one, because sovereignty is a slippery concept and should be 'treated with care'. The UK never lost control of its borders or its laws, so 'take back control' was just a slogan, and where for some it mattered, it had more to do with prejudice agaist non-EU immigrants. On issue such as climate change there is obviously no sovereignty, but neither does the UK control the value of its own currency, and just as the UK ceded a degree of authority to the EU in matters of law, so it has ceded legal powers to the United Nations, though I don't recall anyone campaigning against our membership of the UN.

I voted Remain for economic and politica reasons -the UK economy was better off in the Single Market rather than out of it; and I approve of European Federalism because I despire Nationalism, which is a pox on humanity. I thought my generation and my parents generation had defeated the Nationalists, even though we knew they had not gone away- but they were an iirritant on the fringes of politics. The new breed of Nationalist anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim, anti-Vaxx and 'anti-Woke' activists offer nothing positive for the world I live in, but they exist, and they must be confronted, and it seems every generation but be educated into the crimes of the past these people deny and seek to revisit upon us, as was shown in the US on the 6th of January.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

I voted Remain for economic and politica reasons -the UK economy was better off in the Single Market rather than out of it; and I approve of European Federalism because I despire Nationalism, which is a pox on humanity. I thought my generation and my parents generation had defeated the Nationalists, even though we knew they had not gone away- but they were an iirritant on the fringes of politics. The new breed of Nationalist anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim, anti-Vaxx and 'anti-Woke' activists offer nothing positive for the world I live in, but they exist, and they must be confronted, and it seems every generation but be educated into the crimes of the past these people deny and seek to revisit upon us, as was shown in the US on the 6th of January.

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That's the problem though, init. Anyone who tries to teach British *history* isn't going to be in their job very long.
(I learnt more about Coulson when he was thrown in the bay than I ever did in the 100 odd years his statue was upright).

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Originally Posted by Jericho

That's the problem though, init. Anyone who tries to teach British *history* isn't going to be in their job very long.
(I learnt more about Coulson when he was thrown in the bay than I ever did in the 100 odd years his statue was upright).

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Indeed, the problem of what British history consists of, who decides the curriculum, and who teaches it has never been solved. The Conservative bias means on one level for many years the 'top down' approach used the various dynasties that have ruled, with additional support for the establishment of Church-Military-Judiciary-Parliament so that one can take in the wars, Christianity, political change and so forth, but when economic and social history entered the fray in the 1960s-70s the acrimony began, because history is a mess of highs and lows, and I know I never heard the word slavery when I was in school, but I am old enough to have been marched into the schoolyard on Empire Day (24th May) to watch the Union Jack being hoisted up a pole.

The Industrial Revlution is crucial to the history of modern Britain -to teach it one has to balance the achievements of science and engineering in partnership with capital to explain agricultural machinery, cotton mills, coal mining, the railway engines, etc -but surely this must also explain how slavery and empire provided Manchester with the cheap cotton it used to make its more expensive and desirable goods? And the textile mills destroyed the weavers who had populated towns and villages to make the people clothes, a grim history documented in part of EP Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class- but should a text by a Marxist be acceptable, or for that matter, to describe factory conditions in the 19thc, the most read chapter, probably the only chapter of Marx's Capital Vol 1 most people have read, ie Ch 10: The Working Day -? Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor (1851) is a rich text of description, but does anyone use it to teach 19th century history in school, when it is one of the most eloquent books of its kind?

All history is edited, in part for practical reasons to make it possible to teach 2,000 years of history to schoolchildren, but also to edit out the diffculties and the controversies, which can be explored at University level. I wonder how many schoolchildren have heard of Thomas Rainsbrough, one of Cromwell's leading naval commanders, who, in the Putney Debates in 1647 declared, much to the concern of both Cromwell and his General, Ireton-

"I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Rainsborough

The fate of this early advocate of 'oone man, one vote', was assassination the year after his incendiary remarks in Putney...thus history is, often literally, a battlefield.

What will future historians make of Brexit? A tragic mistake, or a Liberation from Continental Europe?

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Originally Posted by Stavros

What will future historians make of Brexit? A tragic mistake, or a Liberation from Continental Europe?

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With the benefit of hindsight, supercomputers (to keep track of the lies), and a degree in forensic accounting...the biggest heist in history.

I wonder if Covid has pushed Brexit off the news as the No 1 item? The threat to the integrity of the UK might appear to have receded with regard to Scotland, and Alex Salmond's spite-filled attempt to sabotage the party he used to lead, though the appeal of Independence there remains high among the people who matters most, the voters. But it is in Northern Ireland where the contradictions of Brexit present what seems to be a problem without a solution that is not a United Ireland -or the UK as a whole, rather than just NI- returning in some form to the EU's Single Market.

The article linked below concerns the Democratic Unionist Party and their delusions with regard to both Brexit and the Good Friday Agreement, which they opposed throughout the negotiating period, until they didn't, the late Rev. Ian Paisley realizing that if they did not agree to it, they would be powerless -he agreed to it and formed an alliance in the power sharing exective with former Quartermaster of the Provos, Martin McGuinness -no such spirit of compromise now -but as Susan MKay argues, this is turning into one of the most profound challenges to the Union of the United Kinndom and Northern Ireland since the Treaty of 1921, but without any leading politician with vision of guts to see it through to its most obvious conclusion, thus-

"Speaking to the Welsh affairs committee, Mark Drakeford said that the union was effectively over. There was “no institutional architecture” to make the UK work, and the current prime minister’s approach to the devolved nations was “ad hoc, random and made up as we go along”.
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...ood-friday-dup

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Originally Posted by Stavros

"Speaking to the Welsh affairs committee, Mark Drakeford said that the union was effectively over. There was “no institutional architecture” to make the UK work, and the current prime minister’s approach to the devolved nations was “ad hoc, random and made up as we go along”.

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Ad hoc, random and made up as we go along sounds like a very good description for Mark Drakeford!

When it comes to the Union, I am sure he realises that Wales has a very different legal standing to both Scotland and Northern Ireland.

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Originally Posted by obslam

Ad hoc, random and made up as we go along sounds like a very good description for Mark Drakeford!
When it comes to the Union, I am sure he realises that Wales has a very different legal standing to both Scotland and Northern Ireland.

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Wales is an irrelevance, that has been the English position even before their cherished Brexit. Even one of my oldest friends doesn't care about the place, and he was born and bred in Cardiff.

So what do you have to say about Nothern Ireland, or the UK Government signing a Trade Agreement with the EU and then deciding to ignore the legal obligations that it contains, because of the brutal fact that so far, Brexit Kills Jobs? When Boris said, 'Fuck Business', he meant it. Michael Gove, presented with the factual evidence that trade in goods is on the point of collapse offers an alternative which claims the opposite, but without a single shred of evidence, thus proving that the English never really thought their Brexit would be anything but a roaring success -and like Trump in his Florida prison, refuse to accept the reality even when it slaps them in the face.

It really is simple -Brexit Kills Jobs. Perhaps that is why the English Kill Truth?

You claim your facts as facts but denounce others as lies. And do you think the PM ever really said 'fuck business' as you think he did?

There is zero evidence as yet either way as to whether Brexit will cost net jobs. Some people will lose jobs but other, new jobs will also be created.

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Originally Posted by obslam

You claim your facts as facts but denounce others as lies. And do you think the PM ever really said 'fuck business' as you think he did?

There is zero evidence as yet either way as to whether Brexit will cost net jobs. Some people will lose jobs but other, new jobs will also be created.

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Not my facts, and not my lies.

Claim A, by the Road Haulage Associaton-
The Cabinet Office run by Michael Gove has been officially reprimanded by the UK Statistics Authority for using unpublished and unverifiable data in an attempt to deny that Brexit had caused a massive fall in volumes of trade through British ports.
The criticism follows a story in the Observer on 7 February that cited a survey by the Road Haulage Association (RHA) of its international members showing export volumes had dropped by a staggering 68% in January through British ports and the Channel Tunnel.
The RHA wrote to Gove at the time saying: “Intelligence that we are collecting on an ongoing basis from international hauliers suggests that loads to the EU have reduced by as much as 68%, which can also be evidenced by the increased number of empty trailers which are not currently considered in the statistics.”
The RHA also accused Gove of failing to heed its warnings that trade would be damaged unless there was a dramatic increase in the number of customs officials.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...07q2pNz0LWe60k

Claim B, Response from HMG as reported in Claim A above-
Thanks to the hard work put in by hauliers and traders to get ready for the end of the Brexit transition period, there are no queues at the Short Straits, disruption at the border has so far been minimal and freight movements are now close to normal levels, despite the COVID-19 pandemic.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/r...y-of-lancaster

And Now for Something Completely Different-

"Asked about corporate concerns over a so-called hard Brexit, at an event for EU diplomats in London last week, Mr Johnson is reported to have replied: "Fuck business."
Mr Johnson, who was reportedly speaking at the time to Rudolf Huygelen, Belgium's ambassador to the EU, was also overheard saying he and others would fight Theresa May's soft Brexit "and win".
The foreign secretary, who was a key figure in the Leave campaign, was pressed on the issue in Parliament by Labour MP Owen Smith, who asked him if the comments were correct and, if so, whether they could be "remotely justified".
"I don't think anybody could doubt the passionate support of this government for business," Mr Johnson said.
"It may be that I have, from time to time, expressed scepticism about some of the views of those who profess to speak up for business."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-44618154

I quite agree that some people will lose their jobs, and that new jobs will be created. It has happened in the past, and it will happen again. But when? And how many jobs?

And what about the fact that freedom has been taken away from those citizens in the UK who enjoyed free movement throughout the EU, a right that has been taken away?

Maybe this is The Truth? The insight into Brexit of John Redwood in his FT article of 2017-

"In his FT piece Redwood encourages investors to take their money out of Britain and put it elsewhere. You read that right. The same man who will not let one day pass without emphasising how well Britain is going to do out of Brexit is at the same time talking down the markets and encouraging capital flight. To call this bizarre might be too generous. Still, that’s what disaster capitalists do."
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...ney-britain-eu

Remember Edward Heath's campaign 'I'm Backing Britain'? -or not, as in the case of Redwood.

Or Jacob Rees-Mogg, whose Somerset Capital has been in the vanguard of brokers moving their money out of the UK and into the EU, specifically, the Republic of Ireland-

"A leading Brexiteer has suggested it could take 50 years to judge whether Brexit has been an economic success amid fears quitting the European Union will lead to a downturn."
The influential Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg, who chairs the European Research Group of backbench Tories, was pressed by Krishnan Guru-Murthy of Channel 4 News about whether he would quit if the “economy does take a hit next year” when Brexit happens.
Rees-Mogg insisted the full impact will not be known for “years to come” as he hailed leaving the EU as the “greatest opportunity, economically, for this country”.
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/ent...b0de86f48e3566

Are you willing to wait 50 years? What happens in between now and 2070?

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Originally Posted by obslam

You claim your facts as facts but denounce others as lies. And do you think the PM ever really said 'fuck business' as you think he did?

There is zero evidence as yet either way as to whether Brexit will cost net jobs. Some people will lose jobs but other, new jobs will also be created.

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This is the analysis done a few months ago by the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies. The logic is pretty simple - if you increase barriers to trade with your predominant trading partner there must be a negative impact on the economy. https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/15079

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Originally Posted by filghy2

This is the analysis done a few months ago by the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies. The logic is pretty simple - if you increase barriers to trade with your predominant trading partner there must be a negative impact on the economy. https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/15079

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To which I would add that a key problem with the EU-UK Trade Agreement is 'divergence'. Here, for example, is what Boris Johnson said over a year ago, before the very problems we have in Northern ireland emerged in the wake of our more formal exit this year-

"Prime Minister Boris Johnson has indicated he wants the UK to be able to diverge from the European Union rules and regulations after Brexit, with Number 10 saying the future partnership, “must not involve any kind of alignment.” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has responded by spelling out the EU’s principle that access to the EU’s market is intrinsically linked to acceptance of the bloc’s rules, institutions and legal obligations. “The more divergence there is, the more distant the partnership has to be,” she said. But in practice the EU’s approach is likely to be even tougher: the moment the UK obtains the right to diverge from EU rules, it will – in most areas – be treated by the EU as if it has already done so. The flexibility to diverge does not come for free, as I explain in my latest analysis for the CER. The UK government claims to have accepted that gaining the freedom to regulate as it sees fit will mean new trade friction. But it is not clear that businesses and the public understand what this means in practice."
https://encompass-europe.com/comment...t-will-cost-uk

Though the author of the above is -or was- more positive about the effects, we now see how in reality divergence can create friction and costs, with Lord Frost as usual blaming the EU for the problems he created in the text of the Agreement he negotiated on behalf of Boris Johnson's govt. Note also, that Divergence may be at its most critical in Financial Services, rather than scallops and sauasages, as these two additional notes from a law firm suggest-

https://www.pinsentmasons.com/out-la...-cost-benefits
https://www.pinsentmasons.com/out-la...gital-services

Simon Jenkins has written a bracing article on Northern Ireland, and I recommend some of the readers posts too-
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...ment-147926201

None of this needed to happen, we were doing fine in the EU and its Single Market before Leave Saboteurs insisted on smashing all the crockery just as dinner was being served.

A powerful editorial from today's Observer on Brexit. Right now it is a mess, will it ever deliver? First few paragraphs the rest in the link.

"When the British people narrowly voted to leave the EU in 2016, they did not give the government a mandate to wreck our economic and political relationship with Europe. When Boris Johnson won the general election in 2019, he was expected to forge workable new arrangements with the UK’s largest trading partner, not allow exporters to be strangled by red tape and ruinous extra costs. Nor was he given a green light to break legally binding promises.

When Johnson and his rightwing Leave campaign pals claimed to have “got Brexit done” on 31 January last year, they failed to say the patchwork agreement they signed had more holes in it than a Cumbrian coal mine. Johnson did not admit he had fudged crucial issues such as Northern Ireland’s borders, and sold out Britain’s fisheries, in order to claim a bogus victory.
Yet truth will out. Day by bleak day, the epic damage caused by this execrable deception, this shameful Conservative con, becomes ever more evident. No amount of Michael Gove spin can hide the facts. No amount of distortion of official statistics can conceal the harm. Feeble claims by David Frost, Brexit booster-in-chief, that Covid and EU hostility are to blame will not wash. It’s clear where responsibility lies. And “lies” is the operative word.
Johnson and his team cannot dissemble away alarming figures showing UK exports of goods to the EU plunged by 40.7% in January, caused in large part by Brexit bureaucracy, incompetence and delays. That’s a £5.6bn loss when the economy can least afford it. Exports of food and live animals were particularly badly hit, down by 63.6%. Producers of fish and shellfish, who Johnson personally pledged to protect, saw their exports collapse by 83% year on year."
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...ssible-to-hide

Just because a pro-left, pro-labour, anti-conservative journal writes shit, that doesn't mean it's true, nor does it mean you should be repeating it.

You can tell the narrative right from the get go - "narrowly voted" my arse. Personally, I support the reduction in food miles, as I think it one of the worst things that harms the environment for no good reason at all.

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Originally Posted by obslam

Just because a pro-left, pro-labour, anti-conservative journal writes shit, that doesn't mean it's true, nor does it mean you should be repeating it.

You can tell the narrative right from the get go - "narrowly voted" my arse. Personally, I support the reduction in food miles, as I think it one of the worst things that harms the environment for no good reason at all.

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The Guardian is not a left-wing newsaper, and since 2015 Labour has been a Brexit party, while 'the left' has been opposed to every version of the EU since the Treaty of Rome of 1957. My own argument, in case you missed it, is that while there are genuine arguments to engage with the fundamental concept of 'Ever Closer Union' that even pre-dates 1957, the pragmatic concern is with trade, for the obvious reason that the EU is the nearest and largest market we have. To support a reduction in 'food miles' for the food industry that has been based on them since 1066 and before, would be comical if it were not so destructive. Better focus on why there are Cherries in winter from Chile, King Prawns from Madagascar or Mange Tout from Kenya.

The result of the Referendum stands, I can't do much about that, and while I support it, I doubt enough UK citizens beieve in 'Ever Closer Union' to want it, just as I am not sure if an Independent Scotland can join the EU on that basis, as well as adopting the Euro as its currency. The bottom line remains, that so far, Brexit has been a damaging experience for trade, and probably shall remain so for this year, maybe more. And that the Leave supporters don't really care, because they never cared about trade anyway, as for them Brexit has always been a political, anti-immigrant, anti-Federalist project.

The only thing one can say about The Guardian -and also The Independent, assuming anyone reads it- is that they print more articles critical of Brexit than any other outlet. That's as good as it gets.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

The Guardian is not a left-wing newsaper

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Unfortunately you've lost a lot of credibility with that bizarre claim.

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Originally Posted by obslam

Unfortunately you've lost a lot of credibility with that bizarre claim.

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Whilst it's not quite as right-wing as most of the British press, the Guardian is in no way, shape, or form, left wing.

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Originally Posted by Jericho

Whilst it's not quite as right-wing as most of the British press, the Guardian is in no way, shape, or form, left wing.

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LOL! You can't be serious.

You Gov: ... the Guardian is seen as Britain’s most left-wing newspaper, closely followed by the Mirror...

Wiki: The paper's readership is generally on the mainstream left of British political opinion, and its reputation as a platform for social liberal and left-wing editorial has led to the use of the "Guardian reader" and "Guardianista" as often-pejorative epithets for those of left-leaning or "politically correct" tendencies.

I recognise Wikipedia is not always a reliable indicator but I would say only the Morning Star has been more left wing than The Grauniad.

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Originally Posted by obslam

Unfortunately you've lost a lot of credibility with that bizarre claim.

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It all depends on how you define left-wing. Just as the awfully unfunny Mash Report has been axed by the BBC because it was deemed too 'left wing' without ever promoting left-wing policies (it was critical of the Conservative Govt, which is not the same thing), so the issue with The Guardian is not so much the views of its most well-known columnists -Polly Toynbee is the Aunt Sally for Telegraph readers, for example- but that being critical of the Conservative Party and Brexit makes it left wing. Simon Jenkins, William Keegan, Will Hutton, Jonathan Freedland are all Liberals rather than Socialists, and other than the occasional article by Tariq Ali, Trotskyists and Marxists are notable by their absence, though in the past Richard Gott was a regular commentator on Latin American affairs.

Brexit is a Nationalist project, but it means to be opposed to it does not by definition make such a person 'left wing' because Nationalism is thought of as a 'Right wing' position. Both major parties have been divided over the EEC/EU since 1970, and as I have stated above, for many Socialists in Britain, membership of the EU was not something they wanted, just as it was Labour policy in 1981 to leave the EU, a policy position that Jeremy Corbyn supported at the time and as far as I am aware, on most issues, until yesterday, the clinging to the Social Chapter of the Single Market Act and its commitment to 'Worker's Rights' being as much as he could give voice to.

The Guardian is not a Socialist, but a liberal humanist newspaper, critical of the Royal Family, but not decisively opposed to it; probably sceptical of rather than opposed to organized religion; critical of the armed forces, but not pacifist; supportive of the Judiciary when its rulings are favourable to humanist issues, critical when they are not; and reporting on Parliament rather than calling for its abolition or woolly on reform. Thus the pillars of the Establishment -Monarchy-Church-Military-Judiciary-Parliament are secure in the pages of the Guardian.

So I am not bothered about my reputation, if I even have one on HungAngels.

More interesting is the recent news on Tech Start-ups as a signal that Growth is possible even in Brexit Britain, indeed that it is and looks set to remain a world leader. The link below does present a positive profile of the Tech Sector, part of that 'Big Tech' beast slouching toward DC in the demonic language of the Trump Party in the US. Yes, it does look good, but

a) these trends were established before Brexit, and are probably best placed to function regardless of Brexit, unless the financials change, and with over £1 trillion having left the UK since 2016 -some of it shipped out by the most fanatical Brexiteers, such as Jacob Ress-Mogg and Somerset Capital- the investment profile could change.

And thus b) New Tech or whatever you call it, may supply thousands of jobs, but we need millions. It is a niche sector, and one that I doubt school-leavers can get into, indeed, if the past year has damaged education, a class of schooleavers may not get the College/University eduation they need to enter the tech sector, so over the next 5 years this growth sector could face a recruitment problem because we haven't prepared the generation capable of doing such jobs.

Given that Brexit has been all about the politics and not the trade and the economics -to paraphrase another movement, 'Jobs Don't Matter'- the same way that no impact assessment was ever made of either Brexit in general, or the EU-UK Trade Agreement in particular, means we have a Brexit Government that has not prepared for the very policy by which it wishes to be defined -hence the crisis of trade owing to the divergence from EU rules and regulations. Similarly, if one were to ask Gavin Williamson what his department is doing to ensure Technology is fundamental to the Curriculum and schoolchildren being given the opportunity to learn what it is, he might well look utterly confused and issue some platitude about 'doing all we can to maximise opportunities'. Whatever.

This is the positive review of the technology sector in the UK-
https://technation.io/report2021/#investment