The Poverty of Brexit

He can be proud of it because he did play a part in it.
Boris Johnson cannot say the same. It's a shame he did not think about his greatest hero when he tossed a coin for Brexit.

I was just thinking how strange it is that only now we are hearing the leader of the whole of our country (or she is supposed to be) saying that neither leavers or remain voters will get everything they want. Perhaps she is finally beginning to listen to the voice of the whole UK.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2018/03/03/the-end-of-the-union-2/

It could mean the splitting of the whole UK.

I was in the car over lunchtime and caught a very interesting programme.

How does the UK's departure from the European Union look from the other side of the English Channel? Anand Menon considers what the EU 27 want from Brexit by focusing on the consequences for trade at for three very different ports: Calais, our nearest neighbour, Rotterdam, the giant of European ports, and Gdansk in Poland, a country which has its own issues with the European Commission. Will the EU nations continue to operate as a unified front, as in the first stage of negotiations, or will cracks start to appear once questions of economic self-interest become more apparent? Professor Menon heads the award-winning think tank The UK in a Changing Europe.

You can hear it here

The one thing I drew from it was this is all going to cost incredibly more than we have ever been told and actually getting, not just cars, etc., which are of course essential to the economy, but food, which is essential to our lives, backwards and forwards is going to be so difficult that it will not be anything to do with how much poorer we become but how much food we will have.

Obviously things will improve over time to some extent but preparations seem to be sadly lacking.

I like the fact that the worst thing for Poland would be if no Polish workers returned from Britain.
Nobody in Poland is bothered about Brexit.
Most of Polish imports come from the far east.

This is an utterly brilliant twitter thread by Steve Analyst. It's very funny as well as being infuriating

Does the UK hold all the cards?

This is the actual twitter thread:

twitter.com/EmporersNewC/status/970341839948697600

This is the thread 'unrolled'

threadreaderapp.com/thread/970341839948697600.html

I'd recommend reading the actual thread as it has all the video clips on autoplay; you might be tempted to miss them out on the 'unrolled' thread (where you have to actually play them yourself) but they are absolutely integral to the message of the thread.

Also, the actual thread has other people's comments on it, which are always interesting

This guy is one of my twitter heroes!

This is interesting, too, Maizie, about trade tariffs.

threadreaderapp.com/thread/966741642966429696.html

That's just coffee. Think about everything else that we import.

Great to see the Italians showed the eu just what they think of them

oh wow petra - they also showed that so many support fascism and are ultra racists ... glad they've got your admiration

jura2
I would imagine that a large proportion of the millions who voted for these far right parties aren't fascists or racists.
They wanted to send a message to the eu, and they've certainly done that.
I don't think for one moment the eu will listen, they can't, they have an agenda and it must be adhered to.
These movements aren't going to go away.

They wanted to send a message to the eu, and they've certainly done that.

I rather think that that interpretation very much depends on where you're getting your information from.

In much the same way that petra claims that a large proportion of the millions aren't racists or fascists I could claim that probably the same proportion don't give the EU a second thought.

But Leavers perpetually live in hope that one or other of the EU 27 is going to commit national suicide alongside us.

Didn't happen in France, didn't happen in the Netherlands, didn't happen in Austria nor in Germany. Didn't happen in Greece a few years ago, either. Only 21 more elections to go...

We've got a madman in charge of America and people are rejoicing in the possibility of Europe breaking up; this makes my brain hurt somewhat...

Tegan2
If there is a possibility of Europe breaking up, who's fault is it?

Nigel Farage's, without a doubt

Who will have moved to the USA to be with his friend trump by then.
Oh, and Andrew Neil who has an apartment in trump tower.

Doesn't really matter whose fault it is; fact is it's a potentially dangerous situation, especially as it seems to be the far right that are most keen for it to happen.

Interesting comment from a thread on the other place. Clearly by someone who lives in Italy:

5 star aren’t the fascists, the natural heirs to the fascist party are Fratelli d’Italia. The Lega are anti- establishment, nationalists and anti immigration ( since they broadened out from just hating the South of Italy). 5 Star are anti establishment and anti corruption and for the moment no longer anti Europe. They have also proved to be shite governers of Rome where I live over the last few years so I have no faith in them doing better on a larger scale. The Lega and 5 Star have done the best in these elections and both are talking about their responsibility to govern but think any collation between them (which 5 star always swore they would never do with anyone until 5 mins ago!) would really antagonize the left of 5 star. The bots and the brexiteers have been out in force today trying to make this all about leading to the collapse of the EU. And the Anglophone press are spouting similar rubbish. Reminiscent of the French and Dutch elections -the pattern is if nothing else consistent. The only thing that seems clear at the moment is that PD and Renzi have had a shocker. The rest...what form a coalition will take or whether we go to the polls again remains to be seen.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/3180562-Westminstenders-Break-Up-or-Make-Up?pg=29&order=

I suspect my earlier judgement of wishful thinking on the part of Leavers is fairly correct.

Brexiteers didn't tell us about this, did they?

infacts.org/airline-rights-fly-around-world-air-post-brexit/

The fact that was likely to happen was dismissed as scaremongering!

No Italians didn’t show the EU what they think of them. Italian politics are more complex. Berlesconi and his ilk have a long history of corruption and manipulation of the the media behind them. They now have ( again) another hung parliament. The wealthy part of Italy is very much pro Eu. It’s the poorer regions who voted the far right populists ( more than one party- so no unity there) Sorry to disappoint you.

They must have known about it. America can't change it's rules, because trump says America first.
British Airways appear to be having the most difficulty, followed by Virgin and Easyjet.
Chris Grayling making rapid progress?
Is that why Easyjet are moving half their jobs to Vienna, and Virgin selling 31% of their stake to France?

This is why statutory instruments is a bad idea.

"Is it really worth having blue passports if it means the cost of applying for one shoots up to around £100?

The Tories seem to think so – they tried to sneak the proposal to increase the cost through Parliament via a Statutory Instrument (a change in the law that doesn’t require a Parliamentary vote).

One has to wonder whether this is another hidden cost of Brexit, with the Tories pushing a price rise through in good time to avoid anyone making the link.

Labour blocked the plan – and the new proposed cost will now go to a full vote in the House of Commons tomorrow (March 7).

The plans devised by the Home Office would see an increase of 27 per cent in the cost of children’s passports and 17 per cent for adults. This would effectively mean that a family of four applying by post would pay £287 for all their passports.

Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott said: “Labour is urging MPs to put party divisions to one side on Wednesday and do the right thing by voting against this unfair rise in the cost of getting a new passport.

“This whopping increase will hit families badly and could see some families being forced to cancel their summer holiday plans as the costs become too high.” "

Brexiteers didn't say this was going to happen, either.
Sneaky government.

I'm afraid that the muddled, misinformed thinking of people like Lucky is precisely the cause of this terrible catastrophe for our country, which is looming ever nearer and in an ever more frightening way.
The referendum was fatally flawed. It's outcome should not have been based on a binary count. The difference between remain and leave was only just over one million voters. That was not a vote to leave. Nor would it have been a vote to remain. It merely displayed how divided our nation is.
We had our autonomy; Europe didnt make our laws, it gave us the freedom to move, live, work, marry, procreate safely and securely, within it's borders. I am still furious that my right, and my family's right, to be truly European is being wrested away from us at the whim of uninformed people. And I fear that those people will only see what they have done when its too late.

Agreed

Well said specki....