The U.K. is prepared for nothing

David49

As we’ve moved on to Covid the immediate problem when it
started was lack of PPE, which is going to be needed for any contagious pandemic.

How much PPE is in store today????

I would imagine the same amount as in 2020. Also masks became a political issue and you'd have a cohort of refusers. I keep my own supply of FFP3 masks now, I will look after my family using my own resources.

The biggest problem re Brexit is the same as it was at the time. Too few of those pro remain, got off their bottoms and voted. Over a million of them, including those who are now complaining about Brexit sat at home, either complacent that their side would win or unwilling to make the effort to vote.
The result might not have been what I voted for, but I have more respect for anyone who voted leave and wish they hadn’t, than for those who didn’t bother.
If there was another referendum, do you think the CBBs would change their attitude and actually vote?

The relevant people have made their fortunes from our money flogging us PPE by now. Hopefully they'd never get a second bite of our cherry so to say!

Couldnt swear to it - but think a lot of it got dumped...

I was only too glad that "going out" - for however long I had decided to only resulted in one row with someone in the police (ie because a policewoman was picking on a man sitting peaceably there on his own waiting his turn feet away from the shop he wanted to go in - ie a food shop). She left him alone and then tried harassing me - unsuccessfully - as I pretended she wasnt taking a photo of me and setting off a siren noise deliberately at me and put nose up in air and walked past her. I asked a woman in her garden both on my way out and when I came back again whether I'd been right to think she was harassing me/what did it look like to her? and got told I had been correct...that policewoman was indeed doing so.

I was glad of my new friends I made - quite a few of them. One had to make friends where you could if some of your old ones had decided to drop you for having a different viewpoint - so cue for one of my new friends (still on the scene) is someone I started chatting to in the street and it went on from there and two 1 hour chats later = still a friend now.

I was glad of the fact that the area I live in now has as a plus point that it's pretty "chatty". I can only imagine what it was like to be a person living on their own and not so much as a pet cat if they lived in a "cold" area.

David49

As we’ve moved on to Covid the immediate problem when it
started was lack of PPE, which is going to be needed for any contagious pandemic.

How much PPE is in store today????

Some items of PPE have use by dates as they deteriorate.

It really is a balancing act for stock control and knowing/guessing (in my day job) what your customers are going to be buying.

It can be an educated guess when you know the jobs involved.

For the NHS the requirement is enormous, the square meterage of storage needed vast. With up to date stock control and a plan for selling on before it reaches expiry date but early enough to be saleable.

It really isn’t as easy as just stockpiling 🤷‍♀️

As we’ve moved on to Covid the immediate problem when it
started was lack of PPE, which is going to be needed for any contagious pandemic.

How much PPE is in store today????

Unfortunately the real lesson of Covid has been forgotten. How grateful we were for our neighbours friends and community. How much we appreciated being able to go out even just for a short time. How we recognised that having people living on the streets and unable to afford food and shelter was bad for our community as a whole. It’s just back to me me me again I feel. I don’t want to pay more tax but if Rachel needs the money to bring back a sense of community spirit and worth, and to support us all from cradle to grave´ bring it on. And, whilst we are at it, let’s actively reject the rise of billionaire led social media culture and value our traits and differences. Not a Christian…or anything…but do unto others has a lot going for it.

Oreo

Probably unfair to label all MP’s in that way as there are many who do their best for their area and constituents, from all the political parties.

I agree. 👍

Probably unfair to label all MP’s in that way as there are many who do their best for their area and constituents, from all the political parties.

ArthurAskey

Britain used to be a country led by high calibre MP’s . We are now led by overgrown schoolboys and student activists all pushing their own self serving agendas at the expense of what is best for the country. It’s so sad. Reform is our last hope of pulling the country back from the brink.

And they've all got PPE degrees and no nous.

Mollygo

WWM2
Whilst I agree that it is not likely to happen very soon, I do think that the U.K. would indeed be welcomed back into the EU, but not on the very favourable terms that we had prior to leaving.

Favourable terms. Hmm yes, circa 17 billion contribution we made to the EU, though we did get around 4billion back.
^In 2020 the UK made an estimated gross contribution (after the rebate) of £17.0 billion. The UK received £4.5 billion of public sector receipts from the EU, so the UK’s net public sector contribution to the EU was an estimated £12.6 billion.

On that basis, we could well be welcomed back, because I’m sure they’ve missed that money from us.
Indeed, people we met in EasternEurope e.g. Romania last year were full of praise for all the money they receive from the EU to rebuild their country.
They were sorry we’d left the EU.

NB I expect the EU would charge us extra for changes they’ve had to make e.g. for all the faffing about they’ve had to set up with passports at customs etc.

The consensus among economists and research institutions is that the UK was generally better off economically as a member of the EU. Studies estimate that Brexit has reduced UK GDP by around 2-6% compared to if it had remained in the EU, with the impact expected to grow over time.

Key points include:

Brexit introduced new trade barriers and regulatory hurdles with the EU, the UK's largest trading partner, reducing trade efficiency and raising costs for businesses.

UK exports to the EU have declined notably more than imports from the EU, increasing trade friction.

The UK's GDP per capita was estimated to be 8-10% higher under EU membership according to some studies.

Economic growth post-Brexit has been slower compared to projections made if the UK had stayed in the EU, partly due to reduced investment and labour shortages.

However, some argue Brexit offers potential long-term benefits from regulatory independence.

In summary, while some sectors and regions have adapted, the overall economic data shows the UK has experienced slower growth, trade disruption, and a reduction in GDP since leaving the EU, implying it was economically better off as a member

Bit like the BMA

ArthurAskey

Britain used to be a country led by high calibre MP’s . We are now led by overgrown schoolboys and student activists all pushing their own self serving agendas at the expense of what is best for the country. It’s so sad. Reform is our last hope of pulling the country back from the brink.

Time was when an ordinary working person could think in terms of standing for Parliament and would be doing so for idealistic reasons. I'd forgotten my mother said one of my great-uncles was aiming in that direction - ie to be an MP.

Way back I wondered about it myself - but began to see what a "dirty game" it seems to be and that was the end of that...

"Overgrown schoolboys and student activists" about sums up a fair number of would-bes.

Mollygo

^I think it was a terrible shame that the argument against membership was reduced to a simplistic one of how much we paid for our membership and how much we 'got back'.^
It was a terrible shame, if that was all it was. But it’s a bit simplistic to claim that that was the only reason. In fact a lot of the reasons quoted above are a bit simplistic.

Yes, I agree.

There was a lot to consider and many discussions on all aspects took place.

The voting paper itself was too simplistic.
There should have been the option to remain in the Customs Union at least.

I think it was a terrible shame that the argument against membership was reduced to a simplistic one of how much we paid for our membership and how much we 'got back'.
It was a terrible shame, if that was all it was. But it’s a bit simplistic to claim that that was the only reason. In fact a lot of the reasons quoted above are a bit simplistic.

Britain used to be a country led by high calibre MP’s . We are now led by overgrown schoolboys and student activists all pushing their own self serving agendas at the expense of what is best for the country. It’s so sad. Reform is our last hope of pulling the country back from the brink.

maizie yes and all those benefits flow from the EU free market.

So freedom of movement for goods, people and capital.

I think it was a terrible shame that the argument against membership was reduced to a simplistic one of how much we paid for our membership and how much we 'got back'.

Conversely, when the pro remain people pointed out the benefits of free movement, such as Erasmus, being able to work without restraints in Europe, etc. it was reduced to a culture war with sneering at the middle class 'elites' who wouldn't be able to have cheap European nannies and send their children to European universities any more ...

Leaving has adversely affected those businesses which traded in Europe, whole industries, such as the music industry, which is a very valuable contribution to our trade balance, have had to curtail or cease touring in Europe; or, as is the case for some of my friends close relatives, professional musicians have had to leave the UK and move to a European country with a view to taking citizenship because opportunities are better for them there.

The costs of trading with EU countries have risen to the extent that only really large businesses can absorb them, Hundreds, if not thousands, of small businesses have ceased trading because of the costs. This all affects our national income.

Notably, as Whitewave and Mollygo have pointed out, for all this money that we are supposed to have 'saved' doesn't seem to have done anything to help us in the UK. Where has it gone, indeed...

WWM2
If you mean the figures I mentioned, I got them from a government page. So they could be right, or it could be an administrative error or even a husband’s memory problem.
There’s so many excuses to choose from.
I agree about “where has the money gone? though. There’s no evidence of it suddenly being used to help here in the UK.

Assuming the figure quoted above are correct, and I’m too lazy to check, one wonders where all this money has gone, as it certainly has not apparently been used to boost public services, or even help pay off the U.K. debt.

In point of fact, when the trading club was started up. It was realised that some richer countries were in a much better position to take advantage of the free trade than others. In order to mitigate this and make the market as fair as possible (level playing field) it was understood that stuff like infrastructure, grants for various projects, business start up schemes etc were necessary and these needed financing. Every country in the EU contributes towards this according to their ability (this is one area where the U.K. actually had got a reduction). So when you travel to other EU countries, you can see big infrastructure projects taking place. There was a lot done in the U.K. using “club” money - one was the A30 upgrade around Bodmin. Hastings also got a good deal of money as it was deemed an area of deprivation and if course many others that I could quote. I have no doubt that HS2 would have received a huge amount of money and many other infrastructure projects.

So you see the money doesn’t go into a bottomless pit it is used for positive help to every country in the EU to ensure as far as possible business activity thrives within its territory.

nanna8

I was horrified when the UK left the EU but if you were going to leave why wasn’t it done completely? Make your own rules up, why have the European ones stopping what the government has decided on deportations? I don’t get it - all the negatives, none of the positives.

Would you mind being more specific, please - which European rules are preventing us from deporting people?

fancythat

yogitree

WWM2 I was just 'looking about me' when I was out this morning. What a state our roads/pavements/infrastructure is in. I remember when everything was neat, repaired, painted, unbroken and in working order. Subsequent governments haven't been up to taking on the task of keeping it shipshape, or getting it all back to 'acceptable' again.

Just a thought.

When a Country gets above a certain level of population, does the whole thing become too big to manage properly?

A thought that hadnt basically occurred to me - but I can follow the logic, ie maybe/probably there's more "layers of management". Well I can certainly think of places where there's a surplus layer of "management" in place - costing quite a bit of money, meaning there's more things that can go wrong imo - but serves to give a group of people some jobs that have status and a good salary.

There's likelihood of conflict of interests between different management layers - and a lot of it down to those individual people in the layers wanting their money/status.

I will come back to my posts.
But not for a couple of days.

Realistically when it comes to accepting EU rules including freedom of movement I don’t think a vote to rejoin should be taken for granted in the UK. We lost a lot of friends when we left so acrimoniously.
Maybe in 10 yrs time we will go back cap in hand with some chance of rejoining, until then we make the best of what we have.

I was horrified when the UK left the EU but if you were going to leave why wasn’t it done completely? Make your own rules up, why have the European ones stopping what the government has decided on deportations? I don’t get it - all the negatives, none of the positives.

WWM2
Whilst I agree that it is not likely to happen very soon, I do think that the U.K. would indeed be welcomed back into the EU, but not on the very favourable terms that we had prior to leaving.

Favourable terms. Hmm yes, circa 17 billion contribution we made to the EU, though we did get around 4billion back.
^In 2020 the UK made an estimated gross contribution (after the rebate) of £17.0 billion. The UK received £4.5 billion of public sector receipts from the EU, so the UK’s net public sector contribution to the EU was an estimated £12.6 billion.

On that basis, we could well be welcomed back, because I’m sure they’ve missed that money from us.
Indeed, people we met in EasternEurope e.g. Romania last year were full of praise for all the money they receive from the EU to rebuild their country.
They were sorry we’d left the EU.

NB I expect the EU would charge us extra for changes they’ve had to make e.g. for all the faffing about they’ve had to set up with passports at customs etc.