The big Brexit thread - news, updates and discussion

[TopCat]

Right. That’s not so controversial, surely? And yet it seems to be hard to grasp by people who can’t get to grips with the idea that anybody could have wanted that thing in the first place.

Pretty straightforward but will fully misunderstood. I voted leave and am pleased we have left. Most leave voters I know agree.

 

[Artaxerxes]

You've got a bike, haven't you?

"Editors next job could be in Cyber"

 

[Raheem]

Right. That’s not so controversial, surely? And yet it seems to be hard to grasp by people who can’t get to grips with the idea that anybody could have wanted that thing in the first place.

Very obviously not controversial or hard to grasp. Couldn't have been explained better.

 

[butchersapron]

Not only must they be right, but the methods used to reach that rightness must be right. And also, that sort of non-right-thought process is wrong. Stop it.

Jesus fucking christ.

 

[mojo pixy]

You've got a bike, haven't you?

Sadly, Norman Tebbit saying ''my dad didn't riot, he got on his bike'' seems to have has forever poisoned the idea of taking personal responsibility for the living you make. As if supporting and working for socialism is somehow in opposition to that (here's a clue: it's not)

 

[The39thStep]

I was asked many times, I refused and yes I appreciate I was in a privileged position and many people would find it harder to do than I did. The problem was never the EU legislation it was UK governments that were less than enthusiatic about enforcing it.

Fairer to say that the problem was never the EU legislation it was that EU states were less than enthusiastic about enforcing it .

 

[The39thStep]

Must be said that often even the most ardent pro EU people in Europe are more critical of it than some Remain posters on here .

 

[TopCat]

Must be said that often even the most ardent pro EU people in Europe are more critical of it than some Remain posters on here .

Remain has become part of the culture of liberalism in the UK.

 

[Artaxerxes]

In a related development Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, has used a letter (pdf) to the European commission’s vice-president, Maroš Šefčovič, to ask for some of the “grace period” exemptions from the Northern Ireland protocol rules to continue until 1 January 2023. That would mean exemptions that were only supposed to be in place for a few months lasting two years.

Gove also hints the government may go further if the protocol cannot be made to work for the people of Northern Ireland, reinforcing what Boris Johnson said in the Commons about the UK being willing to invoke article 16 of the protocol. Gove writes:

I must make clear that the UK government seeks urgent resolution of these problems in the context of our obligations to seek commonly acceptable solutions, and recognising the pressing need to restore confidence among people in Northern Ireland that the Belfast ‘Good Friday’ agreement is being respected in all its dimensions. If it is not possible to agree a way forward in the way we propose, then the UK will consider using all instruments at its disposal

 

[gosub]

I thought everyone agreed that despite what Johnson said the UK’s vaccine rollout could have progressed exactly the same without brexit. Is that not true?

No at the very least pharma went out of its way to get UK licensing done ahead of transition end

 

[littlebabyjesus]

No at the very least pharma went out of its way to get UK licensing done ahead of transition end

Is there evidence that this was a big motivation without which it wouldn't have happened as it did? My memory is that the UK govt was extremely keen to get it done asap. Nobody is saying it would have been exactly the same without brexit, merely that it could have been, that there is nothing about brexit that was necessary to make it happen as it did.

This is Johnson talking about it on 31 December. It's pretty important to get this right given the Tories are trumpeting it as a brexit success.

Pioneered in a UK that is also free to do things differently, and if necessary better, than our friends in the EU.

Brexit has given UK chance to 'pioneer' vaccines, says Boris Johnson in New Year message

The whole of that speech is about one thing. Linking the vaccine to brexit.

 

[butchersapron]

Remain has become part of the culture of liberalism in the UK.

It's their Dolchstoßlegende.

 

[philosophical]

Remain might be part of the culture of something or other, but it is also part of the issue of practicalities.
There are things going on around form filling and fees and fish and declarations and traffic queues and workers protections and freedom of movement and costs, amongst other practical (not libertarian, not ideological, not especially cultural) things....oh and the practicalities of dealing with a land border between two different systems.
Remain for many is actually about the gains and losses in practical terms.
What seems to be emerging is something that has been true from the start, that brexiteers who go on about the evils of the EU don't have practical solutions for the problems they have called on. They can loll about with their long words and other manifestations of their faux justification verbal diarrhoea, but they can't deal with, for example, the nascent dissident activity in the north of Ireland.
I believe brexit voters are cowardly and cover their cowardice with elaborate finger jabbing and pointing.
Maybe they would be better served thinking up 'cultural' events for their festival of brexit Britain, or building hard standing washing and toilet facilities on the site of the old Manston airport.

 

[Pickman's model]

the nascent dissident activity in the north of Ireland.

it's only nascent if you haven't been paying attention for 23 years

 

[teuchter]

"Editors next job could be in Cyber"

Some might say it already is, and we're it.

 

[andysays]

Im not aware of experiencing less happiness now in any noticeable way, due to brexit happening. So it can’t follow that directly that the people who voted the other way 5 years ago are happier as a result can it?

Tbh, there were people queuing up on threads here to say how upset they were that Leave had won, as soon as the result was announced, and before any of us knew how it would actually unfold.

You may not be one of them, but there are people on both sides whose primary driver on this appears to be a gut sense of happiness or unhappiness (not necessarily anything wrong with that), which they then seek to justify with a mixture of material and moral arguments.

 

[TopCat]

It's their Dolchstoßlegende.

Fucks sake. I’m going to have to look that up.

 

[butchersapron]

Fucks sake. I’m going to have to look that up.

I'm being all european. It ain't good.

 

[philosophical]

it's only nascent if you haven't been paying attention for 23 years

I have been paying attention for a lot longer than 23 years.
If it helps you, I used nascent to refer to the recent upsurge of something that had been relatively quiet in recent times, but the problem having been given new energy because of the brexit vote.

 

[Pickman's model]

Fucks sake. I’m going to have to look that up.

stab in the back myth

 

[TopCat]

I'm being all european. It ain't good.

We are all European.

 

[TopCat]

stab in the back myth

Thanks

 

[Raheem]

Fucks sake. I’m going to have to look that up.

You need to look that up? Talk about a stereotypical leave voter...

 

[Pickman's model]

Thanks

i had to look it up too

 

[editor]

Fwiw editor I can recommend a few reliable UK suppliers of audio gear.

I almost always buy via UK suppliers, but my mate has been struggling for cash and went for the big discount (now totally cancelled out by the new excess charges) offered by thomann.de. He had no idea he was going to be hit with a huge 33% surcharge.

 

[Smangus]

I was following this thread quite well until I read Pickman's post which referenced Ian Wright , Eric Cantona and Darcy Bussell all at once, then my head imploded....

 

[Flavour]

Let's see what the remainers have to say about the crushing austerity that the ex-ECB Bank chief Mario Draghi will now impose on Italy because the EU demands it in order to give them access to "recovery funds" they just magicked out of thin air

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Let's see what the remainers have to say about the crushing austerity that the ex-ECB Bank chief Mario Draghi will now impose on Italy because the EU demands it in order to give them access to "recovery funds" they just magicked out of thin air

I didn't know about that. I'd probably say something similar to what I said when the EU was screwing Greece, or when the IMF is screwing insert name from a long list of countries here, ie roundly condemn it.

However, as with Greece, given that the UK wasn't in the eurozone, it doesn't have a direct bearing on what would have happened to the UK inside the EU.

 

[sleaterkinney]

'David Davis in particular had this very crude 1980s approach to negotiation. I know David quite well, I knew him before I went into politics – David’s backstory is that he was the trouble-shooter for Tate & Lyle. When there was a problem, they sent David Davis. Shut down a refinery, fire a load of people, get rid of the troublemakers: the bare-knuckle fighter. That’s how he liked to see himself. David Davis’ approach to negotiation is you slap it on the table, you lean across, and you eyeball them. If they don’t give way immediately, you say, ‘I’ll see you round the back.’ That was always his view on this. ‘We’ve got the money, they want our money, so we wave a cheque at them then we stick it in our back pocket and we say, ‘Right, show us what you’ve got’. In the end, they’ll want our money. They’ll want access to our market. How long is this going to take, 15 minutes? Give me 15 minutes in a room with these people. I’ll sort them out.’ That was his view of the world, and it was widely shared among the Brexiteers.'

 

[editor]

Journalists are getting fucked over too according to my union

British journalists based in Europe, a group to which about 440 National Union of Journalists members are thought to belong, have also been left unsure whether they can take short trips to work in a third country (further to the UK or their host EU member state).

NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet has written to President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen to raise the issue.

Nick Gammon, a UK photojournalist based in Amsterdam, told Press Gazette: “We have been forgotten about… these are really big questions and we are not getting any clarity to be honest from anybody.”

“If you are a British journalist you don’t have a deal,” he added. “There is no deal for journalism. The most important thing about the agreement is we are not in it, therefore it is no deal for us.”

Brexit and the UK news industry: 100 days on, still no travel deal for journalists

Following UK exit from the EU we look at how Brexit affects journalism for those working in the UK and EU and those trying to sue them.

www.pressgazette.co.uk