I am rather bored by Brexit. Apart from the revelation of May's crude and decidedly unsubtle negotiating position that must hav been chosen to alienate we learned little more about the UK's position yesterday. We did learn that Europe will play by the rules: with 27 states to accommadate that was pretty much inevitable.
What has interested me are the absurd beliefs of those people celebrating our leaving that television presenters have found to interview. Leaving the likes of Farage aside, what has been apparent is the irrationality of their emotionally based arguments. Of course, I know such interviews are not representative, but I suspect we have all heard similar sentiments expressed.
Taking back control resonates, although all the laws that were imposed are being retained, almost without exception.
Money saving is believed to be possible, without evidence being supplied.
Sovereignty is obviously key.
And, of course, migration will be controlled.
i fear our politicians chosen to negotiate Brexit are woefully inadequate for the task given to them. But that may be a minor concern when those who thought they were regaining control can't spot the difference when Brexit has happened. What then? And how will that anger be managed? That's what really worries me. And have no doubt that there is deliberately fuelled anger already driving these emotions. That will not be going away. It will only get worse. Life in 2019 may not be fun.
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Poker seems to be analogy of the day. We hold a two and a three against a royal flush and our two and three are being played by Tweedledee, Tweedledum and Tweedledumer. All too rich to ever feel the real fallout.
And unable to read the cards they hold
“Life in 2019 may not be fun” – the 2020s will be the time when things become very bad. The UK has sustained its currency through asset sales: selling over priced real-estate to foreigners is one example, sales of important companies e.g. ARM to those outside the UK, another. The sale of important UK companies has been a feature of the UK “economy” since 1980. North Sea oil & gas also kept the show on the road wrt the value of the curreny (& is coming to an end). At some point this Tory-driven Ponzi scheme (for that is what it is) will come to a grinding halt. At that point the currency – since there is very little to support it – will go into free fall – and with it house prices. For those doubters – I draw their attention to the growing…. trade deficit.
As you observed previously, the Tories are only interested in one thing: staying in power. This predicates a 2 – 3 year time horizon & has been a feature of Tory politics since the early 20th century. Thus the comment “I fear our politicians chosen to negotiate Brexit are woefully inadequate for the task given to them” rather misses the point: the Tories are functionally incapable of negotiating since their entire orientation/posture/tactics is: retaining power or getting back into power. What is good for the UK is only relevant in so much as it enables the retention of power/getting back into power. This means that on the Tory side the “negotiations” will always be undertaken with a view to winning the next election – “how does this make us, the Tory-party – look” will be the core consideration – not – “what impact will this have on the UK or England-Wales”.
Those that feel the above are assertions – should take note of the fact that the only reason for the Referendum was internal Tory politics coupled to the “threat” of UKIP (remind me how many seats they have won – not including those held by defectors?) – which the Tories thought threatened their propsects for….. retaining power. We have a viper in our midst, its name is the Tory party & it will be responsible for the destruction of the UK and moving England and Wales economically into 3rd world status.
Harsh, uncompromising reality will be the spiked strip slung across the road in front of the Brexit joy ride speeding to disaster.
But by then it’ll be too late and pointless for the Brexiters to rue their folly.
Our children will be the ones to have to fix the mess and put right our stupid mistake.
I agree entirely with your analysis. All political ideaoligies or approaches, whatever their adherents may claiming to the contrary: contain an element of emotion, of irrationality if you willl. What sets the current approach apart from the usual transactional approach is it’s almost complete reliance on irrationality and an almost unthinking elevation of wishful thinking to becoming the linqua Francia of this entire Government.
Out of the mouths of the great ‘unwashed’ it is eminently regrettable, but to a certain degree permissible. Out of the mouths of career and apparently professional politicians it is not. If they are’true believers’ then they are frankly fools and if they are simply carpetbaggers then their actions are truly reprehensible.
2019: suppose Mrs May and the triumvirate fail to get a deal, so that they therefore decide they should rip the country out of Europe to satisfy Dacre and Cash and Rees Mogg and Redwood and all the other headbangers. Suppose there were a significant financial crisis in a country that even now has a dangerously high debt to GDP ratio, low productivity, and a current account deficit. Suppose the government was confronted by a collapsing pound, rising unemployment, bankruptcies, tailbacks at seaports, queues at airports, crisis in Scotland, crisis in Ulster, etc. Will the PM be able to command a majority in the House of Commons? Would there not be a Tory revolt? Might not Mrs May have to resign? 2019: a divided Tory party, a handful of Lib Dem MPs, a powerless ineffective divided Labour party – we could face a political and constitutional crisis. The Head of State would be a 93 year old lady who doubtless would not want to be confronted by the task of ensuring good governance in a chaotic country, and her designated unelected successor might not be the man to bring unity to a divided country. If you value history as entertainment, 2019 could be a most interesting year, and you, Richard Murphy, could not be bored by Brexit!
The reality will not bore me
The current rhetoric can
There’s a long-established precedent for such adverse circumstances: invent an external enemy. Never fails…
On the BBC 10 O’Clock News a panel from Dover were asked about their feelings and it was noticeable that the “enthusiastic” leavers were all well past 50 years old.
One described himself as “excited” by leaving, but yet again was not pressed as to why he would be so thrilled by something so mundane and unlikely to provide any tangible benefits at all.
Those who had it so good are all too willing to deny it to others
I decided to sample the Breibart website to see what it was like, as Steve Bannon is now an advisor to Trump. It was climate change denial, anti-abortion and anti-immigrant but also had an article by Farage expressing his thanks to Breibart.
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/03/29/nigel-farage-article-50-bannon-breitbart-helped/
The company we choose to keep can tell us a lot.
In a previous incarnationImwas a law enforcement officer and one of the central themes in criminal inteligence that if a suspect is ‘dodgy’ in one field he is likely to be so in most.
Another key area is known associations-on this basis I pronounce Farage guilty!
I’m certainly bored by the BBC’s coverage; then again it was appalling through the Brexit referendum. A particular low point was bringing in Marine Le Pen for an interview.
The EU position is pretty much as anticipated. The pro Brexit people remain as mediocre and unconvincing as ever.
I wondered some months ago if I would come to despise May as much as Thatcher. I though Thatcher was certifiably mad but she was formidable, as indeed were many of her cabinet. Its strange that much of the best opposition is now from Ken Clarke and Hezzer.
I can’t really despise May, she is too much of a mediocrity as indeed is David Davis. Boris is a clown. I can despise the Neo-Con Liam Fox, Michael Gove and IDS. Either way I wouldn’t trust this lot with running a corner shop, never mind the most complex negotiation in the history of the UK.
The UK is in an extraordinary weak negotiating position. I had thought the likely end point was Ukraine but the German representative (Ambassador?) on the Today programme used the analogy of Russia which was interesting.
The UK economy structurally needs high immigration. There is a shortage of people at the high end: doctors, nurses, academics, financiers, scientists, engineers and programmers (I’m sure there are other areas). And also at the low end – agricultural and care workers are prime examples. I can’t see immigration going down without major structural reform.
The NHS is in crisis as indeed is Care, the Prison System and School funding for example is also in decline. One major success of the UK over the past 40 years has been the University sector – I can’t see that doing as well in the next decade.
We have a Government which is wedded to neoliberalism and austerity and an opposition that is the weakest I have ever known – though I understand it was similar in the 1930’s.
You state “…can’t spot the difference when Brexit has happened.” I fear things will get a lot worse, but agree entirely that people will voted Brexit will be right to feel very angry indeed. Towards whom this anger will be directed I don’t know. The right wing press will certainly not put the blame on Brexit or the Tory government. If the past is anything to go by they will try to blame the EU. If the end point is indeed Russia then things could turn out very nasty indeed.
From a conversation on Facebook with someone who said ‘Well, it’s not as bad as the war, we’ll all get to the other end alive…’ to which my response was: the comparison with the war is actually very apt: at the root of my horror at what is going on is that I can see the possibility – and I’ll put it no stronger than that – of exactly that outcome: conflict and war. It’s precisely the same unreal thinking of Brexit which leads inexorably to this; how are the people who are doing this ‘to make Britain great again’ going to react when they find that not only has it done nothing of the sort, but in fact hastened the UK’s decline? Will they go ‘oh, I get it now, I was a bit muddled there, eh?’ – or will they look for someone external to blame and retreat into further isolationism and then hostility? I think we have become very complacent about how easy the road to serious conflict is, how thin and fragile peace is to maintain. For me, being in the EU was worth it on that point alone, whatever its other faults.
Agreed
Read it and weep — pedagogic pygmy….
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-29/after-brexit-9-reasons-be-bullish-great-britain
I think there is about a 90% chance of the hardest Brexit on WTO rules….
This is not down to economic factors or the difficult nature of finding a mutual deal but comes down to the political and ideological drive behind each side.
For the Tory government, the UK press and the Brexiteers the important thing is for the UK to be seen to “Win”……..to get a deal no one thought you could get and get one over on the EU. They will not give in to a crap deal, they would rather leave on harsh terms and not have any of the payments / obligations.
For the EU political elite in Brussels (ie not the national governments) they also are determined to see a “Win” and punish the UK, both because they are angry at their great project being challenged and because it will serve as a warning. Ever since the leave vote they have been determined to offer a crap lesser EU deal where you get all the obligations but less benefits (EU Lite) so the UK could be seen to “Lose” and serve as a warning. They cannot give a deal that looks like the EU loses because of the nationalist turmoil going on across the EU.
So the only (10%) chance is for National leaders to step in and create a fudge at the last minute, something where we pay and have a longer transition period but get some trade benefits / passporting.
I would say that by the time the ideologs on both sides are wound up and shouting with the full backing of each sides press then a hard break is almost certain.
The day had to come when you posted a comment I could largely agree with
….and….( as Jimmy Cricket would have said) …there s more!!!
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-29/konstantin-richter-dirty-dozen-12-things-ruined-eu
This is becoming akin to intruding on private grief . For which I apologise but needs must …..
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-29/bad-brexit-deal-better-no-deal-mathematical-idiocy
For some foolish reason, we are deliberately choosing to cease our role as one of the big three or four in a large club – all acting together, as a counterweight to “friends” near and far, such as Russia, India, China, the US – to standing isolated on our own, a small country off the coast of Europe, with our own depreciating currency, limited natural resources and tiny armed forces. And possibly some less friendly immediate neighbours, at home and abroad, as the United Kingdom become untied.
Thank heavens for financial services, the creative industries, and the English language. Let’s hope we can turn them to account, because otherwise we are stuffed.
Don’t you discredited liberal elite understand? There was an advisory, non-binding referendum and after a three-week campaign that contained more lies and fake new than a US presidential candidate can squeeze into a year, over 37% of those entitled to vote voted to leave. You cannot possibly dispute that there is therefore a compelling democratic imperative for
– the UK to leave under whatever terms can be negotiated that are most consistent with the personal preferences of a Prime Minister who has not been elected by anyone, not even her own party,
– anyone who disagrees to either shut up or be shouted down and pilloried in the media and
– tolerance and compassion towards anyone who looks, acts, believes or thinks differently to some ill-defined standard to be considered dangerously unpatriotic.
I say again that the road back into Europe started yesterday with May’s letter. Yes, indeed all this is totally unecessary – but I still see us going back.
I’m reminded of the film Withnail and I where Withnail is pleading with the local farmer for some food because ‘We’ve gone on holiday by mistake’.
Just replace the concept of a holiday with BREXIT and you have ‘We have left the EU by mistake and we need a more level playing field for trade and security’ to see what our re-entry plea to the EU might be in the future.
The fact that our children will have to put this right is bothersome but gives me a lot of hope as they shall do a better job. We are leaving the EU because of middle aged property price driven complacency; we will re-enter it because of need brought about by our childrens’ lives being harsher and our sovereignty even more undermined as we pimp ourselves to non-EU states elsewhere (particualrly America).
It is worrying that the EU will continue to be blamed for our economic woes even when we have left – the story will be that the EU is not playing by the UK’s rules. But I have faith that this will not wash with younger people who will not tolerate having a worse life than those who went before them.
Hopefully any anger will be channelled into going back in.
I like that Withnall idea…
Actually I made a hash of it. We are more likely to say:
“We’ve gone and left the EU by mistake. Please – will you let us back in. Please!”
A couple of concrete examples of where anger amongst the general population might emerge, Richard. Next week I have to renew my passport. It’s an EU(UK) passport which will therefore be worthless for any UK citizen after 30 March 2019. So, I’m paying full cost for a two year passport, and then will presumably have to pay full cost again for a new ten year UK passport. Or will me and many thousands of others who have to renew their EU passport between now and 2019 be reimbursed or in some other way recompensed for that additional (wasted) cost? I suspect not, given the passport office will have to recruit many more staff to process the mass of UK citizens required to replace their EU passport after March 2019.
Similarly, I have an EU(UK) driving licence which will therefore be invalid across the EU from March 2019 even if the UK authorities decide it’s still valid in the UK. So, me and many thousands of UK drivers who drive in the EU after 2019 are going to have to be issued with UK driving licences, unless a transitional arrangement is in place, in which case this may slow the mass replacement process down but will still be a significant task.
I wonder where in the two year negotiating schedule the government have set themselves these two measures are going to be dealt with? They may be relatively minor in the scheme of things but they impact a seriously large number of people.
And talking of more major issues (and given my primary interest is public administration), I note that due to Brexit the UK needs to adopt a parallel system to the EU’s registration, evaluation and authorisation of chemicals (REACH) regulations by March 2019 as the current regulations are administered and enforced by the European Chemicals Agency (ECA) of which we will no longer be a member. Leaving aside that any UK chemical company trading in the EU will still have to conform to REACH and file the required data to the ECA AS WELL AS the UK’s agency, if the UK is to adopt the REACH regulations and replicate the work of the ECA many millions of £s will have to be found to beef up the required regulatory agency (maybe the Environment Agency?).
And herein lies the rub. This type of duplication is going to be replicated many, many, times over across government. And yet we have a government hell bent on small government. So, the only way to achieve this and stick to this dogma is to scrap almost all regulation so that any regulatory agency only has to be minimal or – more likely, because it follows a pattern we already see – “self regulation”.
So, returning to the example above, I predict that using the powers bestowed on ministers under the so called great repeal act, what we’ll actually see is the REACH regulations and ECA oversight still applying to companies operating in the EU but for those who only operate in the UK (and for their UK sales/arms) an absolute minimum of regulation. This series of events wil be repeated over and over using the argument that there simply aren’t the resources to provide more comprehensive, EU like, systems. But, given the Tory ideological preference for a regulation free economy and society it will then become the new norm of course.
I understand that recently when asked what economy he saw the UK looking like after Brexit, that towering statesman, Dr Liam Fox, replied Germany (in all seriousness, apparently). On the basis of what we see emerging I’d say we’ll be more like India, which for those already wealthy will be fine, but for those already poor, and for the environment and much else, not a very good development at all.
My old friend John Christensen suggested Bangladesh today
We’ll be more like South Africa with its compounds, walled enclaves of the rich. We’re already seeing the beginnings of this with the setting up of private police forces in wealthy areas. Unless, of course, the implementation of the Henry V111 laws and the establishment of a parallel monarchy with the effective coronation of Queen Theresa the First wakes people up a bit. On anger management, well, the Tories already practice divide and conquer, as we’ve seen with the striver/skiver rhetoric. No doubt if anything serious happens suitable distractions will be offered for the amusement of the general population. Something shiny ought to do.
Cheer up people. It’s a necessary catharsis for English nationalism. Things will be better again after Scotland has departed and Ireland is united again. It won’t take generation for the English to finally realised the empire isn’t coming back and that we do after all live in an interdependent world.
I hope someone is working on or thinking about a Brexit version of Yes Prime Minister (a series, not just the script we’ve seen; it was brilliant). Most of us are so sick to the back teeth of the subject, and the lies and incompetence, that something to go with the schadenfreude — some real laughs — is needed. It could be a great cultural export in new global markets.
I’m sure some of our problems arise from the lack of willingness to do political satire on TV now.
Whither Spitting Image?
Ive been re-watching Drop The Dead Donkey, up there with Spitting Image in its savage take-down of politicians. We have seen to have nothing at all, part from a few cartoonists, notably Steve Bell and Martin Rowson in the Guardian
Meanwhile to the point of this blog – I’ve no doubt that there will be massive anger to manage as the gap between the promises of May and the Brexiteers and the realities become clearer. The EU’s response to May’s letter makes it clear just how tough its going to be and how much Mays gang have underestimated what is involved and the weakness of their position. That anger will probably be channeled towards the EU and migrants aided by the Brexit media, plus of course Remoaners
Prompted by a Twitter exchange with Jolyon Maugham, I wonder whether one of the challenges is how to provide an ‘escape route’ for those leavers who want to change their mind without losing face. The hard-core Kippers and Tories will never change but there will be an every increasing number who start to realise the mistake they have made but do not want to admit it. Thinking though the arguments that might be used with them and how and where to present them might be a constructive way to undermine the lunacy of Brixit
I know a blog that needs an article on that…..
Talk to Sean
Hmmm. I wonder what Armando Iannucci is doing with himself now he’s not working in the US any longer? Just imagine what ‘The Thick of It’ could do with the whole Brexit debacle and the ongoing ineptitude of Cameron then May and her gang?
Actually, the current political reality is so preposterous that I wonder if anything the satirists could come up with would seem ridiculous enough?
That may be the problem
And who would air it?
Netflix?
Not the BBC….