Yeah. But it doesn't and isn't happening on this forum, which is where this conversation is taking place.
If the intention was to take advantage of low value unskilled labour, we would have stayed in the EU, where we had virtually unlimited acces to exactly that. If it offends people that we will now be dealing with more skilled workers coming into the UK from all around the world, then I am sorry to hear it. India has very highly skilled IT workers who will benefit the UK and its industrial profile, and these are the target of the trade deal. Complaining that they are Indian and not European seems a little tasteless to me.
That is because freedom of movement is designed to take advantage of the least well off. This argument has absolutely no substance. Have we seen any mass migration of low paid, low skilled workers from the UK moving to the EU to pick fruit? Nor do the wealthier countries in the Union see that happening, because their populations are not in the desperate situation where their livelihood relies on it. What is odd, is that affluent European's, from the UK and the mainland, are oblivious of the driving factors and the deliberate EU exploitation (again, I thank you for linking me to the professor who made that point absolutely clear) of the most desperate. The elitist's dismissal of an individual's desperate situation, that they have to move away from their families to earn a living wage, as being a free wheeling sense of liberty akin to the indulgences of the middle classes, is frankly a ludicrous joke, that only those looking on will ever appreciate. The fact that it is an argument being made by affluant lefties is no surprise what so ever.
Interesting to read this thread for the first time. A couple of points on the steel debate - There was a time, pre EU membership, that we employed >1M in steel manufacture and it once was a strategic industry Not any more; the decline started in 1974 with work and jobs haemorrhaging out of the UK much of it to European countries We make bugger all steel and employ bugger all people (c30k) in the steel industry and haven't for years US steel tariffs are largely irrelevant to the UK
Nearly 2 years ago, on 31st Jan 2020, there was a dinner at Brown’s Hotel in London, organised by Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson. The assembled guests were jokingly labelled as The Brexit Batallion. Very, very interesting summary of the attendees in the complete twitter thread.
Totally agree. The decline of the British steel industry was symptomatic of the general deindustrialization of the UK and the move to a service based economy in the 70s and 80s. However the fact that the US chose to exclude the UK, despite it being only a small industry here now, is also indicative of how the current US administration view us. Economically the tariffs have little, if any, real impact but the political message is significant. Our "special relationship" isn't quite as special as it once was.
The 'special relationship' has always been media nonsense, anyone who swallowed that load of hokum is an idiot US has always done what suits the US Sometimes it suits the US to work with the UK, as in the illegal invasion of Iraq Sometimes it suits the US to work against the US, as in the Suez crisis There is nothing more to it than that
True, but, as you say, the continuation of tariffs on UK steel has virtually no impact on the wider economies of the UK and US. As a punitive tariff it is pretty ineffective. So the only reason that the US chose to remove tariffs from EU and not UK steel must be political. It is a message that the current US administration can, and will, treat us differently now we are out of the EU. Of course, with a different administration, that might change but I suspect the US, and other nations, will always look to have favourable trading conditions with the larger EU market more they do us now. Totally predictable result of Brexit I'm afraid.
A full set of the Lord and Lady Haw Haw’s propagandising for the ruling class in their battle against the poor.
A Marxist view I don't quite subscribe to. I think the issue the twitter thread's driving at is the amount of 'Dark Money' that's sloshing around the (X?)RW "Think Tanks" that use the figleaf of charitable status that act as enablers for mouthpieces such as Toby Young et al (just a randomly picked shytehawk from the selection). I notice that the IEA (briefly mentioned in the thread) isn't appearing as frequently on the beeb since they started asking about its funding during their statements/interviews.
You say you don’t agree, but then make the apparatus clear - there is always lashings of funding available to promote the Ruling Classes’ POV and these are their footsoldiers. That they don’t all usually meet up to go muhahahahahaha and twiddle imaginary moustaches doesn’t make it less a concerted effort to work together for our rulers. However, this event shows how closely they do work and how they recognise their mutual interests. These interests (including, low taxation of the wealthy, deregulation, support for private healthcare and elite education, anti trade-Union activity and anti NHS propagandising, smaller state, anti-benefits and social housing etc etc etc) are not the interests of the poor and that’s all a class war is or needs to be.
But that's the point. Their mouthpieces don't actually hold to (m)any of these views - it's just 'opinions' they're paid to espouse. Case in point is Clarkson he's very touchy (in private) about the stuff 'he' 'writes' much the same as "Mad" Mel Phillips and Ann McElvoy/Atkins although they dress-up what they produce for vast sums of money as 'Promoting Free Speech' and 'Furthering the Debate'. Virtually all the 'commentators' on that list would struggle (due to lack of wit/let alone intelligence) to produce independently a cogent 200 word article on anything unless they get vast amounts of 'resource material' from the think tanks.
If you were correct that would simply double my point. The wealth sitting behind the Telegraph and the ‘think tanks’ is so powerful it can create a whole army to propagandise for it. However, they don’t just choose anyone. There is a happy marriage to be had between the proprietors and a mixture of voices, some genuine zealots like Mad Mel or squeaky US free market nutjob Kate Andrews and the long time hacks like Tony Parsons, who have conveniently monetised their age-related drift towards intolerance.
No one ever argued the EU isn't a larger trading block than the UK. Brexit for Brexiteers was never about the economic argument, that's the thing Remain has never got its head about. Remain lost because it was fighting the wrong battle. To answer your original OP - has Brexit been a success I answer yes. Because now we can hold a UK government 100% to account and there is nowhere they can hide and no one they can blame; and if the citizens of the UK choose they and they alone can change in entirety all layers of people governing us. Ultimate power is back totally in the hands of UK citizens.
And how is that going? I note that Boris has taken full responsibility for all of the numerous ****-ups of the past two years.
I don't speak for anyone else but this "Remainer" totally understood the "sovereignty" and "democracy" argument that some Leave voters were making. But I believe that argument was, and still is, wrong. The EU was about pooling some sovereignty to ensure a fair and open single market. That sovereignty was never lost as, if it were, we could not have left and "restored" it. And I understand the democracy argument but the EU is as democratic, if not more so, than our antiquated FPTP system to elect representatives and the unelected, extremely politicised, HoLs. Parliament was always sovereign and influence and power that each citizen has over it is no different now than it was when we were in the EU. If you think the UK won't continue to blame the EU, as well as everyone else, for their own failings, then I would suggest the last year would indicate otherwise. But that is not the point I have been making in this thread. The point is that the US has made by not removing tariffs on British steel is that they can do so without any real threat of a damaging economic retaliation from the UK. They are much more wary about a trade war from the more economically powerful EU which also once protected us. We are now weaker on the international stage thanks to Brexit.
Can you remind me why that is relevant to your preposterous proposition? If you consider that Parliament represents the will of the people, then in most matters (and you know full well most of those that really counted) we always made our own decisions. In going to war with Iraq, for example, the UK Parliament made that decision alone and most EU members chose another path. The EU President had FA squared to do with it, as he or she did in all important matters of education, housing, taxation etc. Of course British Citizens have limited influence on these decisions, in or out of the EU and the vote to leave has empowered a whole new swathe of toffs to do as they please, to rob and sideline those citizens.
So what? We had general elections when we were in the EU. You're arguing that we have enhanced accountability by leaving. Boris' activities and the lack of comeback on them so far don't suggest it has been enhanced at all.
Brexiteers and Remainers will never agree on what sovereignty is so pointless responding further, it's gone around and around on here for 6 years or more I respect your right to have a view and leave it at that
If the British people, if still in the EU, wanted to remove an incompetent EU president, just how exactly could they do that? If, or when, the British people decide to remove Boris it will be very easy and straightforward thing, and solely in the hands of the British electorate
So, we have gained from Brexit because something which hypothetically could happen (although it hasn't so far) now can't. Meanwhile, accountability for the things which really matter, as @Moose says, is just as poor as it has ever been: in fact, seemingly worse given the appalling cronyism we have seen in the past couple of years. You've really convinced me.
Many people overlook the fact that when the UK was in the EU, the UK *was* the EU, or at least an integral and important part of it with a deep influence, especially with all the various veto exemptions built up over the decades. The idea that democracy begins and ends with who can and cannot be voted in and out is a flawed but seductive idea. After all, who voted for David Frost to be in the Cabinet? Absolutely nobody. The influence lobbyists, opaque think tanks and great swathes of the media continue to have on the UK is far more corrosive. The increasing lack of accountability, the lack of oversight and checks and balances ought to worry people far more than whoever the president of the EU is. The EU will always be reassuringly slow moving and relatively resistent to veering from one extreme to another.
Good post. It was always convenient for domestic politicians to refer to the EU as "them" instead of "us" as they were a great scapegoat for our own failings. Unfortunately domestic politicians still prefer to blame others, including the EU, than accept their responsibility for the mess we are in. And people continue to fall for it I'm afraid.
But it would be in this case? If you vote for something without believing it makes everyone's lives (on average) better then you are a selfish person
https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/united-kingdom/ The current polls show that the British electorate DO want to remove Boris Johnson. But the electorate cannot do that unless the government call a general election. The way Boris Johnson would be removed is via backbenchers and Tory donors losing faith, and the Tory party calling a no confidence vote. And just like when Johnson became PM - the electorate would not get to choose or elect his successor - only the Tory party. "Solely in the hands" is absolute nonsense.
Oh yeah, and his historical landslide victory in the last general election. It is very amusing how people try to spin reality.
