Forums Forums National News Brexit - A Few Years On

I still think we should have gone for a harder Brexit, however our virtual/partial Brexit has reaped rewards.


In the 7 years since the referendum our exports have increased by 50%.
We are second in the world for service exports.
40% of our exports are to the EU, 60% to the Rest of The World.
We have attracted a lot of foreign investment, in 2021/22 we were second in the World.

Things we still need to work on.

We still import too much from the EU which is higher priced.
We legally cannot produce some oil based goods but we still import them.
Our internal distribution of wealth is appalling.

I've not fact checked these figures but they are unlikely to be wrong.

Is that you giving the Tories some credit DD?

Only Reform will deliver a harder Brexit me finks.

Far from it, Boris completely bodged Brexit into a compromise in favour of the EU. I supported Brexit like many other socialists did and most of us felt like we got a 20% Brexit at best.

Reform is Farage's revenge on the Tory party for bodging the Brexit deal, it has no relevance in the contemporary and future running of the country.

I really really don't want to vote Starmer but it is essential to remove the Conservative party who are outright thieves, they have destroyed every aspect of our country and left a trail of debt and commitments that will take years to recover from. We still haven't recovered from Thatcher and now we have had a second bigger wave of the gentry vs the populous.

Strategic Reserves - totally destroyed
NHS - totally destroyed
Defence - totally destroyed
Leisure Services - totally destroyed
Sewage - totally destroyed
Policing - destroyed
Justice System - destroyed
Energy Supply - destroyed
Energy Infrastructure - destroyed
Food Supply - destroyed
Water supply - destroyed
Transport - destroyed
Education - destroyed
Food Supply - destroyed
Housing - destroyed
Local Councils - destroyed

Not one of the above have shown any improvement, they have all gone backwards despite us being well inside the top ten countries in the world.

Labour will take us back in to Europe, perhaps through the back door but closer ties we will have with them that we voted to leave behind. I've voted Labour all my life but I don't trust this lot and I certainly don't trust Starmer who changes his mind like the weather. I'll probably waste my vote on one of the minor parties as a protest.

TBH I don't think Starmer will be in office for a full term. I'm still on the fence about Raynor, she was rock solid socialist at one time, I really can't believe she could change her colours that fast, I think she decided it would be better monitoring from the inside than be blind on the outside.

The EU won't co-operate with any requests from Starmer, if he asks for anything they will want a few pounds of flesh in return I hope he's not as daft as Boris and give them it on a plate..

One things you can guarantee is the the Tories will be crying about the financial state of the country even though it is their excessive borrowing that has created the mess.

The EU will have us back in the blink of an eye, of course they will have their pound of flesh but Starmer & Co will very likely give it to them. If you think illegal immigration is bad now, stand by it's going to get a lot worse, I'm still waiting to hear what the Labour party are going to do with those who are already here, never mind the millions who are yet to come.

It's what they haven't said more than what they have said is the reason they are not getting my vote.

Nobody has a solution to illegal immigration, especially where you can't identify the correct country of origin.

The Rwanda plan is not going to deter anybody, as Starmer correctly points out, adding 1% extra risk to the illegal immigrants is not a deterrent.

The high numbers of immigrants is not primarily down to the illegal immigrants, its the accumulation of legal immigrants.

For 2003:-

Humanitarian 120,000
Settlement 119,000
Citizenship 202,000
EU Settlers 417,000

So that is 858,000 extra legal permanent immigrants per year which completely dwarfs the number of illegal immigrants per year who are likely to be be around 1% of that figure.

This is how we have accumulated over 10 million first generation immigrants in the UK, it is not a consequence of illegal immigration.

Other figures related that are of use for an idea of scale.

84,000 asylum seekers (of which probably around 60,000 will be approved)
54,000 immigrants returned
1,800 immigrants detained
1,300,000 non-visitor visas issued
686,000 permitted extended stay
2,000,000 visitor visas issued

The actual number of permanent illegal immigrants is of course unknown but it is certainly considerably less than the number of asylum seekers.

There shouldn't be any asylum seekers here unless we invite them or they fall from the sky, they should seek asylum in the first safe country they step foot in and that can never be here. I see them as illegal for that reason.

Legal immigration can of course be beneficial in some circumstances but that has be sorted before our infrastructure collapses.

The "First Country" is an EU rule, not International.

The problem with "First Country" is that neighbouring countries would be totally overwhelmed, left defenceless and there would soon be a humanitarian crisis due to lack of social and policing infrastructure to support all the people in the country. Starvation, disease and crime would soon become prevalent.

It could also be fair for asylum seekers to seek asylum in countries that speak the same language, English being one of the prominent languages is the reason some people want to be here, it is often a second language.

Even adding non-invited asylum seekers and illegal immigrants together, it is only a small fraction of the legal immigrants allowed in the country and not the reason for the substantial increase in population.

Switzerland, Sweden, Austria, Germany and Ireland are some European countries that had a higher proportion of foreign born people than the UK (2022 figures). Our problem is that we already have a high population density without immigrants, even more of a problem when you look at our lack of natural resources.

More so, we are a soft touch with plenty of benefits and freebies.