<
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/19/brexit-failed-blame-remoaner-elite-refugees>
"It lasts no more than a second, but it is a moment for the ages. Interviewed
on
BBC Newsnight on Monday, Nigel Farage made a confession that, by rights,
should end the debate that has split this country down the middle for much of
the last decade. A month ahead of the seventh anniversary of the 2016 vote that
took Britain out of the European Union, Farage said three words of striking
simplicity and truth: “Brexit has failed.”
You can watch the clip over and over, for it is something to behold. Here is
the arch-Brexiter himself, the man who dedicated his life to the cause of
rupture from the EU, admitting it has been a disaster. Of course, as we shall
see, he and his fellow Brexiters do not blame that failure on the idea itself,
but it’s the admission that counts. It offers grounds for modest celebration:
now, at last, the contours of an emerging national consensus are visible, as
remainers and leavers alike can join in agreement that this thing has not
worked. And yet it comes at a price, one that also became darkly visible this
week.
Start with the facts that even Farage can no longer duck. During the referendum
campaign, he and his allies promised that Brexit would be a boon for the UK
economy, unshackling it from Brussels red tape and releasing it into a roaring
future. Seven years on, we can see the reality: a country in the grip of a cost
of living crisis that means millions can no longer afford what they once
regarded as the basics. Britain is becoming poorer and falling behind its
peers. Ours is now forecast to be one of the worst performing economies in the
world, not merely seventh in the G7 but 20th in the G20 – behind even a Russia
under toughening international sanctions – according to the International
Monetary Fund.
The consequences of being poorer are seen and felt everywhere, whether it’s in
the 3m food parcels delivered by food banks last year, the family who can’t get
a mental health appointment for a troubled child, or in courts that are jammed
and backlogged for years. For a while, the Brexiters could blame all our woes
on anything but Brexit: Covid or Ukraine. But there’s no hiding place now.
This week came a warning that post-Brexit trading arrangements with the EU
threaten the very existence of the entire UK automotive industry, which employs
some 800,000 people. Ford, Jaguar Land Rover and the owners of Vauxhall called
on the government to renegotiate the Brexit deal. Such demands are getting
louder. Next month, a thousand businesses, alongside representatives of farming
and fishing, will gather in Birmingham for the Trade Unlocked conference,
called to discuss a post-Brexit landscape most say has made commercial life
infinitely harder and more bureaucratic. “Business is beginning to find its
voice,” one organiser tells me."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
