To feel relieved that it’s not a no-deal outcome!

[Xnon]

Whether you’re Remain or Leave the fact is that Brexit is going ahead. I was genuinely scared of a no-deal outcome especially after the weird 2020 we have had.

I don’t know the full details of the deal but I’m just glad that there is a deal rather than no-deal at all. Anyone else feel the same?

Brexit: Boris Johnson hails free trade deal with EU

At least that’s something. I was worried about trading under WTO rules.

Thoughts?

Much more council housing.
Local incentives to encourage industry to move to areas.
Investment in regional transport
Longer term renting being taken seriously.

I would also want local people to be very involved in how they think money and investment should be spent.

@TerryHearn

The reality is also that you won’t go anywhere. You will live in the UK. You will suck it up, You will continue to blame everyone but yourself. After all by default you must be wealthy, educated, faultless members of society. You can add arrogant and pathetic to that list of credentials.

Stay bitter. It won’t change a thing. We have left.

Nice.

I think that you’ll find that those in the UK that are educated (beyond “studying EU politics at degree level”), or have other in demand skills, or have the fortune to have access to EU citizenship won’t “suck it up” and will leave.

But hey, you’ll have your “sovereignty”.

BTW, you still haven’t explained how the UK could have invested in infrastructure over the last (let’s say) 20 years instead of flogging it off?

National house building programme.
End of Help to Buy and other housing market props. We need to stop this country being revolved around property prices.
Much more focus on vocational education. Partnership schools and universities with big business. University and school success needs to be in employment rates not in grades. We need to start building this country to have a skill base of its own. STEM focus at every level of teaching, education and employment.
Tech hubs to be a priority in all major cities via tax breaks.
Crack down on MNCs and their tax avoidance schemes via origin of trade rules.
Clean energy focus.
There also needs to be a focus on the arts. When kids go to school they need to be taught that success is not measured in being a lawyer, a banker or a doctor. We need world class theatre performers, directors, chefs, architects, social workers.
We need to start re-setting people’s expectations that any field of work can fulfill and pay well if you are very good at it.

To the broken record....

Britain hasn’t invested properly for decades due to state aid rules.

@BubblyBarbara

Johnson & his cronies couldn’t give 2 hoots about Northern Ireland.

I think that is broadly an English opinion generally. Unless you have family there, it’s commonly seen as a bit of a pain in the bum that you can’t even drive to. How many non-NI Brits have even been there? 5%? If that.

I agree (sadly).

See - there are things we can agree about.

We definitely need to build more houses.

That’s not “infrastructure” though, is it?

Water, energy, rail, telecoms - all up for state aid under EU regulations as it’s all for the common good.

Help to Buy? Dreamt up to prop up house builders, certainly not for the common good. No way there will be a national house building programme whilst developers sit on land banks.

Vocational education - absolutely agree, but we need to shift the focus from kids getting into £50k of debt for a degree to the value of good apprenticeships that translates into well paid jobs. Maybe the UK should look to Germany for some pointers.

STEM focus - great, let’s see that reflected in UK salaries (spoiler alert - it isn’t).

“There needs to be a focus on the arts” - great, fund it properly and don’t tell artists that they should retrain as software engineers. Also maybe rethink selling most of the main UK studios to US companies because it means UK films can’t be made.

Mind you, I’m enjoying architects and social workers being toted as “less successful” occupations.

Britain hasn’t invested properly for decades due to state aid rules

I think you mean the UK (not “Britain”).

And this is rubbish, as EU state aid rules allowed investment for the common good - utilities, telecoms, rail.

Come on, Terry. You really need to work on the script for your routine. Try to make it more believable. and try to get the audience on your side.

Drop the numbers bit, unless you can get someone to help. You don't understand what a "half" is, and your "58.... 42" one liner doesn't work.

I don’t think you are able to read properly Sabrina. Blinded by rage I think.

A National house building scheme is certainly possible if made law. The government can broadly decide to do whatever they wish now. They can dictate to house builders as they wish. Where are they going to go if they don’t like it? Nowhere.

You will find that actually we are pretty good at film and TV production. Look at what is going on at Elstree. The expansion scheme was signed post Brexit being voted for. Billions of pounds will be flowing in to the country via that investment alone.
Who said architecture or social working is a less successful occupation? I didn’t and it isn’t but I can assure you that kids are aspiring to be doctors, lawyers and bankers before they aspire to many professions. That needs to change.

Ooh piglet you are so clever. Has nothing to add but thinks they are oh so funny with their witty quips. Jokes about adding up but can’t work out that democracy is decided by a majority of people who actually bother to vote. It isn’t adding up for you that you don’t set the agenda. We have left.
Can you hear that? Sounds breezy but wet. Yep. Someone’s pissing in the wind.

No, I’m quite au fait with UK planning (might have spent a few years working on it for instance). UK house building is very much skewed in favour of house builders and help to buy is a symptom of that. What the UK needs is centrally funded social housing.

Oh, and yes UK film studios are awfully good and all that, but since the US corporations bought them out you can’t actually get production space for smaller UK independents. I guess if you don’t know anyone who works in that industry then you’ll just think it’s all hunky dory.

Who said architecture or social working is a less successful occupation?

Well you did - as you implied that success is measured as being a banker, lawyer or doctor, and not as being theatre performers, directors, chefs, architects, social workers.

@SabrinaThwaite I'd give up. The Very Important man who won't be back until 29th isn't going to be listening to anything outside his own narrative and is only interested in offering insults.

@PigletJohn

For someone who was working until Tuesday and would therefore be far too busy to post, our “friend” had been quite vocal today?

[quote ilovesooty]@SabrinaThwaite I'd give up. The Very Important man who won't be back until 29th isn't going to be listening to anything outside his own narrative and is only interested in offering insults.[/quote]
Oh yes, C U Next Tuesday.

That was amusing (if you’re a 9 year old).

Still I like to think it’s worth while calling out bollocks and propaganda when necessary.

[quote SabrinaThwaite]@PigletJohn

For someone who was working until Tuesday and would therefore be far too busy to post, our “friend” had been quite vocal today?[/quote]
They do seem a bit worked up

I think they might have some anger issues?

I’m expecting a full on French cheese refusal and possibly a Belgian beer embargo?

And of course, the membership of the EU didn’t prevent any of our friend’s wish list from happening.

No I didn’t. Students are pre-occupied with certain professions. Nothing new to see here. Certainly not controversial. Nowhere did I claim that architecture was a lesser profession. I was arguing the opposite if anything. Keep seeing what you want to believe and ignoring anything that goes against your own narrative.

Nothing that anyone tells you regarding Brexit will change what your opinions are. Nothing. Even if the UK is booming in a decade or so, you will be predicting a bust just around the corner. You will be claiming that society is more unequal than if we had stayed in the EU. You would never admit anything to do with any perceived success. In fact as I write this you are already balking that Brexit can be a success. It is impossible in your view as you have already decided that Brexit is a failure. It hasn’t actually started seeing that the trade deal won’t start until 1st January. Yes we left in January but nothing has practically changed yet.

You are also unwilling to countenance why people voted to leave. It is lies, racism, lack of education, poverty, frustration, Nigel Farage, Boris. Johnson, Russia, Martians, a thing else? You genuinely feel believe that 17.4 million people voted to leave due to these reasons. Everyone was hoodwinked. 17.4 million people were all misinformed? Lol. It’s sad really. Once you start to accept things for what they are then you will learn to live with the decision that was made.

leave voters have less qualifications, less likely to have been to FE or HE, are less likely to be in work.
They are also more likely to older,

Less likely to have been in HE or FE because they are older. People who left school before 1992 did not have the same access to university education as those who left before. People who left school before the mid 1960s had even less of a chance of a university education. People who were secondary school age before the late 1940s may not even have had the chance of a proper secondary school education, never mind a university education - and are very likely to have had their education buggered up by the war anyway.

None of that, however, means that they are thick, or any of the other even more delightful epithets that have been hurled at Leavers.

Actually, you did expressly put architects and social workers as being on a different aspirational level to that of bankers, doctors, lawyers. But no matter, because that has fuck all to do with EU membership.

And, of course, no answer as to why your “wish list”, all of which has been completely achievable whilst being a member of the EU, has manifestly not happened? Not the will of the Government perhaps?

And as to UK society being unequal? Well, UK governments have managed that supremely well whilst being an EU member. I’m not expecting any earth shattering changes after 1st January.

Yes we left in January but nothing has practically changed yet

I’m glad to see that as a politics student you have realised what the transition period meant. Bless. I’m comforted that your education has not been wasted, despite you not being a doctor, banker or lawyer. Or (God forbid) an architect or social worker.

Nope. I didn’t say what you are claiming I did. I think you have a real problem reading the written language. Kids put them on a different aspirational level. That’s the point I was making. I don’t personally see any profession as lesser or better.

Yes I am fully aware of a transition period but I don’t think you understand the point I am making. We legally left the EU at the end of January. Yet you seem to expect an immediate Brexit success to have been sealed hence your repeated claims that Brexit has failed and “where are all of the successes”. How could anything have occurred since we are in a transition period? You have literally been arguing against your own standpoint therefore.

For someone who claims to be educated you don’t have any seeming ability to understand the world we live in. You don’t listen. You don’t learn. You don’t look at anyone else’s standpoint but your own. Am I guilty of that same narrow mindedness? Probably. But at least I admit it.

Re your point about Politics degrees. Yes I completed one. I studied EU politics as a part of a wider Politics degree. I understood the intricacies of how the EU works. How it has evolved and where it was hoping to go. I don’t agree with it economically nor politically. Does that make me uneducated because I form a different (informed) opinion? What a perverse view to take. Someone who has actually studied a topic is therefore to be critiqued as if they are a dunce. That viewpoint says everything you need to know about Remainers. They actually claim to know more about a topic that someone else has studied to a degree level. Truly worrying and evidence of breathtaking arrogance.

Not unreasonable to be relieved that there is SOMETHING. But you are very wrong if you think this is more beneficial to the UK than were in 2016: that is the only relevanr comparison... does this make it better or worse for us than previous arrangements?

The answer is worse. Much worse.

The confidence that some people have in the face or a chash critciis.

Sorry, but where have I claimed that “Brexit has failed”?

But then again, you do seem to have some comprehension issues.

Have you considered an MBA or MIM? It might help you appreciate the wider picture.