To feel extremely depressed about how Brexit is limiting the lives we once knew.

[Persiantrio]

Presumably now, if you want to go shopping in Paris on the Eurostar, you will have to declare, queue and pay customs on any clothes / goods over a given amount at the border. How crap and inconvenient is that?

Same with any holiday purchases from anywhere in the EU? Not worth it.

Also if you order anything online that happens to come from the EU and costs over over £135, you get hit with massive customs charges of about 40%. Companies like Etsy etc are taking a massive hit as a result.

How is this “taking back control?” Its so depressing and backward. The only reason nobody is kicking off about this yet is because nobody could go anywhere anyway. People don’t realise the freedoms they had and that are now gone. What a shit and insular place to live this will be.

And I don’t wait to hear any predictable ‘vaccine nationalism’ waffle either (because that has nothing whatsoever to do with what I’m asking in this instance and we could have done exactly the same within the EU anyway).

@Wearywithteens

‘Limiting the lives we once knew’?

Shopping in Paris? Is this a joke?

How do you spend your weekends?

Miljea what an unpleasant and condescending post

If you're wealthy enough to pop to Paris for diamonds how do you cope travelling out of the EU to places like the US which require form filling? Unless you have a criminal record, it's hardly difficult (although I accept that the travel time doesn't make it a weekend trip)

@Miljea good post.

Yea, apparently art from Russia and Murano glass vases are heavily hit too.

Add that to clothes from Paris and I have no idea how we will survive at all.

I agree OP, it’s made life just that bit more shit when it didn’t need to be.

My best friend lives in portugal - I used to send her an Easter egg every year because when you’re doing a long distance friendship things like that matter. This year though I can’t - the Place I usually order them from won’t deliver to the EU atm & I can’t post one because customs regulations means you can’t send chocolate through the post. So no Easter egg

It’s not a huge deal in the great scheme of tnings, it’s just a bit sad & shit and all for no benefit whatsoever

I agree with you OP, my nephew has had his study options curtailed by no longer being able to access a specialised course in a EU university, one of my U.K. friends has lost her job due to exports collapsing, another friend was let go from her job due to the drop in overseas student numbers, I’ve had to find a non U.K. supplier for some components I’ve been buying for my company for the last 7 years (I am in the EU), the account team who I’ve remained in touch with have told me that they’ve lost a large chunk of repeat orders due to deliveries taking a lot longer and costing more and will probably need to lay off people.

And if the OP had posted this, nobody would have laughed at her.

@NoIDontWatchLoveIsland

I think OP you are missing the point. Millions of people in the UK are not affluent enough to experience much of the freedom/travel/shopping opportunities. They live in communities where being part of the EU has only brought a massive oversupply of labour and as a result, local labour markets have been undercut on wages by people willing to work a few years & live in overcrowded or poor conditions because they can take their earnings home and get a lot more for them in a cheaper European country.

Like a lot of globalisation, the better off tend to reap many of the rewards but there ARE downsides and they can be concentrated in poorer communities.

I voted against brexit but I can understand why in some parts of the country they really could not see much benefit accruing in their own communities.

But that wasn't the fault of the EU (which I understand that you know!).

It was the fault of successive right wing governments turning a blind eye to wage under-cutting, atrocious worker-housing, benefit paying to allow wealthy Tory-doner mates to get rich and stay rich.

Many of the voters had never voted in their lives, certainly to oust that right wing government.

But they allowed themselves to be spectacularly manipulated into believing it was the fault of the EU. Not their own (democratic) apathy.

It has been argued Remain should have fought harder. Apart from being the status quo (which is always a far harder position to get inflamed from); so many of us thought the benefits of EU membership were so evident they didn't need spelling out- and besides which, until this past fortnight, we didn't do the flag waving you see over much of Europe, the EU flag, pointing out where EU money has been spent.

We'd reckoned without Cummings.

Yes OP I live a small unimaginative life and I want you to have one too. Why not stay in England where they don't eat weird food or speak funny. Why would you want to buy anything that wasn't from M&S or home bargains anyway. I don't know anyone who likes snails for lunch so I don't know why you should want them.

I was never in favour of Brexit. I am still not in favour. But I am getting fed up of pointless threads rehearsing whether you were in favour or not, and whether it was a good idea or not. It's done. End of story. And honestly, most of them are missing the point. There has always been customs for the world. As part of the EU we didn't have internal customs, but we had them for everywhere else, so what's the problem. And honestly, when travelling there is little "pointless form filling and bureaucracy" because most people lie through their teeth if they are over the limit and go through he nothing to declare channels anyway.

Yes it’s shit. Those getting stuck on the ‘shopping in Paris’ bit are missing the point. I grew up in an EU country. My parents moved there from the UK when I was a young child, pre EU, it was difficult but not as difficult as it is to move now. Also I know of many many people sending parcels to loved ones in the EU that are getting stopped at customs and charged. Little things, cheap things too. It’s not a big deal to many ar the moment because we are not going anywhere but it will be much more of a pain to move abroad.

It's really not common to buy pieces on holidays such as jewellery eg diamonds in Amsterdam.

When I was a student, two friends who had just got engaged did exactly that. They could get more for their money and have a unique reminder of their engagement.

As for Johnson babbling on about Global Britain - his maps seem to be missing big chunks of the adjacent continent.

@ThePlantsitter

Yes OP I live a small unimaginative life and I want you to have one too. Why not stay in England where they don't eat weird food or speak funny. Why would you want to buy anything that wasn't from M&S or home bargains anyway. I don't know anyone who likes snails for lunch so I don't know why you should want them.

Yes, all those of us who dont regularly pop to Paris to shop and to Amsterdam to buy diamonds live "small and unimaginative lives".

Christ almighty. I voted remain, and I'm cringing for some of the people on this thread. Can you not hear yourselves?

The ridiculous thing is that having lost all the freedoms that we enjoyed (for our children to study abroad, for ourselves to retire abroad, for those of us who so wish to go shopping in Paris etc) the very thing that the Brexit voters hoped to stop - immigration - appears to just be coming from outside Europe now anyway. I work in admissions, in a large secondary school. Each year, for the last 3 or 4 years, the numbers of EAL children from European countries has been dwindling. But, they are being replaced by children whose home languages are Russian, Hindi, Swahili, Mandarin, Tagalog.... Same numbers of EAL children, just different origins. Personally I'm glad. Nothing more boring than a monoculture, so thank God we still appear to be getting some diversity to make up for everything else we've lost.

One or two people have mentioned food banks as places where there is perceived to be genuine hardship.

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the political party that gave us Brexit the same one that made food banks such 'a thing'.

When I went to sign onto Universal Credit, I was asked some questions about why and I told the interviewer I had experienced domestic violence. She gave me a leaflet for a local women's support group of some kind. I noticed it received funding from the EU. I wonder how much funding it will have lost now and how many similar places have lost funding.

I agree with the sentiment, although the examples are crap. I will miss the EU for the cultural diversity and interplay. There are bigger issues than shopping in Paris coming our way. I liked this Guardian article about it www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/30/biden-tariffs-brexit-britain-eu-big-tech and this bit particularly - “ So EU membership offered Britain much more than merely preferential trading arrangements. It was also a means by which democratically elected governments could confront the power of multinational corporations, acting in the interests of their citizens and in the pursuit of economic justice.”

Although I can't say I've ever just nipped to Paris for a shopping spree, I do agree.
Most of the post who voted leave probably had no idea what it would entail. Alot are probably just racists who assumed it would mean any foreigners would be sent home.
Can also thank all the dickheads who voted Tory

It’s vat + customs on everything you order from the Eu now. I don’t know about you but I have rarely, if ever ordered from the US because the costs are prohibitive.

It’s now the same exact situation for everything (ok apparel, I haven’t looked up the tariffs for everything yet) we buy from the EU.

@ColourMeExhausted

I agree OP. The only reason people aren't more outraged or don't fully comprehend the impact is because of the pandemic. Once travel opens up again there'll be a lot of whinging, and I bet most of it will be done by the idiots who voted for it (who've probably forgotten they did as it was that long ago). I'm over my initial rage and fury, it felt pointless, but I'm sad and depressed about how life has been made even more limited and difficult on top of the pandemic restrictions.

👏🏽 They sure would complain then.

@somethingonthecarpet

The ridiculous thing is that having lost all the freedoms that we enjoyed (for our children to study abroad, for ourselves to retire abroad, for those of us who so wish to go shopping in Paris etc) the very thing that the Brexit voters hoped to stop - immigration - appears to just be coming from outside Europe now anyway. I work in admissions, in a large secondary school. Each year, for the last 3 or 4 years, the numbers of EAL children from European countries has been dwindling. But, they are being replaced by children whose home languages are Russian, Hindi, Swahili, Mandarin, Tagalog.... Same numbers of EAL children, just different origins. Personally I'm glad. Nothing more boring than a monoculture, so thank God we still appear to be getting some diversity to make up for everything else we've lost.

How could Brexit have prevented immigration from outside the EU?

people not post

Wtf? I literally know no-one who has popped to Paris for shopping. For a holiday, yes, but to shop?!

I never said to shop, just to go to Paris. I know lots of people who did, I don't know if they shopped, but I think it was mostly to just sightsee and stuff. I certainly did. I never went to the designer shops there, but then I never do that here either. You could even go for just a day and on Eurostar it wasn't that expensive on a day return. No idea what the prices are now, but it was dead cheap, cheaper than even going somewhere in Britain.

And to those of you who say you don’t care, because you’d never go to Paris on the Eurostar to shop, please spa free a thought for the U.K. businesses who import or sell to the EU. What do you think has happened to their bottom line???

If you'd just gone on a bit of a shopping spree you wouldn't declare at customs in reality though would you. Diamond ring would be worn, handbag would be used, cosmetics unboxed and in cosmetics bag, clothes would have tags off and be packed in suitcase. Its not as if you're going to stand dutifully in line to declare your eifell tower keyring and dior sunglasses

@Persiantrio
*“If you don’t like it, move to Europe then”

^ Exhibit A - Brexiteer 2021.*

Quoting me, but did I vote for Brexit, or just come to the realisation that actually, whilst a remainer, Brexit has proved to be right? I think the EU handling on vaccination and threats about blocking vaccines has shown the whole world how insular they actually are.

I am old enough to remember before the EU and surprisingly we had holidays abroad in Europe with no issues what so ever

But as in many posts on here as soon as anyone says anything that’s not liked they are a Brexiteer, even if in fact they voted remain