To think no one can name a single positive benefit of Brexit

[measuringmylifeincoffeespoons]

Just that really. I'm genuinely curious. There seems to be increasing coverage and evidence of the harm and cost of Brexit. Can anyone point to a positive benefit?

@WatchoRulo it's a good thing that we do live in a democracy and that we have freedom of speech. It was David Davis (oh, irony) who said that a democracy isn't a democracy if it isn't allowed to change its mind. And being told to shut up about the consequences of a really bad decision which is now playing out exactly as predicted - well, that isn't freedom of speech, is it?

As far as I'm concerned there's nothing wrong with asking 'and how is that working out for you then?'

@Mirabai
A choice made by people who had no grasp of the consequences.

Oh* *😴here we go again with the tired old trope about Brexiteers being stupid and 'not knowing what they were voting for'.

After all these years I thought the Remoaners Remainers could come up with something better.🙄

Unfortunately it’s the truth. Imagine how boring it is for the rest of us.

@OldMotherHubbardsCat what more did you want? The economic data is there for everyone to see. You can stick your head in the sand and pretend that Brexit has made life better, but you'd be an ostrich. All you're doing is castigating those of us who didn't vote for the giant shitshow for not BeLeaving enough and that is pathetic.

@@pointythings what more did you want?

I'd like all the Remoaners Remainers to stfu and stop banging on about something that happened 6 years ago that's a done deal.

@Mirabai the “system” I was referring to was democracy. Why would I need to “blush”?

Both sides lied and reduced complicated economic and political issues to soundbites. It happens regularly in general elections too,

@OldMotherHubbardsCat right, so we're not allowed to complain about the consequences of your voting choices, even though we're suffering them along with you. Got you. No freedom of speech because we have to appease the Brexiters' poor little offended sensibilities.

No. Not happening. You wanted this, own it.

@WatchoRulo in what sense did the Remain campaign lie? So far, Project Fear has turned out to be Project Reality. We had a long transition period buffering us, but once that ended, the shit hit the fan.

"knowing what you are voting for/against" is very hard to pin down, due to events, and people's biases will always led them to a "I told you this would happen" conclusion that fits their own agenda.
Martin Lewis was particularly sound on the referendum at the time - when people continually asked him for more detailed predictions about what the results of voting either way would be he responded by saying it wasn't possible to tell. Similarly - when the Thatcher apologists tell me the country would be in an awful mess but for her, my response is that we can't see that version (the non-Thatcher) version of history because it didn't happen.

I don’t see the point in attacking any voters but on continuing to express dissatisfaction etc I’d say yes but MPs a better bet though.

Although the opportunity to get it in a party’s manifesto has passed. Starmer (realistically the only would who could) has made position clear.

5 to 7 years for another chance and we could be in a different place, in this climate it’s a long time.

We haven't got a trade deal with the US. The Australia one is shit by one of a previous governments admission. Exports to Japan slumped after the trade deal and the Indian Deal hasn't happened yet after Bravermann insulted them and is expected to benefit them much more than us.

And why would you want to swap a market on your doorstop for one further away where you have to make pretty similar or worse concessions?

*previous government ministers admission

Gosh. That's intelligent debate.

George Osbourne said there would be an emergency budget and immediate tax rises - 2p rise on the basic rate of income tax and a 3p in the higher rate, as well as raising inheritance tax by 5p , as soon as we voted to leave (if we did).

David Cameron said he would stay on and lead in the case of a leave vote.

There are other examples - I want to make it clear - lies were told on both sides and that fact doesn't mean I regard one side's lies as virtuous and the others evil. It's a fact of how things happened, and in fact in my experience of UK elections, many (not all) politicians tell lies, make promises they can't keep and make outrageous claims.

FWIW I think this whole fiasco (Brexit) just proves we need proportional representation. If we'd had PR, a few UKIP MPs would probably have been elected and shown themselves to be useless (as happened in some local councils). Cameron wouldn't have been scared of UKIP and we wouldn't have had the referendum. As a result of FPTP, EU-sceptic MPs and party members have existed in all parties (the Lib Dem conversion to full on EU support is quite recent actually).

Make me.

FWIW I think this whole fiasco (Brexit) just proves we need proportional representation.

Current promised by the Reform Party. Certainly looking at voting for them now. Sorry if that upsets any Tories.

Mind you Labour may just be onto something abolishing the House of Lords...

Of course that's assuming we aren't overrun by the Russians the nurses are smuggling into the country inside the trains that the strikers have used to steal Christmas,

(It's entirely possible I may have reached a fatigue point with the main stream media ...)

Current promised by the Reform Party. Certainly looking at voting for them now. Sorry if that upsets any Tories.

Not sure Tories would be upset if a voter that would probably vote Labour switches to Reform.

Oh dear, Brexit was 18 months ago not 6 years ago.

No-one dispute it’s a “done deal” the issue is that it’s an ongoing disastrous one.

If you didn’t want the country discussing what a bad decision you made, and the multitudinous ways it has damaged this country, then you need to rethink your vote.

@forwhatitsworth22

Did you ever buy an Iphone prior to 2020 (when we left EU) a Samsung, a Japanese manufactured TV, a Makita power tool or a Specialized bicycle (US brand)?

Could no one in the US Japan India or Australia buy a Roll Royce, a RR jet engine, a Jaguar car, bank with Barclays, buy insurance from Lloyd's worldwide, only EU countries could ever buy UK produced defence equipment!!!

Germany sold 3x as much to China as the UK ever did, Germany of course could only do this because it left the EU in 2004 - eh?

Its quite unbelievable that people have so little knowledge of world trade and the EU.

Osborne was fired. Cameron legged it - he knew what a disaster it would be and cba.

The implication that lies told by Remain were in any way commensurate with the lies told by Leave is - a lie.

The Leave campaign was lies on an industrial scale never before seen in politics in my lifetime.

OK, well I should have known better than to answer that question earnestly.
I will leave you to it - only "Leave was evil" is an acceptable view - I get it, you don't want to debate, just reinforce your own (totally correct) view and everyone else's is invalid.

Lets face it, EU membership was way above 99.99% of voters ability to make a genuine choice.

Both sides voted on ignorance - who can honestly say they knew about the WTO/Tariffs, Eurotom, Horizon, the differences between ECJ and ECHR, qualifications equivalence?

It was a cowardly decision to give us a vote.

You expected Martin Lewis to do the work of the OBR?! 😂

The impact was predicted accurately on trade, on the economy, on NI. If you didn’t bother to read up on it that’s on you.