“Everybody thought the EU was about people coming into the country … no-one told of us the benefits”.

[MrsMurphyIWish]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cm2136jnjx1o

And the response to this very now deprived community is to vote Reform.

“Brexit has removed a key source of funding, which the area desperately needs. County Durham received £154m of EU funding between 2014 and 2020, about £22m a year. Since the UK left the European Union, it receives about half that amount, £12m annually, under the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.”

The story is sad (and typical of deprived areas - I know, I live in one). Towns feeling forgotten and never recovering from closed industry but why can they not see history will repeat itself?

He didn’t argue passionately enough for Remaining though for fear of alienating his party. We are in this situation because Cameron put party ahead of country. And Corbyn was an absolute disgrace.

I haven't mentioned any "extra money".

"We might have had more of we hadn't had "Brexit" isn't the point.

If poorer areas are getting less after leaving the EU it is simply because our goverment has other priorities for spending what money we have than the EU had.

Why do you think migrants didn't cross the channel in boats pre 2020?

Because they were hiding in lorries or hanging underneath trains snd coming through the tunnel for one thing. That route was made more difficult so they found an alternative that was harder to police.

My point yesterday about the 1975 leaflets was if you think you've got a strong case, you're not threatened by discussion of counter points. And in 1975 it came out 2:1 remain:leave (albeit overall not a majority if voters who didn't participate are included - just like in 2016).

Looked up what my Eu mp was doing in the EU Gov just before polling day (of course I didn’t even know who they were like most people) they were a group of snp having meetings one a day about meetings - none of which ended with a decision just a meeting - paid for and their accomm and flights and good pay generously funded by my tax - for nothing as far as I could see -oh and I was also funding MPs in London and MSPs in Scotland and the House of Lords -and all that growing numbers generous pensions -and I’m in a deprive area still going slowly down hill. Why would I vote for them it would be silly -we already have too much government.

Simply not true, lorry numbers peaked in 2002, at around 25,000 pa, due to agreements reached with the French ie UK border control in France and the wider EU, this is also when hi tech was bought in, making, as you say, a lot harder to do.

So for some 18 years, migrants and traffickers never thought to use the channel?

The truth is, once we left the EU and rights to return migrants, we became easy pickings, coupled with the French doubtless having no real reason to stop.

Don't you think its rather odd that the rapid increase in x ch boats coincided with the UK officially leaving the EU in 2020 ?

The Dublin agreement is always trumpeted in these discussions.

According to wiki it wasn't that helpful. One of several issues mentioned:

• Low Transfer Rates: For the UK, only about 7% of outgoing requests resulted in a successful transfer to another member state between 2015 and 2018.

She agreed with joining the European economic community , but she would not have agreed with joining the political union that it morphed into without any of us having any say about that.

The fact that the British public did not vote in referendums on major EU treaty amendments (such as Maastricht, Amsterdam, Nice, or Lisbon) is not to do with the EU these were ratified by Parliament in Britain. Many other european nations needed referendums to ratify them. Your statement makes it sound like your country had no say in it which is completely untrue.

This is what also got on a lot of people's nerves.

To have a referendum to stay in the EEC which most people agreed to. Yet the government behind our back went full flung into being EU which is a totally different kettle of fish, without so much as a by your leave to people of the country.

It's like going a golf club then being told you have to play tennis as well

We had several General Elections during that time period, including being able to vote for UKIP/Farage, yet no one did or very few.

Pro EU parties were given huge majorities

Why are people forgetting that Farage was a key player in Brexit? The country was misled by his falsehoods, and are repeating that mistake. I just don’t get it.

Yet pro Rwanda supporters say that just the threat of being sent to Rwanda would be good enough to stop people coming here....

The bottom line is that x channel migration only became an issue once we left the EU... not before.... wonder why? channel got narrower shallower perhaps...

But that is how your democracy is set up! You are a constitutional monarchy not a republic so if that is a big issue, maybe it is time to call for a republic where in most systems a referendum is needed to make any changes to the constitution there is no such requirement in the UK

I’m sorry, but most average citizens could not realistically be expected to fully understand the implications of such a massive and complex overhaul as Brexit. There were countless technicalities that were never clearly communicated; many people wouldn’t even think to look for them, and others simply wouldn’t understand the legal jargon involved. Given all this, I’m honestly not surprised that when people were promised the moon on a stick, they rushed to vote “out”, convinced it would magically solve their problems.

Issues of this scale, whether the UK should or shouldn’t remain in the EU, should never have been decided by a referendum. The consequences were simply too complex, too technical, and too far-reaching to be reduced to a simplistic yes-or-no question.

Recently, while buying a piece of jewellery, and a casual conversation in the shop about jewellery, stones etc. led us to mention Angola, as my husband was about to travel there for work the conversation just flowed naturally. The sales assistant then asked us where Angola was😬 And we’re supposed to believe that people with such limited awareness were equipped to make an informed decision on something of this magnitude? Sorry, but I have very little sympathy…

One reason I was pro Brexit (though didn’t assume we’d leave because I had heard no dissent - the public who dissented were never heard) was the attitude in Gov that as long as we pour money into London the rest can go hang -DC obvioyusly never felt the need to leave the capital -had he or his minions done that they would have known the unhappiness there was with the status quo —i will take the look of shock on the faces of the bbc presenters when the result was announced to my grave and chuckle - they had no clue in their London bubble.

Which general elections. Thatcher was in for the majority of the time. It's only after she went

Ukip didn't even exist until later so how anyone could vote for them is beyond me

I totally agree that leaving the EU made it harder to police.

You compare the threat of being sent back to France with being sent to Rwanda?

Rwanda hadn't even started when the Irish were complaining that it was sending our migrants into Ireland.

The Calais barrier, more and more sophisticated detection equipment, bigger and bigger penalties, the realisation by the traffickers that sending them on boats was far lower risk for the operators, all sorts of things were happening at the same time.

And by the by, now boat crossings are getting more difficult, numbers found in lorries has increased by 25% from 2023 to 2025. At least with the boats we know exactly what numbers are coming in on them. . With the lorries we don't have a clue.

Labour have done a number of good things that could and should have been done before. Precipitately cancelling the Rwanda plan before judging its actual impact was not one of them.

But they had referendum to stay in EEC. So either do have them or not. Can't have it both ways.

If you got a job and a certain amount of duties then. the employer suddenly changed the whole ball game without notifying you would you be happy?

It was quite clear from conversations I had that people didn’t want to hear and didn’t want to investigate - they found a guy they believed and that was it

trying to talk about issues and I would be rebuffed “I don’t know about that “ in a shut up and move on tone or a you are lying tone

not “ I haven’t heard about that can you tell me? “ or “ where can I find out about this “ or “I don’t think that’s a big issue “

arrogance and blind faith

This isn't true though and it's dishonest.

The benefits of the EU were widely discussed before the referendum.

It was just that certain people found the promise of less immigration and amazing trade deals more alluring.

Yes, those of us pointing out the obvious downsides at the time were accused of being part of "project fear". Take Cornwall. Over One Billion euros invested by the EU in Cornwall since 2000, and another 350 million was planned but will now not happen.
The whole thing was turkeys voting for Christmas. It's very tempting now to just say "Sod 'em - they voted for this, they can have it" but that's not going to help the next generation growing up in these areas, who need jobs and hope.
gets votes the same way Hitler did: blame someone "other" and promise that if you punish the "other" it will all be lovely again for "us". If people are desperate enough they'll buy it, which is why the other parties need to help struggling communities and be seen to do so.

What are you on about? the EU was formed in 1993, Thatcher hadn't been PM for 3 years....

We had a GE in 1992, 1997, 2001, 2005, 2010, 2015 all won by pro EU parties

UKIP founded in 1993.

But they had referendum to stay in EEC.

And to leave the EU. Neither of those referendums were a requirement and, as far as I am aware but will stand corrected, neither were binding as in the government didn't have to act on the result. Holding the referendums were decisions taken by the government of the day. In other systems referendums have to be called and are binding, it is not on the whim of a particular government.

the employer suddenly changed the whole ball game without notifying you would you be happy?
I would not be happy living in a constitutional monarchy no

Nope, all the tech was in and working by the earlier 2000s.... as was the UK border control in France & the high penalties.

By 2010, less than 9000 people tried to get into the UK via Lorry or Train.

Yet you think it took them 10 years to figure out there is a narrow bit of water to cross?
I posted on MN in 2016 that we will see a huge increase in x ch trafficking should we leave, it was blindingly obvious... poo hoo'ed by the Brexitiers, we lost all influence on the French.

Boats started the moment we left the EU.