Are you afraid? Brexit.

[Puddelchen]

I feel very uneasy about what the future holds for us after Brexit but am I just overreacting? Can it really be so terrible? Why is no one around me talking about this in real life, you would think it would be a hot topic.

Sounds like Armageddon.

But why should anyone be worried about that really. It will all be fine. (I doubt it).

Reallyshouldgetup that’s the horrifying thing , we are putting ourselves through all of this just to be ‘ better than most of the rest of the world’ . So as long as we are better than a third world country we should be happy . In what way is that an improvement on what we had in 2016?

This thread is going to have such comedy value come March.

I'm not "afraid" personally (as I live in the EU) but why would anyone with an ounce of compassion find it amusing that government policy was causing people anxiety?

People are reacting rationally to what the government is doing and saying. The government is preparing for no deal, or at the very least it is spending billions of pounds of taxpayers money pretending to prepare. If you're not worried you're not paying attention.

If it turns out that the government was just kidding then any scorn should be directed at government ministers, not at the people posting on this thread.

Glad you think it's fucking funny @Kikipost . Nobody else does.

Perhaps you'd be compassionate enough Kiki to take 15 minutes to read the following link. It has some ( not all) examples of the effect that Brexit has already had.

Then yes please do reassure me, the frightened and worried people on this thread about which examples they should be finding amusing ?

Examples include:

“Oxford University Hospitals, which had the highest proportion of EU nurses of any trust outside London, has seen a dramatic exodus of EU staff. In the past year, of 133 departures, 108 were EU nationals. It currently has 450 nursing vacancies.”

“The annual cost to the NHS of securing all necessary visas and other documentation for its overseas staff post-Brexit (i.e. under the new immigration regime) is estimated at £490 million. “

But I'd like some specific reassurances on all 140 things on this link.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1081836120617439233.html?fbclid=IwAR2dRtKXyPcu7B2KRLSmpit2ZliKWs5xTr9vUUMqapjtSyey3ZIOLw234

Friends only talk about it if I bring it up, and most say they don't read the news and haven't been following brexit.

One asked if No Deal means that we stay in the EU.

I have gained citizenship of another EU country and we are moving some of our savings into EU savings accounts and a bank in an EU country.

If No Deal seems likely we will go abroad in march and return when/ if things settle down (we can work remotely). I just don't want to be here for no deal disruption.

I think there will be food but it will be much less choice and more expensive, and more remote areas will face more severe shortages.

"One asked if No Deal means that we stay in the EU."

Am I allowed to call that friend stupid?

Honestly
Come back here in March
And you will either smile or curl or toes at the hyperbole and OTT predictions

Whether you’re a Leaver or a Remainer or a still-not-really-sure-er, if you are worried that the country is not in the best economic or social position to leave the EU on 29 March 2019 - write to your MP and tell them!

WE NEED TO REVOKE ARTICLE 50

I’ve drafted a letter you can copy and paste, click on the google drive link below or c&p from this thread!

Thank you so much xxx

docs.google.com/document/d/1g2qkZcTi72cILbx1BmmQnY74dCRMCsa66n01j1c1QXw/edit?usp=sharing

Thanks @Kikipost your word is so reassuring

Letter text here:

(Your name)

(Your address)

(Date)

(Name of your MP)
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA

Dear (MP),

DEPARTURE OF THE UNITED KINGDOM FROM THE EUROPEAN UNION ON 29 MARCH 2019

I am writing to you to invite you to petition the Government to revoke, with immediate effect, the UK’s Article 50 notice to leave the EU on 29 March 2019.

I make this request with no agenda other than a deep concern that there has not been sufficient time to allow for a complete negotiation of the terms of the country’s departure or to prepare for the practical effects. For example, it is widely predicted that even with a withdrawal agreement in place, a departure on 29 March this year will lead to severe delays in the import and export of goods at our cross-channel ports, and of the timely and reliable distribution of time-sensitive medical products across borders, because there hasn’t been enough time to make the necessary preparations. Further, there is no technical solution available to manage a customs border between the EU and the UK on the island of Ireland, or the control of movement of people across that border that does not offend the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.

I am extremely concerned that the prospects of a chaotic, rushed departure from the EU this March will cause significant social and economic instability in this country and abroad. Even more so if a ‘no deal’ Brexit occurs. The risk of severe and long-term social and economic disruption to the UK, when the ‘benefits’ appear at this date, so intangible is, in my view unacceptable.

Sir John Major recently made a speech on this subject*, and I find myself agreeing with him wholeheartedly:

“…We need to calm the markets. We need to protect the economic wellbeing of the British people. We need to protect our national interest. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that - to do so - we need to revoke Article 50 with immediate effect. The clock must be stopped. It is clear we need the most precious commodity of all: time…”

I anticipate that you support the Government’s position that it has received a firm mandate from the UK electorate to take steps to leave the EU. However, I would argue that such a mandate did not require the Government to ensure the ‘divorce’ took place on 29 March of this year. If it is not in the best interests of this country to leave the EU on that date, we must not.

The European Court of Justice has confirmed that the Article 50 notice can be revoked by the UK Government, without a parliamentary vote**. It would, of course, be possible to trigger Article 50 again in the future, once the current obstacles have been overcome, if the Government so chooses.

I hope that you will be able to take time to consider the points I have raised in this letter and I look forward to receiving your response in early course.

Yours sincerely,

(Your name here)

• Extract from Sir John Major’s speech to the Institute of International and European Affairs in Dublin, made 11 December 2018 ** Case C/621/18 Wightman and ors v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union

This thread is going to have such comedy value come March.

You know what? I shall be delighted if it does. And if it does then our cash will go back into the bank, the diesel will be used in the cars, the DC will grow into their next lot of clothes/coats/shoes (which I have already bought), we will use up the washing powder and household items and we shall gradually eat the food we have stored. The only thing "extra" we will have bought over and above normal expenditure is a second freezer. That's fine and it will be used. Everything else has just been purchased in advance.

Unfortunately there is a risk that the joke will actually be on those sneering and poking fun. Quite why they feel the need to do that when actually the sneering goes in the face of all current information, I'm not really sure but I'm sure it gives some sort of misguided sense of superiority

If you want to take the risk then take the risk. I suspect its the same mentality as those fuckwits who think they don't need house insurance because their house could never burn down...

Nothing would make me happier to come back and say I was wrong. Seriously, I'd love egg on my face over my concerns.
But if you are wrong @Kikipost , we are all fucked.

Out of curiosity, any of those deeply concerned studied history at degree level and beyond.

Genuine question. I did. And amongst my peers from 17 years ago... we share a similar stance ie this will blow over, and there will absolutely not be a housing crash / food shortages etc etc in any scenario.

As I say, genuine question

Genuine answer. My dh has an MPhil in history. History was part of my degree too.

I can’t believe you are asking Kiki.

You really think remainers anxious of what lies ahead don’t know their history?

Fuck me, unbelievable....

Out of curiosity, any of those deeply concerned studied history at degree level and beyond.

Masters in economics plus qualified and practising lawyer. Speaking to people everyday who are making plans to downsize and streamline their businesses to try desperately to protect them. So perhaps slightly more relevant than your history degree..

As I say, we shall see
But I think this thread will be of comedy value

Not long to wait....

we share a similar stance ie this will blow over

I find it remarkable that you are a history grad. You must have studied countless episodes where it didn’t ‘blow over’, you definitely would have encountered prosperous societies that crumbled. You would have looked at racism, and scapegoating and movements of people. Yet none of that went in?

And you will either smile or curl or toes at the hyperbole and OTT predictions

@Kikipost
Predictions based on government policy, government publications (I guess you missed this?: researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-8397/CBP-8397.pdf) and government actions.

It's rational to be worried (it's also rational not to be worried, btw, if you don't follow politics). If things work out OK and in April we are all able to look back and smile, it will be because the event that the government spent billions of taxpayers money preparing for didn't happen. In which case, I hope you will save your sneers and your toe curls for the government ministers that flushed your tax money down the toilet.

Anyone can claim to be a history graduate.

History MA here . The thing is for me it’s not about what happens in the first 3 months or 6 months it’s about what happens over the next two or three decades. Yes we will ldo earn to adapt to the new reality and in that sense the crisis will blow over. But we will have taken a turn which will make ourselves and our children poorer , even the leavers agree on that

I'm worried. I try not to be, but I am.

It's the old risk analysis matrix thing - you assess the likelihood of the risk occurring and the potential impact, and take mitigating action accordingly. We may not know the likelihood, but we know that the worst possible impact is very serious indeed. And yet it seems that our politicians have no interest in taking any mitigating action. That's what is so scary - the people who could actually do something don't seem to have any interest in doing so, and the rest of us are being hauled along for the ride, like it or not. I feel completely disenfranchised from this process. I should email my MP I suppose, but it would feel like screaming into the void.

Yes, I studied history as part of my degree - also a former Whitehall civil servant and lobbyist. And I'm worried. I've seen for myself how politicians are as likely as anyone else to get it wrong!

You must have studied countless episodes where it didn’t ‘blow over’, you definitely would have encountered prosperous societies that crumbled.

There's plenty of scholarship looking at societal collapse (some, like Jared Diamond's Collapse, is quite accessible to non-historians). I can't claim to have any wider historical expertise, and actually I don't think that we are at the point of major societal upheaval quite yet (mainly because I think the WA will pass) - but the idea that major societal dislocations can't happen because "history" is really strange, especially coming from a historian.