Brexit mega thread part 10 : what's the (s)tory? Incompetence, tax evasion, dodgy loans and economic free fall...nothing to see here...check out those sunlit uploands!

[Chevyimpala67]

Part 10 of our long running thread.
I'm still putting my money on a spring GE.
The tory slash and burn of the UK is right on track.
Bon chance my friends!

Ofcourse some people have seen benefits of Brexit, nobody is disputing that, however one swallow does not make a summer

https://twitter.com/acgrayling/status/1654007554500853765

86% of young people want to #Rejoin the EU.

And yet Keir Starmer is still repeating Labour's policy of not rejoining the EU and not joining the single market or the customs union.

Yes, and I think he is wrong in doing so but he is not saying that Brexit is a success is he?

>And yet Keir Starmer is still repeating Labour's policy of not rejoining the EU and not joining the single market or the customs union.

Of course he is.

• put your brain in gear and think what the tories/right wing media would do if he even hinted at rejoin,

as it is the 'closer engagement' policy is about as far as he can go.

The Tories already jump up with a deflecting 'no-one wants to see a rerun of....' at the slightest opportunity.

He's saying Labour can make Brexit work.

Indeed "Make Brexit Work" with caps is the slogan on the Labour Party website.

The five steps in the Labour party plan are

• sort out the Northern Ireland Protocol
• tear down unnecessary barriers - extend [a] new veterinary agreement to cover all the UK, seeking to build on agreements and mechanisms already in place between the EU and other countries
• support Britain’s world-leading industries
• ensure we keep Britain safe
• invest in Britain

This last point will involve working "hand-in-hand with business to bring the good, clean jobs of the future to our shores, harnessing the power of government, alongside the ingenuity of our brilliant private sector". Which, given the sums the US and the EU will spending on subsidising their green industrial plans, and their determination to onshore jobs in tandem, will be expensive and difficult. Y'know, with us being outside those blocs

I don't think there is any point in even hinting at rejoin/closer relationship with the EU for the next decade sadly. It would still be electoral suicide and there are plenty of other issues the Tories are currently stuffing up that need sorting.

So as far as Brexit is concerned, whoever wins the next general election we're stuck with the downsides.

Also, I'm liking Labour's "New Deal for Working People" https://labour.org.uk/page/a-new-deal-for-working-people/. But I'm struggling to see it succeeding in bringing in all the things it lists while still relying so heavily in its industrial and economic strategies on "our brilliant private sector", which may very well have somewhat different views on them.

I will be dead long before the chance to rejoin happens. My children too old to care. And it's a chance that the UK is intentionally and cynically making harder by the day with it's sum total of behaviour. The EU peers of the 86% in that survey will simply grow up learning there is no place for the UK in the EU, and that is that.

It's a shame. A criminal shame too.

I think with everything that’s coming around AI there will be so much vastly accelerated change economically and socially over the next decade, compared to what we have seen before, and such widening socio economic divides that there will be a growing understanding that the UK really can’t not rejoin. We are so much more economically vulnerable without being in the EU... and for what alternative gain?

It makes me so sad. My son moved to Finland just in time (DIL is Finnish). He is studying at Uni with no fees, his course is in English but he is learning Finnish as part of it. Not only is his rent is lower than they were paying in a Midlands city for a smaller flat but it includes their heating and broadband (building wide systems) and he can rent an electric vehicle from the housing association for periods as short as 2 hours for 20 euros for those occasions when the excellent public transport doesn't suit (like trips to IKEA or the vet). He has security of tenure in the flat for his whole course plus up to 12 months afterwards. He has publicly maintained cross country skiing (free), lake swimming (free) and choice of publicly maintained ice skating (free) within 15 minutes walk of his flat. And now other people won't have that opportunity.

That sounds like my dream @countrygirl99 I'd loved to have done that, or for my kids to have had the chance to do the same. I'm still so angry and sad that so many people decided it was a good idea to give this all up.

It is awful. I hope young people realise that there are still some options for studying abroad cheaply. For instance, universities in Germany are close to free for all international students.

But presumably there are now visa requi😔

...requirements

There are undergraduate courses taught in English at some public universities in Germany. Not many students from the UK could study at university level in German. Also I think you bneed CCC or better at A level.

You need about 900 - 1,000 euros a month to scrape by as living costs - more if you're in an expensive city like Munich. On a student visa you can work 20 hours a week, I believe, so at minimum wage, if you could get a job and if the hours fitted around your course, you could just about do it in a less expensive city. That's a lot of ifs.

Studying in Germany is do-able if you move away from the mindset that everything is available in English and do what young people in other countries quite often do - work hard and make some sacrifices to learn a foreign language to a fairly high level so that you can study abroad. If you reach B1 (lower intermediate) level you can do a German language course at a German university to prepare you for the German exam. There are other requirements though. If you do a degree in Germany you then have the right to stay on, potentially permanently.

It's do-able but with a lot more barriers, especially financially.

I think that only German students from poorer households get financial assistance towards maintenance. So for people from middle income families I don't think there will be much difference there. There are some additional costs to do with health insurance for instance. Most international students will be self-funded / will work part-time. Many German students also work part-time.

I think that the situation is similar in France and Switzerland. Yes, you have to pay your living costs, but then you always did. EU students have to as well.

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/eu-joint-gas-buying-scheme-attracts-demand-65-firms-2023-05-04/

You now have to pay visa costs, health insurance and a financial deposit as well as living costs.

Yeay, we stopped FoM and made things more difficult

https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/following-proposed-overhaul-eu-pharma-legislation-19-member-states-push-adoption-critical

EU countries lay out framework for combating drug shortages

Let's encourage our young people to make use of the options they still have. Constant doom and gloom isn't helpful to them. I know some Asian families who are making enormous sacrifices so that their child can study abroad.

But let us also never forget who it was that made things so much harder for our young people to study and work abroad and let us always hold them to account.