'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
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'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
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Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#2Before anyone gets too excited, this is from 2025. It's a statement from a Mayor of Manchester trying to raise his political profile, not a statement from a prime minister who needs to set a concrete agenda. It was before he was forced to run in a pro-Brexit riding to get into parliament, and thus made a bunch of soft commitments to not broach the issue.
Highly misleading to post this without at least a [2025] tag, but I'd say it's misleading to post it to a news forum at all without significantly more context in the title.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#3Yes it was. Maybe not too late to fix it, and I hope they do.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#4Man, if only some sitting politicians would take up the call.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#5In a funny way, it seems that Brexit had a net positive effect for the EU.
I remember that prior to it, there were quite a few other anti-EU movements in France, Italy, Greece and other countries. It seems that, after the Brexit disaster, they all receded. Even Hungary and Poland got rid of their anti-EU governments.
The EU is stronger because of Brexit, not weaker.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#6Before anyone gets too excited, this is from 2025. It's a statement from a Mayor of Manchester trying to raise his political profile, not a statement from a prime minister who needs to set a concrete agenda. It was before he was forced to run in a pro-Brexit riding to get into parliament, and thus made a bunch of soft commitments to not broach the issue. Highly misleading to post this without at least a [2025] tag, b…
Indeed. Even in that speech he contextualises it as a long-term goal.
Plus, what he thinks and what is possible are different things, and he absolutely knows it.
We will, I believe, not rejoin the EU while it is in its current form, because leaving closed us off to the bespoke deal we had before; that deal mattered and was the thing that made our relationship with the EU functional.
We will now suffer as a result of the hubris of idiots for generations; it's unavoidable, and it compounds almost every problem we have.
There is, however, reason not to talk a lot about rejoining for the next two years, because two of our biggest economic threats are Hormuz and Trump; the former can only be addressed as part of a global coalition now, and the latter can only be addressed by playing directly to his narcissism with royal visits and very bespoke strategy. Trump plays the EU by trying to divide it anyway.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#7The UK left the EU to control their borders, and the number of irregular arrivals, increased sharply after Brexit. Think about that for a while...
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#8In a funny way, it seems that Brexit had a net positive effect for the EU. I remember that prior to it, there were quite a few other anti-EU movements in France, Italy, Greece and other countries. It seems that, after the Brexit disaster, they all receded. Even Hungary and Poland got rid of their anti-EU governments. The EU is stronger because of Brexit, not weaker.
Indeed.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#9Yes it was. Maybe not too late to fix it, and I hope they do.
It won't happen. I was against Brexit, but now that it's happened it's better that the UK stays on the outside.
The mood in the EU is that after Hungary, we don't need Eurosceptic nations polluting the Union from the inside. There'd have to be a groundswell movement far larger than the original Brexit movement, and I simply don't see that happening.
The fundamental issues of why Brexit happened have to be addressed first, and the British people simply don't want that.
Examples: 'We get our special deals back'. That was negotiated from inside the EU, with the leverage to leave or abuse the veto they held. That leverage is gone.
'We won't join the Euro'. That was a special opt out, also negotiated from inside the EU.
Of course Britain wants to have its cake and eat it. We all do, but it's about leverage, and the UK has exhausted its leverage. Better that the EU and UK remain close allies but forge different paths. It's clear the UK doesn't want to pay the cost of EU membership.
It doesn't really matter what the bulk of British people think they want if the elites can spend a few million turning swing voters against their own interests, and that's fundamentally what needs to be addressed.
Re: 'I want to rejoin the EU Brexit has been a disaster' – Andy Burnham
#10The UK left the EU to control their borders, and the number of irregular arrivals, increased sharply after Brexit. Think about that for a while...
It happened because we left border treaties that meant that continental EU states were obliged to prevent onward travel to us.
Once we stepped out of that, we needed to find new incentives for France and Belgium to care. We have failed to do so and we had destroyed many agreement frameworks within which any such deal could be struck.