[ritchiebaby]

Very true, jim, which makes it all the more amazing that nobody in Government nor Trade organisations seems to know about the ins and outs of the "new" EU import forms and regulations. Or did we just not bother implementing them?

[0762]

They should've talked to experienced people who previously had to fill in these time-consuming customs forms in the 1960s and early 70s!! I was one of them but thankfully did it in Leith for a brief period!!

[ritchiebaby]

My wife did so too, the old-fashioned manual way - no IT systems back then, as you well know!

[spireitematt]

We are basically being run by a hard right cadre of the tory party and you are still obsessing about EU  bureaucracy    

What can I or the electorate do? The answer is nothing. The Tories have an 80 seat majority. The Tories can pretty much do what they want with an 80 seat majority. I do think come the next election which is scheduled for 2024 that the Tories will turn round and say to the electorate that because of Covid they weren't able to put into action the plan and manifesto they had planned for the next 5 years etc.

Labour seem to be weak on a lot of issues or agreeing with the Tories. I mean do we have an opposition?

Then you've got the Lib Dems who are not the Tories but seem to be very close and the part they played in the 2010-2015 coalition will probably be remembered for many years.

Then there is the SNP who seemed to be obsessed with identity politics and independence and so is the Scottish Tories which is bizarre, there probably worried that if Scotland did go independent that it would make the Scottish Tories defunct.

I'm starting to wonder if the 2 main parties have had the day and that it's time for something new to emerge. We had the Alternative Vote referendum back in 2011 and I think we probably need to look at Proportional Representation again because in the 2019 General Election 43% of the British electorate voted for the Tories but 57% of the electorate did not vote for the Tories and somehow they have ended up with an 80 seat majority, it's not exactly representative of the British electorate. The thing is both Labour and the Tories aren't interested in PR because FPTP helps them but it doesn't help the smaller parties and it isn't representative of the electorate.

[hibeejim21]

"I'm starting to wonder if the 2 main parties have had the day and that it's time for something new to emerge. "

Starting to wonder ? You have to be kidding me.

The political system in the UK has been goosed for decades. UKIP didn't win a single seat but they have guided the biggest ever change to UK life in our generation probably. It's all moot anyway, as long as there are 40% of the public who want policy thats nasty and hard on those immediately underneath them or from different parts of the world then the tories will satisfy it and stay in power and the media will help them 100%.

Brexit is precisely why they have an 80 seat majority. It was driven by a demographic of people who have had the best the UK state could offer, have pensions and houses and now want to pull the rope up on anyone else. If something new is to emerge its likely gonna be more right wing.

[theo_luddite]

Nothing new will emerge while we have first past the post, the two leading Turkeys are not about to vote for that version of Christmas so we won't see it in our life time.

The little men (and a few women) with big ego's, and them that eventually became UKippers who didn't want us in the EU because it didn't suit their future (bye, bye tax havens, pay your taxes where you earn your money) or their present (Proportional Representation meant they could never get a majority of like minded bigots across Europe to form a big enough majority, or any majority come to that) meant that there was only one way they could go.

Dress it up as pandering to the Little Englander vote and hope it carries the day. It did, by 4%.

Hardly a stunning victory and hence nigh on half the population that voted were stuffed by the turkeys that chose to use the vote for other purposes, like railing against Cameron's austerity policies as well as the bollocks of .....

- taking "control of our borders" - we always were in control of our borders. When was the last time you didn't need to show a passport to come home from abroad when you turned up at an airport or sea port? We were never in Schengen let alone the EU completely free movement in a fully paid up sense.

- restricting immigration - that's worked well with Covid hasn't it? Immigration is still pretty much at the same level, other than from countries that won't let people out, because they don't want them going back from this Covid infested hell-hole.

- and deciding what to do with our money. Our money? You mean, which tax haven(s) to park your money in Bodgit (and friends). We actual tax payers at the pleb end of money tree never get to decide what to do with our money, which even with a well paying job quickly gets swallowed up if you join or stay on the money-go-round that is the housing market.

Yes we can decide to occasionally go on holiday, buy the occasional new or used car, TV, clothes, food, drink, in normal circumstances if you're in a position to do so, but unlike some (yes you Bodgit) we, actually pay for it, even though we are just the "registered keeper" of our vehicles, and the Government actually owns them (look the legal bs on that one up). We can't however park our "savings", or to make it easier for you - the money we don't really want to pay tax on either - in the same offshore counts as you can.

Strange, but these "off-shore tax-havens" where even the locals apparently pay little if anything in the way of taxes, all seem to make the world go round, so they must be raising revenues to pay for the infrastructure and all the political shenanigans that go on somehow. Creative accounting perhaps?

[0762]

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/th...d=msedgdhp

This is a good Guardian summary of where we are with Brexit, the aftermath and the dishonesty attached to it. Oh to turn back the clock 5 years and somehow change the "remain" dynamics and instill proper representation of the case to remain from various senior politicians who did a great disservice to a huge chunk of a population that depended on a robust campaign - really deserved better than being landed in this mess.

[hibeejim21]

"Nothing new will emerge while we have first past the post"


Correct. And the tories will likely co-opt anything new that threatens them into their own politics if necessary or destroy it if they can't. The English have literally elected this mob to hurtle us into the abyss and any deviation from that will not help them get re-elected.

The only hope is that the media decide it's time for a change and start pushing that idea.

[0762]

The Brit govt's refusal to publish an impact analysis on their Brexit deal, despite having done so for other trade agreements, "speaks volumes" re where they are in this mess that they created themselves. Johnson's official spokesperson repeatedly refusing to give a straight answer in the debating chamber when asked to provide a formal assessment despite their "bluff n bluster" stuff re it being a "good deal" - NOT SO!!

[hibeejim21]

Well we already know that amsterdam has taken over Londons mantle as Europes top financial centre.