Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Syt]

Ah right. That was way before my time here. To be fair I have never been to Bracknell. The property prices do indicate it is the worst-after-Slough town in the area, though.

IIRC they offered tax breaks to companies to get them to invest in the town, and attracted e.g. 3M and a couple of others. However, when those incentives expired those companies all up and left. My old company moved to Reading, e.g.

EDIT: according to Wiki they're trying to turn things around:

Regeneration

Because of Bracknell's age, it was decided that it should undergo renovation. Designs and plans were submitted and rejected first time round. The council went for a second attempt and were accepted, work was due to commence early in 2008 but due to the global credit crisis, the plans were postponed. The cost is estimated at around £750 million. The regeneration will provide brand new services, a completely redeveloped town centre, 1,000 new homes and new police and bus stations.[12][13]

The Borough Council continues to work in partnership with the Bracknell Regeneration Partnership (comprising Legal and General and Schroder) to regenerate the town centre.

The first stage of the redevelopment began with the opening of a new Waitrose store in December 2011. By June 2013 shops in the northern part of the town in Broadway and Crossway had been vacated. Demolition of this area then began in September 2013, and was completed in December 2013. Construction of new shops, restaurants, and a Cineworld cinema began in February 2015. On 4 September 2015 it was announced that the new development would be known as The Lexicon.[14] The Lexicon opened on 7 September 2017. The Lexicon comprises 600,000 ft2 of new retail, a new 12-screen cinema (including a 4DX screen), new restaurants and cafes, completely new paving and public realm and 1300 new parking spaces as well as improved access by public transport (the council having substantially refurbished the bus station in 2015).[15]

The scheme won at the Revo Awards 2018: Gold in the Re:new category and Best of the Best in the Re:turn category.[16] Shortlisted for the Planning Awards 2017 in the Regeneration category, the scheme won Development of the Year at the 2018 Thames Valley Property Awards. The town saw visitor numbers of 16m in its first year (compared with around 4-5m prior to the town centre's demolition). The town centre rose in the retail rankings to number 33 (from 255 before redevelopment). In January 2019, the town had risen again to 29 in the retail rankings.

Bracknell is the first post-war New Town centre to have been substantially regenerated and represents a significant examplar development.

[jimmy olsen]

Exports to Europe down 40%! Who could have predicted it? 

https://www.businessinsider.com/brexit-is-a-disaster-britain-trade-european-union-boris-johnson-2021-3

[Duque de Bragança]

"Brexit means Brexit".

[Sheilbh]

Exports to Europe down 40%! Who could have predicted it? 

https://www.businessinsider.com/brexit-is-a-disaster-britain-trade-european-union-boris-johnson-2021-3

Yeah - it's been particularly catastrophic for the food sector, which isn't hugely surprising but still sad.

[Tamas]

Exports to Europe down 40%! Who could have predicted it? 

https://www.businessinsider.com/brexit-is-a-disaster-britain-trade-european-union-boris-johnson-2021-3

Luckily this can all be blamed on Covid so Brexit can continue to be an astounding success.

[Sheilbh]

Just saw that this is being planned not far from where I live - 24 new council homes in New London Vernacular. Bricks! Fortressy!

[Sheilbh]

The new policing bill is so authoritarian that both Theresa May and David Blunkett have expressed concerns about it

This anti-protest bill risks making the UK like Putin's Russia
David Blunkett
The proposed police and crime law is so badly drafted that it should unite people from across the political spectrum
Fri 2 Apr 2021 11.00 BST

These days, the police aren't just engaged in the fight against crime. They're also being asked to preside over cultural flashpoints. At various points, police relationships with different sections of the public have been severely tested, whether over Covid-19 restrictions, rows about statues, or demonstrations around the tragic death of Sarah Everard.

Now the government's plans to use the police, crime, sentencing and courts bill to give police in England and Wales sweeping powers to put down protests look set to strain those relationships to breaking point. And it will leave a bad taste in the mouths of British people who value tolerance, democracy and open debate.

By giving police forces sweeping discretion about how they deal with protesters, this law would drive a wedge between them and the public. Among other things, the bill would allow police officers to impose any conditions they feel necessary on certain types of protest, and expand their power to shut down demonstrations they feel would be unacceptably noisy or a nuisance. Try defining the term "nuisance", because parliament certainly won't, and you see the problem.

Forcing the police, who are citizens in uniform, to make individual, highly charged decisions makes it inevitable that some will be inconsistent, and that means we'll see individuals singled out for blame. The pressure on Cressida Dick and the Metropolitan police after the vigil for Sarah Everard gives us an inkling of the controversies that could blaze across the country if these sweeping powers are pushed on to the police. That risks making the force the scapegoat for every unpopular decision – a dangerous spot to be in for a service set up to police by consent.

Protest might be inconvenient for politicians, but it acts as a pressure valve, allowing citizens to express their views and vent frustrations that could otherwise boil over. Irish politicians such as John Finucane MP have drawn on their experience of the Troubles to warn that stifling protest won't work and risks undermining the belief that each of us has a stake in society. If we suppress protest, we could see more anger towards institutions including the police, the judiciary and parliament. We would lose the civil engagement and sense of celebration that we see at events such as women's marches or Pride.

It's easy to stereotype protesters as leftwing. But this bill would mean alienating others across the centre and right wing of the electorate whom the government won't want – or can't afford – to lose: taxi drivers angry about Uber, say, or ardent Brexit supporters. The French gilets jaunes movement proved the appeal of a big-tent protest movement that mobilised citizens from the left, centre and right. However, the long burn turned out to be reactionary rather than revolutionary. The pendulum can swing either way.

Tolerating dissent and protest is a British value, and it's central to our democracy. It's ironic that this bill would mean far harsher treatment for protesters in Parliament Square, where statues commemorate Mandela and Gandhi, leaders of historic disruptive, noisy and annoying protest movements now taught in British schools.

Protecting statues and having a sensible dialogue about the relevance of the past to reshaping our future is just good common sense. So is any strengthening of the law needed to clarify how to deal with protest that gets out of hand (sometimes deliberately).

But this bill is, I think, so badly drafted that it should unite people from across the political spectrum. Conservative MPs Steve Baker and Dominic Grieve warned on Conservative Home that the bill could create uncertainty by giving too much discretion to the police. Fiona Bruce, Conservative MP and the prime minister's special envoy for religious freedom, said it could have a profound chilling effect on free speech.

Theresa May urged the government to walk a fine line between being popular and populist. A former Met police commander said the bill would pit the police against the communities they serve. Time, therefore, for the government – if it really means to help the police rather than embarrass its opponents – to think again. The Queen's speech takes place on 11 May. Instead of "carrying over" this legislation, they should start the process by redrafting it and seeking genuine consensus.

It is, of course, true that the public remains resolutely in support of the police, despite the controversies of the last year. The home secretary and prime minister will be hoping to ride out the loudest criticism – banking on a majority of voters in favour of a strict approach to law and order who quietly approve of a crackdown on protest.

But those voters want to see laws that support the police, not hinder them. Many would understand the need to deal with those who exploit democratic expressions of dissent and by doing so, paradoxically, play into the hands of their political opponents. But when they see government washing its hands of difficult decisions – while police forces are scapegoated and left to fail in public – that approval will shift.

Banning protest would make us more like Putin's Russia than the UK. It would be a lasting and toxic legacy for Boris Johnson.

If this bill passes into law unamended, we're heading for more ugly conflicts between the public and the police – and a police force that's weaker for it.

David Blunkett was home secretary from 2001 to 2004

[Sheilbh]

Several nights of riots in unionist areas in Belfast and Derry - condemned by Arlene Foster.

There's been a huge scandal in Northern Ireland over covid rules. Basically funerals are permitted but you're only allowed up to 30 mourners. Many people across all communities have stuck to those rules and had to restrict who can attend funerals of loved ones.

In the last year a senior Republican from the IRA died after a failed lung transplant. He'd allegedly been head of intelligence for the IRA before becoming the chair of Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland, but has been linked to murders as late as 2015 (of a former informant). His funeral had over 400 people in attendance, including the Deputy First Minister Michell O'Neill, the leader of Sinn Fein (Mary Lou McDonald) and Gerry Adams. There were also over 1,500 people in the procession for his funeral.

This was investigated by the PSNI, because of the sensitivities they also asked for another police force to review their investigation. So the Cumbria Constabulary did that and recommended that the PSNI make prosecutions for the breach of covid regulations - especially for the organisers and prominent people breaking the rules. The PSNI, in consultation with the public prosecutors in Northern Ireland, decided not to prosecute anyone because it was too sensitive.

This has caused huge annoyance in all communities, but especially among unionists who think it's another example of republicans being treated with kid gloves. All the unionist parties have caused on the Chief Constable of the PSNI to stand down. It's since come out that the PSNI actually negotiated with Sinn Fein ahead of the funeral which is part of the reason they don't want to prosecute now.

Not sure how much that's contributing to the riots but people are really pissed off because the PSNI have come out this weekend to remind everyone of the rules and say they will be enforcing them and will arrest people who attend gatherings etc. Everyone is really annoyed about the funeral and Sinn Fein are still refusing to apologise or accept there was anything wrong about it.

Edit: And in other covid policing news the Met shut down a mass at the Polish Catholic Church in Balham - communal worship is allowed but the numbers are limited - from the footage it is not clear that there's any breach at all. Giving the police the benefit of the doubt and there were breaches of the regulations I'm not sure it's the best use of their resources raiding minority churches to chec they're complying

[The Brain]

The PSNI, in consultation with the public prosecutors in Northern Ireland, decided not to prosecute anyone because it was too sensitive.

So essentially the UK is a failed state?

[Zanza]

Finally a real Brexit benefit: a British energy efficiency label instead of European protectionist overregulation.

[Duque de Bragança]

No need to to keep the inches now that the UK is out, I say. 

[Sheilbh]

But this does go to the point that the risk was always likely to be increased costs and duplicate regulations that are exactly the same rather than Singapore-on-Thames. Most of my work's in data but the UK GDPR is basically exactly the same as GDPR - we just cut and paste it into domestic law. But that means that while a, say, US company was exposed to one rule in Europe and, generally, one risk of fines they're now exposed to two rules that are basically the same but twice the fine risk.

Separately - very good piece by Kenan Malik on the Sewell report:

Yes, we need a more nuanced debate about race. But this flawed report fails to deliver it
Kenan Malik
How racist is the UK? The Sewell commission says it has answered the question. Instead, it has chosen easy polemics
Sun 4 Apr 2021 09.00 BST

Britain is less racist than it was 40 years ago. Many minority groups in Britain still face racism. Both those claims can be (and are) true. So are these two claims: racism exists in Britain; racism does not explain all the disparities faced by minorities. We live, though, in an either/or culture. You accept one or the other, but not both. The report of the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities self-consciously seeks to bridge that gap and bring complexity to the debate. That it fails should concern us all.

The commission was set up by the government after the Black Lives Matter protests last year. Its chair, Tony Sewell, writes in the foreword that Britain has "fundamentally shifted" in recent years when it comes to racial disadvantage. Racism remains "a real force in the UK", but "too often 'racism' is the catch-all explanation and can be simply implicitly accepted rather than explicitly examined". I agree. I have long questioned the contemporary narrative about racial disparities, arguing we need to think more carefully about the complex interplay of race, class, gender and geography. The Sewell report is, however, a flawed piece of work, its polemical needs distorting its empirical analysis.

The commission's challenge to concepts such as "institutional racism" has led to its non-white members being abused as "tokens" or "native informants". This, in turn, has allowed the report's defenders to dismiss criticism as "tribal", even "racist". It's the kind of public exchange that allows the real problems to stay obscured.

The report details the experiences of different minority groups, revealing not only the many patterns of disadvantage but also the many successes, from the narrowing of the ethnic pay gap to rising educational attainment. What all this shows, it argues, is that "it is possible to have racial disadvantage without racists". This is a strange way of framing the issue, ironically bringing the commission perilously close to the views of those whom it is most keen to challenge. It also allows it, however, to argue that "we need to look elsewhere [other than racism] for the roots of that disadvantage". Racial disadvantage, it notes, "often overlaps with social class disadvantage", but quickly moves on from class to ask "how have some groups transcended that disadvantage more swiftly than others?" Its answer is "family structures" and "cultural traditions".

It provides two illustrations. The first is single-parent families, the report noting both the "wealth of evidence" linking family breakdown to negative outcomes and the disproportionate number of black children in one-parent households. Almost in passing, it mentions that this is an attribute of poverty; only a minority of poor children live in two-parent households, making lone parenting a feature of working-class white communities too. Such detail might "complicate the picture", the report acknowledges, but does not detract from the desire to make this an issue about race.

The second example is the lack of fluency in English within Bangladeshi and Pakistani communities: "Among 45- to 64-year-olds, 17.4% of Bangladeshi women and 9.0% of Pakistani women were unable to speak English." This "is an obstacle to economic advance" and "helps explain" why these communities are so poor.

The lack of English among older Bangladeshi and Pakistani women is a problem, reducing their ability to build social networks or find employment. But it's a stretch to suggest that the inability of a small number of older women to speak English is a significant contributor to the economic disadvantages their communities face. Around 3% of Britons of Bangladeshi origin and 2.1% of those of Pakistani origin cannot speak English. To put that in context, the figure for the Chinese community is 2.3% yet it is taken by the report as a model community that has raced ahead. The point is not that broken families or a lack of English are not social issues that need tackling. They are. The point rather is that the commission distorts the data to pursue polemical points. It criticises others for seeing everything in racial terms – but does exactly that when it suits its agenda.

The underlying theme of the Sewell report is that the causes of disadvantages faced by minority groups lie primarily within those groups. This places it in a longstanding tradition of moralising social problems, from blaming poverty on the behaviour of the poor to condemning "lifestyle choices" for health inequalities. Social issues – including the complex interactions of race and class – are reframed as moral choices and the behaviour of individuals. Racism itself comes to be seen in terms of individual behaviour and attitudes rather than as a social phenomenon.

The report's discussion of discrimination in the labour market is apposite. There has been a slew of studies in which researchers sent out identical CVs except for the applicant's race or ethnicity. These consistently showed that white applicants were more likely to get interviews than non-white ones. It's gold-standard evidence of racism. The report acknowledges these studies but claims they "cannot be relied upon to provide clarity on the extent that it happens in everyday life". Again, it seeks to individualise the problem. Many minority groups, it argues, don't understand the job market and are too choosy: "If not enough young Black people are getting the professional jobs they expected after graduating, we need to examine the subjects they are studying and the careers advice." It blames "prejudice and ignorance" for the lack of black apprentices. In fact, while young black people are under-represented in apprenticeships, black people overall are not and the number of non-white apprentices has steadily risen over the past decade to almost match their proportion of the population.

One of the challenges of contemporary politics lies in the atomisation of society and in the tendency to see social problems more in terms of culture and identity than of politics and class. Much of the debate about race reflects this. The Sewell report, for all its claims to question orthodoxies, in recasting issues of disadvantage as problems of individual behaviour or cultural norms, only deepens this trend. There is much talk in the report of "agency". But "agency" here means not the possibilities of collective action, but, rather, a kind of "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" individualism.

Many of the report's recommendations are useful, if anodyne. The analysis, though, falls victim to the report's polemical needs. Far from resetting the debate about race in a constructive fashion, the Sewell report replaces one set of simplistic narratives with another.

Kenan Malik is an Observer columnist

[Josquius]

It was a huge missed opportunity during the brexit ref (one of many...) to point out how the EU actually reduces red tape and brexit would mean a massive increase in the stuff.
It sucks that there was absolutely zero effort on this front and the bloated EU bureaucracy lies were just left to stand.

[Grey Fox]

FCCUK( I forget the real name) is exactly like the CE spec. We juste have to print a extra logo on our products. Yay for Brexit.

[Zanza]

It was a huge missed opportunity during the brexit ref (one of many...) to point out how the EU actually reduces red tape and brexit would mean a massive increase in the stuff.
It sucks that there was absolutely zero effort on this front and the bloated EU bureaucracy lies were just left to stand.

Every British expert pointed it out. The EU and international think tanks or organisations pointed it out. British institutions like the OBR pointed it out. British press like FT or Economist pointed it out. Even some backbenchers pointed it out.

It's just that the English opposition seems utterly incapable to actually oppose the government and have its own narrative. Labour was completely ineffective under both Corbyn and now Starmer. And the Tories deliberately purged all dissenting voices eventually and are now ideologically pure sovereignty first.