Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Well yes, isn't the Commonwealth still supposed to be a thing? And yeah I guess now there won't be a question of priorities, we have shed Europe and went with the Commonwealth.

Yeah - I mean that's not the Commonwealth though. The Commonwealth has India and Pakistan in it for example and they have radically different view on China - especially at the minute with all the China-India border clashes going on (I feel like generally the world should be paying a bit more attention to these)

But you're right this is something Brexiteers argued - that we could naturally start working with Canada and Australia more - and I thought it was bollocks. But I think maybe there is something to it, to my surprise.

[Agelastus]

But you're right this is something Brexiteers argued - that we could naturally start working with Canada and Australia more - and I thought it was bollocks. But I think maybe there is something to it, to my surprise.

Yes - for example, have you noticed that for the first time since the Leander class we seem to have put together a successful export design of Frigate?

Or, at least, Canada and Australia are going with variants of the Type 26 from the BAE led consortium instead of the German design Australia went for in the last program or the home grown design Canada built. Correlation is, of course, not causation but one does wonder if the politics helped instead of hindered for once.

[It seems they've forgiven us for how we shafted them when we joined the EEC.]

[Zanza]

You could have sold frigates or coordinated your HK or G7 policy with Australia and Canada inside the European Union just as well, but I guess it helps to pretend there are any Brexit dividends.

[The Larch]

You could have sold frigates or coordinated your HK or G7 policy with Australia and Canada inside the European Union just as well, but I guess it helps to pretend there are any Brexit dividends.

I was going to say that, nothing that the UK is doing recently would have been prevented from being inside the EU.

[Sheilbh]

You could have sold frigates or coordinated your HK or G7 policy with Australia and Canada inside the European Union just as well, but I guess it helps to pretend there are any Brexit dividends.

I was going to say that, nothing that the UK is doing recently would have been prevented from being inside the EU.

Sure. I mean I think that side of the argument was useful four years ago. Are we going to be in a better place because of Brexit? No. But that's irrelevant now.

My biggest concerns following Brexit was that we would retreat into ourselves more and more and basically try, as far as possible, to disengae from the world. I also thought we'd be a medium sized power outside of a major bloc and subject to bullying by China especially, so the Cameron-Osborne "Golden Century" plus Chinese bullying on the sort of issues we've seen in Canada and Australia targeting universities etc.

I am pleased and more optimistic that my biggest fears aren't coming true, the early signs under May were far less promising. It's early signs but there are positive signs on those - plus, unexpectedly, immigration.

Edit: And on coordination with Canada and Australia you are right, but we wouldn't have done it within the EU because I think people like me would think it was some pointless nostalgic imperial hangover. I still thought that a few months ago. I now actually think that's probably been a missed opportunity for decades - in terms of a Brexit dividend it will force change and experimentation.

[Tamas]

Sheilbh, your relentless optimism can be exhausting. 

[HVC]

Sheilbh, your relentless optimism can be exhausting. 

and very unbritish

[Sheilbh]

Sheilbh, your relentless optimism can be exhausting. 

Only in 2020 does "I'm pleased and optimistic that my worst fears are not coming true" count as real optimism.

I just think it's important to note that, while it's early days, I was wrong on these points.

Edit: Incidentally, in other predictions that will inevitably be wrong (other examples include thinking that Scott Walker would do very well in the Republican Primary - reality he was the second to withdraw a full three months before the first primary ). I've changed my mind, I don't think Johnson will still be Prime Minister at the next election

[Zanza]

- in terms of a Brexit dividend it will force change and experimentation.

May you live in interesting times!

[Sheilbh]

Well, Sheilbh expressed a hope for "positive English nationalism" earlier in this thread, so his optimism seems to be off path at least occasionally.

That's not a hope that's a necessity. We need to be as comfortable with Englishness as Ireland and Scotland are with Irishness and Scottishness. I always think of my radical left Irish friend who cannot understand how we lack a sense of nationalism, because it's the bedrock of Irish politics

Especially because we're are likely to need it in the next few years - I think Scottish independence will happen. And I still would not describe myself as English despite having been born here and lived most of my life in England. In part that's because of my Irish parents who impressed not being English on me very early, and in part it's because there is a baggier less problematic British national identity. I don't know, if Scotland leaves, that I'd be comfortable with an English passport (even if I would have English, and possibly Scots, citizenship). I think I'd stick to an Irish passport.

But it can't be based on nonsense. I hope that what we've seen in Bristol might actually be part of this. Actually confronting our history and our past - this is also important for Scotland who have really taken quite the spin on their history in recent years.

[Tamas]

It does seem like all the predictions on Johnson being either lazy, indecisive, cowardly, or some combination of these, are true.

His absence from briefings and, IDK, governing, is very telling. We are -at best- just about coming out of a major pandemic, we are half a year from the most drastic change to the country in peace time since  perhaps the 40s, and Boris just casually appears on the telly with his signature comb-it-like-it's-not-combed hair for a few minutes every fortnight.

No wonder he couldn't lose Cummings, he is content with unleashing his frustrations on the country while running it, no danger to Boris' position.

[Richard Hakluyt]

The next political comedy should be called The Cummings Eye Test 

[Sheilbh]

- in terms of a Brexit dividend it will force change and experimentation.

May you live in interesting times!

Yes. But I'm not sure the British state has covered itself in glory in the last 30 years. So change is necessary.

[Zanza]

Dominic Cummings agrees. I just wonder if the change he will drive is something that most people will consider a change for a better Britain. Early indications point to a chance that Brexit was just the first of more bad change to come for Britain, especially the British state.

[Josquius]

Especially because we're are likely to need it in the next few years - I think Scottish independence will happen. And I still would not describe myself as English despite having been born here and lived most of my life in England. In part that's because of my Irish parents who impressed not being English on me very early, and in part it's because there is a baggier less problematic British national identity. I don't know, if Scotland leaves, that I'd be comfortable with an English passport (even if I would have English, and possibly Scots, citizenship). I think I'd stick to an Irish passport.

Ugh. The thought of being English
I can see the rotten corpse of the UK continuing on for a while Yugoslavia style once Scotland goes independent. But you just know there'll be some opportunistic populist decides to wreck that after a while. Hopefully I'll have other options and never have to be English. As let's face it, all words aside that doesn't seem set to be a particularly nice country.