One of the enduring myths of the last few years is that “before we joined Europe we traded more with the commonwealth & empire.”
It’s amazing how embedded this myth has become to the point that even some remainers believed it.
But it’s utterly wrong.
For the last 200 years Britain’s biggest trading partner has been Europe - not the empire and not, later, the commonwealth.
This makes sense both from geography as well as comparable industrial development reasons.
However there was a time in history when this wasn’t the case…
The time when UK traded more with empire than Europe was during the “trilateral trade” era - when Britain exported manufactured goods to Africa, slaves to America, then agricultural goods back to UK.
Of course this was not free trade” but “coercion trade”.
Boris Johnson is the expression of "Brexitism national will".
What Brexit is..is what Boris Johnson wants it to be today, not what Johnson said it was last year - which could be something utterly different.
That is why you must get rid of Boris Johnson 1st.
All flows from that.
Its hard for many to grasp this.
Indeed especially hard for many remainers who are immune to Johnson schtick.
It seems so..."unbritish".
But that is where we are.
To deny this is to deny the journey this country has been on.
We cannot even begin to roll this back until he goes.
)0% of people dont the difference between free trade, the WTO & a customs union.
Why should they..they have busy lives to lead.
Brexit thus can only "percieved" as a "feeling" or a "picture" thru which hopes/emotions are projected.
Matt Hancock to be rejected by the UN after publication of Britain’s disastrous handling of the Covid pandemic.
Boris Johnson had attempted to place former UK health minister Hancock in an top United Nation’s Africa Covid role but UN now look to have turned this down.
Matt Hancock had apparently been advised by Boris Johnson that his appointment was “in the bag” and so announced his position before checking with the UN.
BBC confirms story.
UN nations, particularly African countries, resented having someone who was in charge of one of Europe’s worst Covid response being foisted upon them by Boris Johnson
OK don’t hate me but I’m coming round to the “world cup every 2 years” idea.
There are more reasons than one might think at 1st glance why this makes sense.
1. The premier league is turning into a super league in itself with 5-6 other European clubs dominating football.
The gap between these and most clubs is widening every day.
International football is now, strangely, a more equalising force in football than club football.
In other words as club football gets more detached from the mainstream - international football is filing this gap by providing genuine completion where money is not the overriding insurmountable factor.
Aim should be to get Tories below 310 seats.
Don’t care about the final parliament composition.
The current polls are in this territory- although not convincingly so.
We’re basically at margin of error territory where we know 1-3% green votes shift to LibDems or Labour every GE.
I’m other words everything being equal the current polls suggest most likely outcome a labour led coalition dependent on LibDems & nationalist parties.
Not ideal for labour.
But if you’re looking for most likely context to give UK a shot at SM/CU quite probably the best outcome.
UK civil servants have been told to “workshop a trade war with EU” as the UK govt now believes the current trade deal agreed with the EU is so bad that a trade war might not be as costly in comparison.
In essence the implication is that the trade deal negotiated by this govt is so bad that the additional costs of a trade war might be bearable in the short term in order to achieve the govt’s goals.
There’s also been talk that the EU if forced to retaliate would likely choose “iconic industries” which would not affect local EU supply chains & where local substitutes exit - such as 🇬🇧 whisky or salmon.