'The Government has blown it.' (Jack Taylor/Getty Images)
The disco started at 8pm. Pints were poured, game soup was served and, as 11pm drew near, the music stopped so the landlord could play Land of Hope and Glory. A few people started to cry. It was January 31, 2020 and, finally, Britain had left the European Union. “It was such a relief,” the landlord tells me. “We’d stuck our heads above the parapet and won. There was a sense of togetherness — that things would finally get better.” And have they? “No. Boston is awful. The situation is perilous. The Government has blown it.”
Three years on, the Robin Hood Inn has closed. If you want a drink on this street in Boston, just south of the town centre, you’ll have to make do with the Eastern European off-licence a few doors down.
Surrounded by fens to the north and marshes to the south, Boston looms over a dank sea of flat expanses; an island town that has always been the exception. Once, it was the biggest port in England after London. Today, it is the fattest town in the country, the least integrated, the lowest paid, the most murderous, and the most Brexity.
According to new polling by UnHerd, Boston remains the capital of Brexitland, albeit not by its 2016 margin, when 75.6% voted to leave. Still, Boston and Skegness is the only constituency in the UK that does not think it was wrong to leave the EU: here, 37% of voters believe it was a mistake, while 41% disagree. Our polling also reveals it to be the most concerned about immigration: 72% believe “levels are too high”.
Todor arrived here from Sliven, Bulgaria, a few months before the 2016 referendum, looking for the “breadbasket of Britain” and its promise of jobs for those who work hard. “I came with my friends after reading about Boston on the internet. We lived out of town in a caravan and picked cabbages, down on our knees for 10 hours at a time.” Now 29, he works in a food-processing factory, packing flowers, broccoli and potatoes for £350 a week. He can just about afford to rent a bed-bug-infested, one-bedroom flat with his girlfriend and month-old baby. “My friends and I were the first to come to Boston from Sliven,” he says proudly. “Since then, another 2,000 have followed.”
Sitting in his coffee shop on the corner of the town’s cobbled marketplace, Moroccan-born Anton Dani points out these new arrivals. “They come on a daily basis,” he explains. “You can tell who is new and who is not.” He gestures to the small groups of young men standing around the square; they are smoking, staring, whiling away the time until they can register for work. Dozens of families are milling about the city centre, too. “Often you know they are new because they are very poorly dressed — and they are with children who should be in school but haven’t been enrolled yet.”
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SubscribeFollowing on from yesterday’s offerings, Unherd are really going to town (in this case, literally) over a poll. I’d simply raise the question: would Boston be any better off without Brexit?
It was being part of the EU that started the immigrant trail to places like Boston; that and the reluctance of the indigenous population to work on the fertile land picking crops. Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.
Much needs to be done to turn places like Boston around, and simply railing at the outcome of a referendum is an easy way of avoiding grasping the political nettles which have been allowed to grow for decades. I therefore see all this journalism (Newsnight last night, included) as an attempt at deflection from the failings of our political classes, both at home and prior to Brexit, abroad. At least following Brexit, the finger can be pointed more precisely.
I also detect another trend, however. It’s my opinion that since the launch of Unherd, a perception may have arisen that it may have swung in a Right-leaning direction. If that’s the case, it would simply be because views are being given space which aren’t usually by MSM. If i’m right (as it were), i see these articles as an attempt by the editorial staff at Unherd to try to redress this perception, perhaps for very good commercial reasons. Having a readership and respondents skewed one way or the other isn’t good for business. To be fair, i can live with that; in fact, welcome it. All views should be aired, that’s the point isn’t it? Only then, can they be challenged.
But it brings me back to an earlier point about intellectual coherence. In order to succeed, articles might be better focusing not on “Brexit isn’t working” as if it were meant to be some magic bullet, but “Why aren’t our political class making the most of Brexit”. Get to it, please.
None of this drivel has the first thing to do with Brexit.
Unherd is rapidly becoming the BBC.
Honestly, some days Unherd feels like it’s trying to be some kind of knock off Guardian. One thing Brexit showed loud and clear was the utter contempt that the affluent Guardian journos and their readers have for the majority of people in this country, and to be frank, we do not need yet another site for these kinds of journos to inflict their dross on others.
I have yet to see anyone providing an examination of the actual methodology that was used for this poll, how they sampled the populace, how they phrased the questions they posed, etc, and all of those things are vital to understanding the level of error margin on the results, and whether the poll is actually of any use whatsoever.
I have a feeling that the methodology leaves a lot to be desired.
“Feelings” lol
“I have a feeling” aka, I am of the opinion that, “feels” aka appears to be. I know that we live in an era where words are constantly robbed of nuance, especially those abused by politics, but understanding of such nuance is still possible.
You may well have a “feeling”, we all do now in this touchy-feelly world, but would it be possible for you to supply anything more substancial than your “feelings” on this particular issue? Facts, for example…
Facts? I haven’t read, heard or seen one since, say, 1968.
Facts? I haven’t read, heard or seen one since, say, 1968.
You may well have a “feeling”, we all do now in this touchy-feelly world, but would it be possible for you to supply anything more substancial than your “feelings” on this particular issue? Facts, for example…
“I have a feeling” aka, I am of the opinion that, “feels” aka appears to be. I know that we live in an era where words are constantly robbed of nuance, especially those abused by politics, but understanding of such nuance is still possible.
“Feelings” lol
I see. I can tell your a man that cares about his country. You idiot. These towns are the symptom of the decline coming your way. You don’t try and fix it here, where the first signs of serious decline appear. You will struggle to stop it. The biggest problem is that the BBC and msm HAVE been ignoring all these problems. So have our politicians. Did you read about the local school being rammed? The pub shut down? How do we make these places better for our children, if you ignore the problems, what will be left to them then? It has everything to do with brexit. These towns took the numbers, stretched the services, stretched the housing availability. These places needed the immigration bringing down. It hasn’t happened.
Which is very much the point that i was making, except you’ve drawn the wrong conclusion. It’s our politicians who’ve failed to bring immigration down post-Brexit, not the effects of Brexit itself.
I think you’re both saying the same thing. Brexit is a symptom of deep seated social and economic trends.
I think you’re both saying the same thing. Brexit is a symptom of deep seated social and economic trends.
These towns suffered the decline for the last 30 years. They are dissatisfied with Brexit because it’s not sorting out the problems fast enough.
It seems ludicrous that this would make them want to backwards.
And it is a mistake to blame it on immigration. Immigrants become your neighbours, and as they settle in they share a common interest in the neighbourhood.
The problem in the fens was migrant workers — people who come and do the job, living in a bunkhouse, and take the savings home.
This has nothing to do with race, or asylum seekers. It has everything to do with an EU levelling up system that ‘takes’ from the provinces to make a wealthier EU that makes London richer.
They are dissatisfied with Brexit (7 will be even more as time passes) because Brexit was a promise that occlude never be delivered. One of the core claims of Brexit was that ‘we could control immigration’ Grown ups who pointed out that the issues around immigration were complex & that most immigrants were from outside the EU & therefore Brexit wouldn’t make any difference , were labelled ‘remoaners’ Well now we know they were right.
I don’t think you’re entirely right – the same politicians, most of who were very against Brexit, are still sitting. Maybe they figure they do nothing, things get worse, they can subtly blame Brexit and the voices to reverse it will do their job for them. It might be an explanation for the lack of willingness (and/or impotence) to do anything about our borders.
It’s our job to elect people who can see a way through this (and those people do exist), but sadly I think most people are suitably disengaged and will tick whichever box aligns with their chosen rosette colour. Meaning we get more of the same people, with the same outcomes.
I don’t think you’re entirely right – the same politicians, most of who were very against Brexit, are still sitting. Maybe they figure they do nothing, things get worse, they can subtly blame Brexit and the voices to reverse it will do their job for them. It might be an explanation for the lack of willingness (and/or impotence) to do anything about our borders.
It’s our job to elect people who can see a way through this (and those people do exist), but sadly I think most people are suitably disengaged and will tick whichever box aligns with their chosen rosette colour. Meaning we get more of the same people, with the same outcomes.
They are dissatisfied with Brexit (7 will be even more as time passes) because Brexit was a promise that occlude never be delivered. One of the core claims of Brexit was that ‘we could control immigration’ Grown ups who pointed out that the issues around immigration were complex & that most immigrants were from outside the EU & therefore Brexit wouldn’t make any difference , were labelled ‘remoaners’ Well now we know they were right.
Which is very much the point that i was making, except you’ve drawn the wrong conclusion. It’s our politicians who’ve failed to bring immigration down post-Brexit, not the effects of Brexit itself.
These towns suffered the decline for the last 30 years. They are dissatisfied with Brexit because it’s not sorting out the problems fast enough.
It seems ludicrous that this would make them want to backwards.
And it is a mistake to blame it on immigration. Immigrants become your neighbours, and as they settle in they share a common interest in the neighbourhood.
The problem in the fens was migrant workers — people who come and do the job, living in a bunkhouse, and take the savings home.
This has nothing to do with race, or asylum seekers. It has everything to do with an EU levelling up system that ‘takes’ from the provinces to make a wealthier EU that makes London richer.
Have you tried InfoWars? I think that might be what you’re looking for.
You will find lots of like-minded people there, and no-one will say anything that doesn’t fit exactly into your world-view.
Lots of right wing people here who don’t want to hear anything that could be considered left wing. Unherd has expressed right wing and left wing views,and so it should.
Lots of right wing people here who don’t want to hear anything that could be considered left wing. Unherd has expressed right wing and left wing views,and so it should.
Honestly, some days Unherd feels like it’s trying to be some kind of knock off Guardian. One thing Brexit showed loud and clear was the utter contempt that the affluent Guardian journos and their readers have for the majority of people in this country, and to be frank, we do not need yet another site for these kinds of journos to inflict their dross on others.
I have yet to see anyone providing an examination of the actual methodology that was used for this poll, how they sampled the populace, how they phrased the questions they posed, etc, and all of those things are vital to understanding the level of error margin on the results, and whether the poll is actually of any use whatsoever.
I have a feeling that the methodology leaves a lot to be desired.
I see. I can tell your a man that cares about his country. You idiot. These towns are the symptom of the decline coming your way. You don’t try and fix it here, where the first signs of serious decline appear. You will struggle to stop it. The biggest problem is that the BBC and msm HAVE been ignoring all these problems. So have our politicians. Did you read about the local school being rammed? The pub shut down? How do we make these places better for our children, if you ignore the problems, what will be left to them then? It has everything to do with brexit. These towns took the numbers, stretched the services, stretched the housing availability. These places needed the immigration bringing down. It hasn’t happened.
Have you tried InfoWars? I think that might be what you’re looking for.
You will find lots of like-minded people there, and no-one will say anything that doesn’t fit exactly into your world-view.
Good points. But our entire political class was and is pro EU and Remainer. Large parts of the Tory Party – its Chancellor included – are also Remainer. You could barely fill the Cabinet Office with passionate Brexiteers from the Cabinet AND Parliament. The vast army of civil service & technocracy (enraged at the loss of 100k Euro pensions) has sat on its hands and effectively sabotaged any of the token and limp effort by the Covid-bust Executive to drive Brex forward. Brexit was led by the provinces and people outside Westminster, demanding an end to the multiple socio economic injustices – uncontrolled mass migration, the destruction of unplanned public services, the rigged SE Property Boom that enriched ‘our political class’ and more – that have blighted Boston and trashed our country. Brexit has no leaders and no army in the political sphere. The civil service & BBC are busy and successfully ‘bullying’ them out – Johnson, Priti tick tick Raab & Suella next. Who else is there??? The counter revolution by the pro EU State has succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. And look who may enter Number 10 next! The man who actually led the battle to overturn democracy. Lets campaign a second ballot if he wins. Losers consent is for wimps. I weep for places like Boston. All betrayed.
Brexit did have a champion and it was Boris Johnson. That’s why they made so much effort to bring him down.
Johnson was never really interested in Brexit. Hence the NI Protocol exists, when it shouldn’t. For Johnson, Brexit was just a box to tick – nothing more.
The NI protocol was perhaps necessary to break the impasse. Yes, it’s a dog’s breakfast and needs to be radically changed to bring NI into line with the rest of our UK, but as a means of getting the deal done it was something Boris calculated would do the trick – and it worked. Of course, history has moved on since then.
Spot on Steve. The Johnson haters on here can’t see the perspective that he made it happen albeit incompletely, and that’s why the establishment kicked him out on anything they could pin on him before he could consolidate the gain into complete departure.
It was the biggest mistake of the Tories and those on the right allowing Johnson to be kicked out.
Spot on Steve. The Johnson haters on here can’t see the perspective that he made it happen albeit incompletely, and that’s why the establishment kicked him out on anything they could pin on him before he could consolidate the gain into complete departure.
It was the biggest mistake of the Tories and those on the right allowing Johnson to be kicked out.
Johnson pioneered Euroscepticism when he was a journalist, long before he went into politics.
The NI protocol was perhaps necessary to break the impasse. Yes, it’s a dog’s breakfast and needs to be radically changed to bring NI into line with the rest of our UK, but as a means of getting the deal done it was something Boris calculated would do the trick – and it worked. Of course, history has moved on since then.
Johnson pioneered Euroscepticism when he was a journalist, long before he went into politics.
Cameron specifically said “anyone but Boris” when the leadership contest began after his resignation.
Boris specifically said “anyone but Sunak” when the leadership contest began after his resignation.
The difference was that the floor of the party did not want Sunak either. So much for democracy…
Boris specifically said “anyone but Sunak” when the leadership contest began after his resignation.
The difference was that the floor of the party did not want Sunak either. So much for democracy…
I half agree Mr B. He was targetted yes. But Johnson failed Brexit in 2020-22. He was panicked by the hostile and hysterical media & NHS First Lobby into lockdown. Ok – a dreadful time. But several months in it was perfectly obvious that the total suffocation of economic activity was a gift for the deranged Remainiacs desperate to strangle Brexit at birth (Covid arrived Day 2). Instead of showing both courage and alertness to the grave danger, Boris danced jiggs seeing his popularity soar when he acted all Churchillian and talked of War. Then he doomed us further by embracing the insane MMT magic money tree experiment, so locking future hyper inflation into our system. It was not even he who finally broke the Imperial Big Lie Orthodoxy & stopped Year 3 of lockdown. Did he not notive how eagerly far left unions embraced lockdown?? Johnson killed Brexit at birth by bending the knee to a hostile pro Lockdown State. Game over Day 3.
So for less important reasons, you support him being kicked out. If he’d stayed he was the only U.K. politician prepared to take on Europe – but you lack the perspective to see that consolidating the Brexit gain was, by far, the single most important target to achieve. With your opposition to Johnson, you allied yourself to those opposing Brexit, which is rather ironic.
This is not true. I never supported the trumped up BBC media coup against Johnson. A leaving do in the tested HQ of the State described as a disco party? It was appalling, symptomatic of the arbitrary law that held sway from 2020 My point is that Johnson destroyed himself, the Tory Party and Brexit – ALL – by falling so readily for the Hard Lockdowners cynical and insane suffocation of economic life for 2 years. It consumed him and our economy. Brexit became a forgotten after thought gathering dust in the To Do tray while Imperial demanded we be imprisoned in our homes. We will never know what he might have done if the Wuhan Lab leak had not happened. His catastrophic surrender to the Lockers will be line 1 on his sad epitaph.
A good rejoinder!
A good rejoinder!
This is not true. I never supported the trumped up BBC media coup against Johnson. A leaving do in the tested HQ of the State described as a disco party? It was appalling, symptomatic of the arbitrary law that held sway from 2020 My point is that Johnson destroyed himself, the Tory Party and Brexit – ALL – by falling so readily for the Hard Lockdowners cynical and insane suffocation of economic life for 2 years. It consumed him and our economy. Brexit became a forgotten after thought gathering dust in the To Do tray while Imperial demanded we be imprisoned in our homes. We will never know what he might have done if the Wuhan Lab leak had not happened. His catastrophic surrender to the Lockers will be line 1 on his sad epitaph.
I believe he was prepared to go with the herd on lockdown, and everything else, as long as the UK did leave the EU.
Covid was the perfect excuse to keep kicking the can on Brexit. Instead Johnson budged on everything except Brexit.
So for less important reasons, you support him being kicked out. If he’d stayed he was the only U.K. politician prepared to take on Europe – but you lack the perspective to see that consolidating the Brexit gain was, by far, the single most important target to achieve. With your opposition to Johnson, you allied yourself to those opposing Brexit, which is rather ironic.
I believe he was prepared to go with the herd on lockdown, and everything else, as long as the UK did leave the EU.
Covid was the perfect excuse to keep kicking the can on Brexit. Instead Johnson budged on everything except Brexit.
Johnson couldn’t give a toss about Brexit- are you really so easily fooled? You honestly think he cares about anything but his own advantage?
When it came to the campaign, he hummed and hahed, he wrote his little ‘pro’ and ‘against’ list, and decided, at the end of the day, it was going to happen, and then, and only then he joined the Leave camp. As an ideologically empty narcissist- would gain the most from supporting the inevitable.
If he was “brought down”, it was by his own lying, corrupt, narcissistic and uttrerly vacuous personality- not by some evil conspiracy. Luckily for him -and all of his kind- there are always plenty of suckers who uncritically worship a “personality” .
Cummings article on the post. Im not sure on the boris thing, one of the links has been disabled, but there’s a little.
Ah, we appear to have reached the daily moment at which the stopped clock tells the right time.
Cummings article on the post. Im not sure on the boris thing, one of the links has been disabled, but there’s a little.
Ah, we appear to have reached the daily moment at which the stopped clock tells the right time.
Johnson was never really interested in Brexit. Hence the NI Protocol exists, when it shouldn’t. For Johnson, Brexit was just a box to tick – nothing more.
Cameron specifically said “anyone but Boris” when the leadership contest began after his resignation.
I half agree Mr B. He was targetted yes. But Johnson failed Brexit in 2020-22. He was panicked by the hostile and hysterical media & NHS First Lobby into lockdown. Ok – a dreadful time. But several months in it was perfectly obvious that the total suffocation of economic activity was a gift for the deranged Remainiacs desperate to strangle Brexit at birth (Covid arrived Day 2). Instead of showing both courage and alertness to the grave danger, Boris danced jiggs seeing his popularity soar when he acted all Churchillian and talked of War. Then he doomed us further by embracing the insane MMT magic money tree experiment, so locking future hyper inflation into our system. It was not even he who finally broke the Imperial Big Lie Orthodoxy & stopped Year 3 of lockdown. Did he not notive how eagerly far left unions embraced lockdown?? Johnson killed Brexit at birth by bending the knee to a hostile pro Lockdown State. Game over Day 3.
Johnson couldn’t give a toss about Brexit- are you really so easily fooled? You honestly think he cares about anything but his own advantage?
When it came to the campaign, he hummed and hahed, he wrote his little ‘pro’ and ‘against’ list, and decided, at the end of the day, it was going to happen, and then, and only then he joined the Leave camp. As an ideologically empty narcissist- would gain the most from supporting the inevitable.
If he was “brought down”, it was by his own lying, corrupt, narcissistic and uttrerly vacuous personality- not by some evil conspiracy. Luckily for him -and all of his kind- there are always plenty of suckers who uncritically worship a “personality” .
Brexit did have a champion and it was Boris Johnson. That’s why they made so much effort to bring him down.
I think you have missed the point a bit. The people living in some of these places are DESPERATE for change. Brexit was a massive deal for them, they would at least have expected it to lower the number of immigrants arriving. That hasn’t happened. That’s the point. I agree to be honest, if more are arriving still, after three years, it has failed them. These towns are on their knees. Good article unherd. These are the places that need real help.
100%. I thought this article was very good in revealing more of the daily horrors still experienced in mass migratory target towns. We already know why and how Brexit has been de-railed by the indifferent faraway London ‘elite’.
Jolly good Mr marvell something we can agree on. If we care about these towns it means caring about the people in them too. So you understand me the way I see it is we can’t start bashing the underclass and huge sectors of our immigrant population, that isn’t going to help, blaming them for the problems. Also in these towns people have to live along side each other, dividing communities further is only a bad thing. The country was catastrophically mismanaged it seems. So let’s pin it on the governments that have repeatedly neglected these places.
The problem is that nobody actually cares about such towns, the issues within them are the symptom of this chronic lack of care, and there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything besides use them for vacuous virtue signalling exercises before being once again ignored for a more fashionable cause.
This article offers a few handpicked stories from a single town focussing on the very issues that anyone not living in an off grid hobbit hole for a decade could have told you are the priorities of Brexit land. It’s not offering anything new to think about, it’s merely rehashing the same talking points that many remainers have been dismissing as ignorant and racist since the referendum. It might not be directly sneering at people in neighbourhoods like mine, but as it has no new insights to offer, it’s just another dull article on the subject du jour that journos decide they have to cover.
Well said!
The problem is that nobody actually cares about such towns, the issues within them are the symptom of this chronic lack of care, and there’s no incentive for anyone to do anything besides use them for vacuous virtue signalling exercises before being once again ignored for a more fashionable cause.
This article offers a few handpicked stories from a single town focussing on the very issues that anyone not living in an off grid hobbit hole for a decade could have told you are the priorities of Brexit land. It’s not offering anything new to think about, it’s merely rehashing the same talking points that many remainers have been dismissing as ignorant and racist since the referendum. It might not be directly sneering at people in neighbourhoods like mine, but as it has no new insights to offer, it’s just another dull article on the subject du jour that journos decide they have to cover.
Well said!
I’m at an utter loss as to understand how a brexit supporting tory party with an 80 SEAT MAJORITY and the hardcore support of four national newspapers is somehow thwarted by a shadowy London elite! How are they influencing actual policy? For goodness sake you won (sort of); this is your Brexit. Own it.
I am sure Brexit voters happily own being out of the tawdry EU Empire, no matter the fact we are still in neutral! I sure do! I watched their callous indifference as Greece burnt, their gleeful guzzling of Russian gas and nuzzling up to Putin and Xi (but not Ukraine). Did you see them try to steal our vaccines, suppress innovation with oppressive Prussian bureaucratism, promote clean German diesel and generally act like a thuggish protectionist cartel, especially to the Third World? Happily free! Covid and the lockdown insanity is obviously the main factor which has stopped forward progress. Our law is still EU law. The lack of energy within the battered hapless Tories is another factor. That much is clear. But you ask – how could the (very unshadowy) permanent Remainer British State, technocracy and civil service possibly find ways to frustrate Brexit and the power of a Parliamentary majority in Britain?? Really??? Are you reading a Ladybird book on our democracy?? Have you not observed the revolutionary changes in governance since 1997, all made to diminish the power of national Parliaments within EU States??
There’s nothing shadowy about the Public Service and the myriad of quangos and NGOs. Every leader needs the support of a staff and trustworthy staffers and they were all Remainers.
How do they influence policy? They send the emails, they write the letters, they attend the conferences on the Ministers behalf, they draft the answers to the PMQs. This is a large country with a long-established executive. It can’t be personally run like a country vicarage. That’s why Boris was so important.
I am sure Brexit voters happily own being out of the tawdry EU Empire, no matter the fact we are still in neutral! I sure do! I watched their callous indifference as Greece burnt, their gleeful guzzling of Russian gas and nuzzling up to Putin and Xi (but not Ukraine). Did you see them try to steal our vaccines, suppress innovation with oppressive Prussian bureaucratism, promote clean German diesel and generally act like a thuggish protectionist cartel, especially to the Third World? Happily free! Covid and the lockdown insanity is obviously the main factor which has stopped forward progress. Our law is still EU law. The lack of energy within the battered hapless Tories is another factor. That much is clear. But you ask – how could the (very unshadowy) permanent Remainer British State, technocracy and civil service possibly find ways to frustrate Brexit and the power of a Parliamentary majority in Britain?? Really??? Are you reading a Ladybird book on our democracy?? Have you not observed the revolutionary changes in governance since 1997, all made to diminish the power of national Parliaments within EU States??
There’s nothing shadowy about the Public Service and the myriad of quangos and NGOs. Every leader needs the support of a staff and trustworthy staffers and they were all Remainers.
How do they influence policy? They send the emails, they write the letters, they attend the conferences on the Ministers behalf, they draft the answers to the PMQs. This is a large country with a long-established executive. It can’t be personally run like a country vicarage. That’s why Boris was so important.
Jolly good Mr marvell something we can agree on. If we care about these towns it means caring about the people in them too. So you understand me the way I see it is we can’t start bashing the underclass and huge sectors of our immigrant population, that isn’t going to help, blaming them for the problems. Also in these towns people have to live along side each other, dividing communities further is only a bad thing. The country was catastrophically mismanaged it seems. So let’s pin it on the governments that have repeatedly neglected these places.
I’m at an utter loss as to understand how a brexit supporting tory party with an 80 SEAT MAJORITY and the hardcore support of four national newspapers is somehow thwarted by a shadowy London elite! How are they influencing actual policy? For goodness sake you won (sort of); this is your Brexit. Own it.
Read my earlier reply. We don’t telling about these towns being on their knees, we’re living in them, thanks. It’s NOT down to Brexit.
The immigration in Boston is the problem. Brexit was a vote to cut immigration. There are still new immigrants arriving there every day the article says. So brexit has failed them. The people there, immigration was the main issue. It is still the main issue. For whatever reason, brexit hasn’t delivered for them. It’s no good beating about the bush. I’m afraid whatever version of brexit this is, just isn’t working for these places. I’m not a rejoin the EU fan, I think we are still better off out of it, but the article is correct to say that at the moment, brexit hasn’t had the impact up there that was promised. The author wasn’t ‘hanging the woes’ on the brexit debate itself. Sounds like once again our immigration laws and quotas still aren’t working. Brexit doesn’t seem to have made a difference. No one is blaming the brexit debate for these issues, just saying that as a tool to fix them, the current version of brexit in Boston at the moment, it’s not working.
The immigration in Boston is the problem. Brexit was a vote to cut immigration. There are still new immigrants arriving there every day the article says. So brexit has failed them. The people there, immigration was the main issue. It is still the main issue. For whatever reason, brexit hasn’t delivered for them. It’s no good beating about the bush. I’m afraid whatever version of brexit this is, just isn’t working for these places. I’m not a rejoin the EU fan, I think we are still better off out of it, but the article is correct to say that at the moment, brexit hasn’t had the impact up there that was promised. The author wasn’t ‘hanging the woes’ on the brexit debate itself. Sounds like once again our immigration laws and quotas still aren’t working. Brexit doesn’t seem to have made a difference. No one is blaming the brexit debate for these issues, just saying that as a tool to fix them, the current version of brexit in Boston at the moment, it’s not working.
100%. I thought this article was very good in revealing more of the daily horrors still experienced in mass migratory target towns. We already know why and how Brexit has been de-railed by the indifferent faraway London ‘elite’.
Read my earlier reply. We don’t telling about these towns being on their knees, we’re living in them, thanks. It’s NOT down to Brexit.
It’s as if the editors at Unherd haven’t realised that most of us who are actually here reading and commenting day after day are utterly bored with this remainer narrative, and no amount of polls or verbose explanatory articles is going to make us suddenly have an appetite for them flogging this dead horse some more.
Remain is a subject that only ever highlights the affluence and hypocrisy of those who cling to it, it’s a narrative that says the average person is too stupid for their opinions to count, that they need the patronising hand of the affluent elites to tell them what to think and make decisions for them. Time to put it to one side, and deal with the world as it is and stop daydreaming about some fantasy version of the EU that never existed.
OK, you’re a secular saint and a man of the people, we get that, kudos to you.
But do you have any practical suggestions please?
Whilst I’d love to be a man of the people, I lack the reproductive equipment to be a man of anything.
As for practical suggestions, are there any practical suggestions that can overcome the monstrous clusterf*ck that is the bureaucracy and political systems of this country?
Of course it would be nice if there were some succinct, easy and obvious suggestions to post up here, but it is pretty much impossible to try to account for the many different ideological agendas in play, the incestuous relations between corporations and governments, and the Global economic dumpster fire in the time it takes to drink a coffee. Thus, it’s not really a reasonable demand to make.
Of course, if you want to spend several months going back and forth, we can probably come up with a few practical suggestions in that time frame, presumably if we haven’t all been nuked, frozen to death, or died from climate change in the meantime.
I am sure however that those in this comment section would be very pleased to hear any practical suggestions you have to offer, rather than watch you repeat the same question after every comment without providing any examples for us mere mortals to try to imitate.
Uncalled for and snide.
We could become a democracy. Then blaming the government is like blaming yourself and we would have to come up with ideas. If we became a democracy all of the UK would decide if Scotland, N Ireland and Wales would separate off.
I know where that wouldn’t be popular.
Whilst I’d love to be a man of the people, I lack the reproductive equipment to be a man of anything.
As for practical suggestions, are there any practical suggestions that can overcome the monstrous clusterf*ck that is the bureaucracy and political systems of this country?
Of course it would be nice if there were some succinct, easy and obvious suggestions to post up here, but it is pretty much impossible to try to account for the many different ideological agendas in play, the incestuous relations between corporations and governments, and the Global economic dumpster fire in the time it takes to drink a coffee. Thus, it’s not really a reasonable demand to make.
Of course, if you want to spend several months going back and forth, we can probably come up with a few practical suggestions in that time frame, presumably if we haven’t all been nuked, frozen to death, or died from climate change in the meantime.
I am sure however that those in this comment section would be very pleased to hear any practical suggestions you have to offer, rather than watch you repeat the same question after every comment without providing any examples for us mere mortals to try to imitate.
Uncalled for and snide.
We could become a democracy. Then blaming the government is like blaming yourself and we would have to come up with ideas. If we became a democracy all of the UK would decide if Scotland, N Ireland and Wales would separate off.
I know where that wouldn’t be popular.
OK, you’re a secular saint and a man of the people, we get that, kudos to you.
But do you have any practical suggestions please?
“In order to succeed, articles might be better focusing not on “Brexit isn’t working” as if it were meant to be some magic bullet…”
On the one hand, we had/have people talking about Brexit as if it were going to be all milk and honey on day 1 without anything having to change or anyone having to seriously pull their finger out…but on the other, you have another bunch of people who think that going back to the single market (which is the more likely option rather than re-entry into the EU) is going to sort everything out, pronto. Both of these groups are delusional and don’t seem to be able to see further than the end of their own noses.
Going back into the single market might solve certain issues (import/export restrictions)…but other problems are global or continental in nature and have very little to do with being in/out of the EU. Case in point: the lack of skilled labour. Being outside the EU might make getting staff from the EU a bit more tricky…but what if the problem is that there just aren’t enough of these people in the EU anyway? Then the extra bureaucracy isn’t the issue. Since both Germany and Austria have been wringing their hands about this issue for years now – that should tell you that EU membership ISN’T the core issue here. Maybe your education system is outdated and not producing people with the skills you need. Maybe taxes are so punitive that the brightest sparks go somewhere more attractive. In Austria, the Kafkaesque bureaucracy and sheer rudeness of staff at the immigration authorities probably do their bit to scare good people off. It could be any number of things – but you need to start taking a good hard look at the wider scheme of things rather than focus on a single, divisive issue.
It may be because we are so used to having things so easy and comfortable in the West; it might also be to do with the rise of social media playing havoc with our attention spans and ability to think in a sustained way…but everybody seems to be hankering after quick solutions and silver bullets. And there aren’t any. Only tough calls that require painful trade-offs and serious graft over a number of years – if not decades.
Brexit might be a kind of blessing in disguise for Britain as there is now nowhere else to look and no-one else to blame for your problems. In that regard, the discussion should move away from Brexit and start looking at the bigger, long term picture. It looks quite grim from over here, but there is a reason why people say “best foot forward”. Sitting in the gutter crying about Brexit solves precisely none of your problems.
For the sake of completeness, I will just add to that already considerable rant that German/Austrian media are all over the “the majority now regrets Brexit” thing, revelling in every little problem Britain has…while conveniently failing to add that a lot of those problems ail them too. It’s a pretty toxic mix of schadenfreude, whataboutery and denial which is not going to do anyone any good. Britain isn’t unique in many of its issues…simply ahead of the curve.
Quite. We are able to see the problems clearly and we now have more freedom to do something about them – and to do it quickly. There are many advantages to being smaller and the ability to move faster is one of them. The more time the Germans, Austrians and others spend talking about our “problems”, the less they spend on facing up to their own. I’m fairly confident we’ll make more progress and faster than them.
Britain has made mistakes but I dislike this attitude of disdain towards it for experiencing difficulties per se. No change occurs without some kind of turbulence/pain happening, and change is what will bring Britain into the future. Entities/countries that avoid turbulence and change at all costs will simply get ground under the wheels of history…or end up having much messier revolutions.
Britain has made mistakes but I dislike this attitude of disdain towards it for experiencing difficulties per se. No change occurs without some kind of turbulence/pain happening, and change is what will bring Britain into the future. Entities/countries that avoid turbulence and change at all costs will simply get ground under the wheels of history…or end up having much messier revolutions.
Quite. We are able to see the problems clearly and we now have more freedom to do something about them – and to do it quickly. There are many advantages to being smaller and the ability to move faster is one of them. The more time the Germans, Austrians and others spend talking about our “problems”, the less they spend on facing up to their own. I’m fairly confident we’ll make more progress and faster than them.
“Going back into the single market might solve certain issues”
Given that the UK has a comprehensive trade deal I would suggest that re-joining the single market would solve very few problems, other than sending fresh sausages to NI.
But it would create many more, as the UK would be subject to many EU laws — over which it would have no control — and it would have to scrap many promising initiatives such as TPP membership and freeports.
For the benefits of Brexit to become fully realised, it needs our politicians to do some heavy lifting, which so far they seem incapable of doing. That was my point – that it’s never been “land of milk and honey” territory and it was recognised pre-Brexit there may well be a dip in the UK economy before things started to change. Then came Covid, and the rest. I see you’ve reached the right conclusion though.
In even the best circumstances, all that Brexit was ever realistically capable of doing was stripping out one layer of corrupt, inept and micro-managing bureaucracy, but that was always going to have a consequence of putting more pressure on all of the other layers of corrupt, inept and micro-managing bureaucracy that exist within our borders as well as provide further opportunities for their corporate friends to take the Michael out of us.
I don’t believe that the vast majority really did think that ticking the Brexit box was going to be a one step ticket to the land of milk and honey even if it is politically convenient to remainers to paint it that way. Brexit was always going to be a very small step on a long road of painful political reform that pretty much everyone in politics and business would dig their heels in and resist, because to enable it would be a threat to the power they’ve accumulated.
In even the best circumstances, all that Brexit was ever realistically capable of doing was stripping out one layer of corrupt, inept and micro-managing bureaucracy, but that was always going to have a consequence of putting more pressure on all of the other layers of corrupt, inept and micro-managing bureaucracy that exist within our borders as well as provide further opportunities for their corporate friends to take the Michael out of us.
I don’t believe that the vast majority really did think that ticking the Brexit box was going to be a one step ticket to the land of milk and honey even if it is politically convenient to remainers to paint it that way. Brexit was always going to be a very small step on a long road of painful political reform that pretty much everyone in politics and business would dig their heels in and resist, because to enable it would be a threat to the power they’ve accumulated.
Yes, very good points
For the sake of completeness, I will just add to that already considerable rant that German/Austrian media are all over the “the majority now regrets Brexit” thing, revelling in every little problem Britain has…while conveniently failing to add that a lot of those problems ail them too. It’s a pretty toxic mix of schadenfreude, whataboutery and denial which is not going to do anyone any good. Britain isn’t unique in many of its issues…simply ahead of the curve.
“Going back into the single market might solve certain issues”
Given that the UK has a comprehensive trade deal I would suggest that re-joining the single market would solve very few problems, other than sending fresh sausages to NI.
But it would create many more, as the UK would be subject to many EU laws — over which it would have no control — and it would have to scrap many promising initiatives such as TPP membership and freeports.
For the benefits of Brexit to become fully realised, it needs our politicians to do some heavy lifting, which so far they seem incapable of doing. That was my point – that it’s never been “land of milk and honey” territory and it was recognised pre-Brexit there may well be a dip in the UK economy before things started to change. Then came Covid, and the rest. I see you’ve reached the right conclusion though.
Yes, very good points
Boston, and the surrounding area, was destroyed by EU policy.
It has not recovered, but that does not make people want to go back to the EU…it makes people want a government that is going to exploit the chance to change.
Precisely.
Precisely.
Absolutely agree with you. UNHERD has become the Guardian. Polling outside of the MSM & ‘Westminster bubble’ suggest there is no buyers regret concerning Brexit. What is apparent is that the Westminster ‘Blob’ have no intention of fulfilling Brexit. For me, as Mick Hume exposed in his excellent book ‘REVOLTING’, is that the Government(s) are in utter contempt of their subjects & have bitten that EU bug where they are actively demolishing democracy!!! Still now we see them in the spotlight for what they are.. Worthless self serving scumbags!!!!
As usual, not a single practical suggestion, other than vague exhortations to “get to it”.
To what?
Can you list your practical suggestions please – you surely by now have had long enough to come up with something – anything.
Brexit is all mouth and no trousers, lol.
Banging on about a non-politician (i’m an artist) coming up with solutions to complex issues is no argument whatsoever, but i dare say you’ll trundle it out again when there’s nothing else left to say.
Suggestions:
Leave the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human rights.
Guest worker status for specified foreign nationals much like Germany’s Gastarbeiter scheme.
Scrap those EU laws and directives that are not within our interests.
Adopt WTO trading status.
Take back control of our fishing grounds although I understand that the licences are mainly in foreign hands.
If you want to join me down the pub I’m sure we could sort out this little problem in an evening :]
Banging on about a non-politician (i’m an artist) coming up with solutions to complex issues is no argument whatsoever, but i dare say you’ll trundle it out again when there’s nothing else left to say.
Suggestions:
Leave the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human rights.
Guest worker status for specified foreign nationals much like Germany’s Gastarbeiter scheme.
Scrap those EU laws and directives that are not within our interests.
Adopt WTO trading status.
Take back control of our fishing grounds although I understand that the licences are mainly in foreign hands.
If you want to join me down the pub I’m sure we could sort out this little problem in an evening :]
Surely the problem of Brexit (and the reason that politicians stubbornly refuse to “make the most of Brexit”) is that Brexit itself was a scapegoat – a gigantic feat of misdirection.
Brexit was two different things – to Conservative politicians and their hangers on, it was, primarily, an opportunity to derugulate – to diverge from European standards and thereby (they hoped) turbocharge the profitability of business. This prospectus excites wealthy Tory donors but doesn’t resonate much beyond that (their troublesome regulations are your food standards and Brexiters don’t want those cut any more than Remainers).
What made Brexit a popular cause was that it was presented as a way to right all of the political wrongs of the past 50 years. Under-investment in the regions? Brexit will fix that.Over reliance on imigrant labour? Brexit will fix that. Under-funding of the NHS? Brexit will fix that. Democratic deficit… you get the picture. But, in fact, none of these problems were fundamentally caused by the EU and, therefore, leaving the EU doesn’t fix them.
Even in the case of immigration, we could have imposed the transitional restrictions on immigration that almost all the other rich economies of Europe adopted. But we didn’t because the UK government wanted to continue its low wage/flexible labour force model.
Boston’s problems weren’t created in Brussels, they originate in Westminster.
The grotesque irony is that the country desperately needed a massive change of direction but, through the referendum, responsibility for making the changes required – decentralisation, infrastructure investment, a shift to a higher wage and better diversified economy etc – has been handed to the exact same bunch of freemarket wingnuts who created the problems that Brexit was intended to fix.
Thanks for this, George. One of the more reasonable and reasoned btl comments.
Good points well made.
We are addicted to a low wage economy, we lack so many skills necessary for our future prosperity.
Great comment.
Thanks for this, George. One of the more reasonable and reasoned btl comments.
Good points well made.
We are addicted to a low wage economy, we lack so many skills necessary for our future prosperity.
Great comment.
Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.
The article does mention a number of possible causes, not just Brexit. And there lies the rub. Was Brexit sold as a panacea for real and perceived problems? Now the reality is in clear view.
I do not live in Britain, nor am I a ‘Remainer’. Just thought I’d say that!
I’d tend to agree with that. Our political classes now have nowhere to hide, but the opportunities to make real changes which Brexit presented still exist, which they hitherto wouldn’t do.
I’d tend to agree with that. Our political classes now have nowhere to hide, but the opportunities to make real changes which Brexit presented still exist, which they hitherto wouldn’t do.
Far too much of our national political debate is directed by rather dubious polling carried out by people and organisations with too much skin in the game. Plus, if course, there are the endless statistics produced by economists and supranational bodies like the execrable IMF …
‘that and the reluctance of the indigenous population to work on the fertile land picking crops. Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.’
I suppose if the locals lived in a caravan like the incomers they would be less reluctant to work?
I remember the Blair government reassuring us that only 13,000 Eastern European would settle in the UK,I’m not sure if it’s 5 million plus but whatever the number belonging to the EU has driven down wages for many people.
I voted Brexit but admit it’s a work in progress, we were members for 40 years, it will take decades to reap the benefits assuming our political class makes it work.
” the failings of our political classes” – Exactly. The people voted for local governance so they left the EU only to get incompetent local politicians. But this seems a worldwide issue no matter where you are. Perhaps we are victims of popularity contests pitting lesser evils as candidates. Where have people of principle gone? Are they afraid of cancellation? Seems those not of the elite group, like a Trump, are quickly weeded out. It’s amazing such a crude person got elected but yet he did try to change the system and the elite will have none of that. But he did withstand the constant attacks and they aren’t quite finished yet. We need more to say “this is wrong” and proceed to remedy the issue, or at least try, as they too will be attacked endlessly.
Thanks for this Steve. After todays Unherd articles judging Brexit as a failure after a mere 3 years, and after global disruptions of Covid and Ukraine, I feel my devotion to Unherd is waning – I like to see alternate views, but the repeated shallow theme in 3 articles that Brexit has failed with no countering view, suggests to me that Unherd, as you suggest, is changing tack.
Time to decamp to Spiked unless I see alternate views published this week.
None of this drivel has the first thing to do with Brexit.
Unherd is rapidly becoming the BBC.
Good points. But our entire political class was and is pro EU and Remainer. Large parts of the Tory Party – its Chancellor included – are also Remainer. You could barely fill the Cabinet Office with passionate Brexiteers from the Cabinet AND Parliament. The vast army of civil service & technocracy (enraged at the loss of 100k Euro pensions) has sat on its hands and effectively sabotaged any of the token and limp effort by the Covid-bust Executive to drive Brex forward. Brexit was led by the provinces and people outside Westminster, demanding an end to the multiple socio economic injustices – uncontrolled mass migration, the destruction of unplanned public services, the rigged SE Property Boom that enriched ‘our political class’ and more – that have blighted Boston and trashed our country. Brexit has no leaders and no army in the political sphere. The civil service & BBC are busy and successfully ‘bullying’ them out – Johnson, Priti tick tick Raab & Suella next. Who else is there??? The counter revolution by the pro EU State has succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. And look who may enter Number 10 next! The man who actually led the battle to overturn democracy. Lets campaign a second ballot if he wins. Losers consent is for wimps. I weep for places like Boston. All betrayed.
I think you have missed the point a bit. The people living in some of these places are DESPERATE for change. Brexit was a massive deal for them, they would at least have expected it to lower the number of immigrants arriving. That hasn’t happened. That’s the point. I agree to be honest, if more are arriving still, after three years, it has failed them. These towns are on their knees. Good article unherd. These are the places that need real help.
It’s as if the editors at Unherd haven’t realised that most of us who are actually here reading and commenting day after day are utterly bored with this remainer narrative, and no amount of polls or verbose explanatory articles is going to make us suddenly have an appetite for them flogging this dead horse some more.
Remain is a subject that only ever highlights the affluence and hypocrisy of those who cling to it, it’s a narrative that says the average person is too stupid for their opinions to count, that they need the patronising hand of the affluent elites to tell them what to think and make decisions for them. Time to put it to one side, and deal with the world as it is and stop daydreaming about some fantasy version of the EU that never existed.
“In order to succeed, articles might be better focusing not on “Brexit isn’t working” as if it were meant to be some magic bullet…”
On the one hand, we had/have people talking about Brexit as if it were going to be all milk and honey on day 1 without anything having to change or anyone having to seriously pull their finger out…but on the other, you have another bunch of people who think that going back to the single market (which is the more likely option rather than re-entry into the EU) is going to sort everything out, pronto. Both of these groups are delusional and don’t seem to be able to see further than the end of their own noses.
Going back into the single market might solve certain issues (import/export restrictions)…but other problems are global or continental in nature and have very little to do with being in/out of the EU. Case in point: the lack of skilled labour. Being outside the EU might make getting staff from the EU a bit more tricky…but what if the problem is that there just aren’t enough of these people in the EU anyway? Then the extra bureaucracy isn’t the issue. Since both Germany and Austria have been wringing their hands about this issue for years now – that should tell you that EU membership ISN’T the core issue here. Maybe your education system is outdated and not producing people with the skills you need. Maybe taxes are so punitive that the brightest sparks go somewhere more attractive. In Austria, the Kafkaesque bureaucracy and sheer rudeness of staff at the immigration authorities probably do their bit to scare good people off. It could be any number of things – but you need to start taking a good hard look at the wider scheme of things rather than focus on a single, divisive issue.
It may be because we are so used to having things so easy and comfortable in the West; it might also be to do with the rise of social media playing havoc with our attention spans and ability to think in a sustained way…but everybody seems to be hankering after quick solutions and silver bullets. And there aren’t any. Only tough calls that require painful trade-offs and serious graft over a number of years – if not decades.
Brexit might be a kind of blessing in disguise for Britain as there is now nowhere else to look and no-one else to blame for your problems. In that regard, the discussion should move away from Brexit and start looking at the bigger, long term picture. It looks quite grim from over here, but there is a reason why people say “best foot forward”. Sitting in the gutter crying about Brexit solves precisely none of your problems.
Boston, and the surrounding area, was destroyed by EU policy.
It has not recovered, but that does not make people want to go back to the EU…it makes people want a government that is going to exploit the chance to change.
Absolutely agree with you. UNHERD has become the Guardian. Polling outside of the MSM & ‘Westminster bubble’ suggest there is no buyers regret concerning Brexit. What is apparent is that the Westminster ‘Blob’ have no intention of fulfilling Brexit. For me, as Mick Hume exposed in his excellent book ‘REVOLTING’, is that the Government(s) are in utter contempt of their subjects & have bitten that EU bug where they are actively demolishing democracy!!! Still now we see them in the spotlight for what they are.. Worthless self serving scumbags!!!!
As usual, not a single practical suggestion, other than vague exhortations to “get to it”.
To what?
Can you list your practical suggestions please – you surely by now have had long enough to come up with something – anything.
Brexit is all mouth and no trousers, lol.
Surely the problem of Brexit (and the reason that politicians stubbornly refuse to “make the most of Brexit”) is that Brexit itself was a scapegoat – a gigantic feat of misdirection.
Brexit was two different things – to Conservative politicians and their hangers on, it was, primarily, an opportunity to derugulate – to diverge from European standards and thereby (they hoped) turbocharge the profitability of business. This prospectus excites wealthy Tory donors but doesn’t resonate much beyond that (their troublesome regulations are your food standards and Brexiters don’t want those cut any more than Remainers).
What made Brexit a popular cause was that it was presented as a way to right all of the political wrongs of the past 50 years. Under-investment in the regions? Brexit will fix that.Over reliance on imigrant labour? Brexit will fix that. Under-funding of the NHS? Brexit will fix that. Democratic deficit… you get the picture. But, in fact, none of these problems were fundamentally caused by the EU and, therefore, leaving the EU doesn’t fix them.
Even in the case of immigration, we could have imposed the transitional restrictions on immigration that almost all the other rich economies of Europe adopted. But we didn’t because the UK government wanted to continue its low wage/flexible labour force model.
Boston’s problems weren’t created in Brussels, they originate in Westminster.
The grotesque irony is that the country desperately needed a massive change of direction but, through the referendum, responsibility for making the changes required – decentralisation, infrastructure investment, a shift to a higher wage and better diversified economy etc – has been handed to the exact same bunch of freemarket wingnuts who created the problems that Brexit was intended to fix.
Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.
The article does mention a number of possible causes, not just Brexit. And there lies the rub. Was Brexit sold as a panacea for real and perceived problems? Now the reality is in clear view.
I do not live in Britain, nor am I a ‘Remainer’. Just thought I’d say that!
Far too much of our national political debate is directed by rather dubious polling carried out by people and organisations with too much skin in the game. Plus, if course, there are the endless statistics produced by economists and supranational bodies like the execrable IMF …
‘that and the reluctance of the indigenous population to work on the fertile land picking crops. Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.’
I suppose if the locals lived in a caravan like the incomers they would be less reluctant to work?
I remember the Blair government reassuring us that only 13,000 Eastern European would settle in the UK,I’m not sure if it’s 5 million plus but whatever the number belonging to the EU has driven down wages for many people.
I voted Brexit but admit it’s a work in progress, we were members for 40 years, it will take decades to reap the benefits assuming our political class makes it work.
” the failings of our political classes” – Exactly. The people voted for local governance so they left the EU only to get incompetent local politicians. But this seems a worldwide issue no matter where you are. Perhaps we are victims of popularity contests pitting lesser evils as candidates. Where have people of principle gone? Are they afraid of cancellation? Seems those not of the elite group, like a Trump, are quickly weeded out. It’s amazing such a crude person got elected but yet he did try to change the system and the elite will have none of that. But he did withstand the constant attacks and they aren’t quite finished yet. We need more to say “this is wrong” and proceed to remedy the issue, or at least try, as they too will be attacked endlessly.
Thanks for this Steve. After todays Unherd articles judging Brexit as a failure after a mere 3 years, and after global disruptions of Covid and Ukraine, I feel my devotion to Unherd is waning – I like to see alternate views, but the repeated shallow theme in 3 articles that Brexit has failed with no countering view, suggests to me that Unherd, as you suggest, is changing tack.
Time to decamp to Spiked unless I see alternate views published this week.
Following on from yesterday’s offerings, Unherd are really going to town (in this case, literally) over a poll. I’d simply raise the question: would Boston be any better off without Brexit?
It was being part of the EU that started the immigrant trail to places like Boston; that and the reluctance of the indigenous population to work on the fertile land picking crops. Hanging all these woes on Brexit is intellectually incoherent.
Much needs to be done to turn places like Boston around, and simply railing at the outcome of a referendum is an easy way of avoiding grasping the political nettles which have been allowed to grow for decades. I therefore see all this journalism (Newsnight last night, included) as an attempt at deflection from the failings of our political classes, both at home and prior to Brexit, abroad. At least following Brexit, the finger can be pointed more precisely.
I also detect another trend, however. It’s my opinion that since the launch of Unherd, a perception may have arisen that it may have swung in a Right-leaning direction. If that’s the case, it would simply be because views are being given space which aren’t usually by MSM. If i’m right (as it were), i see these articles as an attempt by the editorial staff at Unherd to try to redress this perception, perhaps for very good commercial reasons. Having a readership and respondents skewed one way or the other isn’t good for business. To be fair, i can live with that; in fact, welcome it. All views should be aired, that’s the point isn’t it? Only then, can they be challenged.
But it brings me back to an earlier point about intellectual coherence. In order to succeed, articles might be better focusing not on “Brexit isn’t working” as if it were meant to be some magic bullet, but “Why aren’t our political class making the most of Brexit”. Get to it, please.
”That is the tragedy of Boston as Brexitland. It was supposed to be a Land of Hope and Glory, but the party only lasted one night.”
OMG…. well do something then – Defund the Police, Teach CRT, open a gender therapy clinic, build Windmills, come on – lots of things to do to sort this out. Reduce Carbon – that will help a lot, put EV charging points in for motorists, have the farmers set aside 10% of their land for wildlife, Plant Trees – come on, there are a thousand things to do to fix this.
Our politicians are morons, our “journalists” are morons, and many more besides.
Any practical suggestions John, or is spewing generalised insults your main contribution?
The distinguishing characteristic of Brexiter thinking is how long it is on sanctimonious inverted snobbery rhetoric and how short it is on practical policies.
Politicians, Journalists and most Senior Civil servants live in a small chic area of North London.
They have their own self-sustaining ideologies —everybody they meet over a glass of wine agrees with them — and the rest of the country are simply ill-informed and need re-educating.
Any practical suggestions John, or is spewing generalised insults your main contribution?
The distinguishing characteristic of Brexiter thinking is how long it is on sanctimonious inverted snobbery rhetoric and how short it is on practical policies.
Politicians, Journalists and most Senior Civil servants live in a small chic area of North London.
They have their own self-sustaining ideologies —everybody they meet over a glass of wine agrees with them — and the rest of the country are simply ill-informed and need re-educating.
Our politicians are morons, our “journalists” are morons, and many more besides.
”That is the tragedy of Boston as Brexitland. It was supposed to be a Land of Hope and Glory, but the party only lasted one night.”
OMG…. well do something then – Defund the Police, Teach CRT, open a gender therapy clinic, build Windmills, come on – lots of things to do to sort this out. Reduce Carbon – that will help a lot, put EV charging points in for motorists, have the farmers set aside 10% of their land for wildlife, Plant Trees – come on, there are a thousand things to do to fix this.
It’s been three years of plague and a year of war in Europe. Way to early to be judging the merits of Brexit.
None of the problems in Boston are down to Brexit though are they? Current high levels of immigration, a lack of jobs and non existent police are down to the Tories, they haven’t been caused by Britain leaving the EU
No surprise there. Most of the so-called Conservative Party are, and always will be, Remainers.
It was Edward Heath who took us into the bloody thing in the first place.
The EU is a dearly-held foible for British elites, who like to feel they have more in common (probably true) with their continental equivalents than with their fellow British, whom they look down upon.
The EU provides elites with an opportunity to excercise the same kind of contempt for Britain among the educated British left-liberals that George Orwell described in Road to Wigan Pier. Except that in this case, the disdain is (sometimes, not always) disguised under a mantle of faux-progressive platitudes, if not downright lies and misrepresentations, about how lovely and ‘good’ the EU is.
Plus, of course, with the EU creating the laws and instructing the civil service on their implementation, our politicians didn’t have to actually govern, and the civil service didn’t have to work out how to make it happen.
Politicians got to buzz about going to meetings, serving on committees and quangos, feeling important but without any real responsibility for outcomes. The civil service just followed instructions.
Brexit has revealed how ineffectual and lacking in understanding, abilities or talents our political classes really are.
One of the reasons I voted for Brexit was for this to become this plain, and I suspect, why so many politicians were against it.
The senior Civil Service have NEVER just followed instructions. They have always tried to impose their wtll on politicians who, not being experts in the field, have usually accepted the advice put before them as gospel without challenging it! They hated Mrs T because she actually told them what SHEwanted to happen.
A very important observation. Remember Gove describing how they all sat in Whitehall waiting passively on Mondays for the EU boxes to arrive from Brussels??. 60% of that paperwork cooled up by the Commission went directly into our laws! 40 years as an EU province utterly neutered our governing class. Lets hope independence rekindles the lost art of intitiative and independent thinking.
The senior Civil Service have NEVER just followed instructions. They have always tried to impose their wtll on politicians who, not being experts in the field, have usually accepted the advice put before them as gospel without challenging it! They hated Mrs T because she actually told them what SHEwanted to happen.
A very important observation. Remember Gove describing how they all sat in Whitehall waiting passively on Mondays for the EU boxes to arrive from Brussels??. 60% of that paperwork cooled up by the Commission went directly into our laws! 40 years as an EU province utterly neutered our governing class. Lets hope independence rekindles the lost art of intitiative and independent thinking.
Not a single practical suggestion in your moralistic rant.
So what ? He wasn’t replying to you.
I don’t find anything “moralistic” in what he wrote. Not that that matters.
You can wait all day for a practical suggestion. People have become polarised. Remainers hope (not believe) that something as big as the EU must be safe and secure. Ask them if they want to commit as far as having the euro as currency.
The Brexiteers feel that Europe is useless and that the UK is better in some way. Then they go on to blame everybody in our government for not being better. A total dearth of ideas.
So what ? He wasn’t replying to you.
I don’t find anything “moralistic” in what he wrote. Not that that matters.
You can wait all day for a practical suggestion. People have become polarised. Remainers hope (not believe) that something as big as the EU must be safe and secure. Ask them if they want to commit as far as having the euro as currency.
The Brexiteers feel that Europe is useless and that the UK is better in some way. Then they go on to blame everybody in our government for not being better. A total dearth of ideas.
Plus, of course, with the EU creating the laws and instructing the civil service on their implementation, our politicians didn’t have to actually govern, and the civil service didn’t have to work out how to make it happen.
Politicians got to buzz about going to meetings, serving on committees and quangos, feeling important but without any real responsibility for outcomes. The civil service just followed instructions.
Brexit has revealed how ineffectual and lacking in understanding, abilities or talents our political classes really are.
One of the reasons I voted for Brexit was for this to become this plain, and I suspect, why so many politicians were against it.
Not a single practical suggestion in your moralistic rant.
No surprise there. Most of the so-called Conservative Party are, and always will be, Remainers.
It was Edward Heath who took us into the bloody thing in the first place.
The EU is a dearly-held foible for British elites, who like to feel they have more in common (probably true) with their continental equivalents than with their fellow British, whom they look down upon.
The EU provides elites with an opportunity to excercise the same kind of contempt for Britain among the educated British left-liberals that George Orwell described in Road to Wigan Pier. Except that in this case, the disdain is (sometimes, not always) disguised under a mantle of faux-progressive platitudes, if not downright lies and misrepresentations, about how lovely and ‘good’ the EU is.
You could make a reasonable argument that our politicians have been so dilatory in adopting the consequences of Brexit (e.g. David Cameron immediately gave up, Theresa May started well but became corrupted by the machinery of State) that ‘proper Brexit’ hasn’t started yet.
TPP membership and freeports, two of the things that were not possible under the EU, were initiated immediately.
But they will take time for fruition.
TPP membership and freeports, two of the things that were not possible under the EU, were initiated immediately.
But they will take time for fruition.
In 2021 and 2022, the first two years of Brexit, economic growth in the UK was greater than in any developed country.
But that growth is clearly not even.
It’s not a Brexit question, the real issue is that the politicians can no longer use the EU as an excuse.
None of the problems in Boston are down to Brexit though are they? Current high levels of immigration, a lack of jobs and non existent police are down to the Tories, they haven’t been caused by Britain leaving the EU
You could make a reasonable argument that our politicians have been so dilatory in adopting the consequences of Brexit (e.g. David Cameron immediately gave up, Theresa May started well but became corrupted by the machinery of State) that ‘proper Brexit’ hasn’t started yet.
In 2021 and 2022, the first two years of Brexit, economic growth in the UK was greater than in any developed country.
But that growth is clearly not even.
It’s not a Brexit question, the real issue is that the politicians can no longer use the EU as an excuse.
It’s been three years of plague and a year of war in Europe. Way to early to be judging the merits of Brexit.
Brexit could never, on its own, be the solution to these problems. It’s just a first step towards the revolutionary de-centralisation and democratisation that’s needed.
The bigger struggle to loosen the grip on our lives of the incompetent and greedy Oxbridge elite is yet to come.
Now that they can’t blame the EU, our politicians have no excuse not to deliver. Just need a new party that challenges the other two, might take a bit more pain to get to that though.
Don’t like Oxbridge people? Just wait until Starmer’s dinnerlady brigade really show you what incompetence is.
Funny how everyone goes on about racism, misogyny etc when what really holds this country back is snobbery like yours and the stranglehold that a parasitic middle class has on the economy.
There are a lot of Oxbridge people (well, I’ve only noticed Oxford ones) in Starmer’s crew. Usually not very good ones.
Starmer is one of them, don’t forget.
Starmer is one of them, don’t forget.
Funny how everyone goes on about racism, misogyny etc when what really holds this country back is snobbery like yours and the stranglehold that a parasitic middle class has on the economy.
There are a lot of Oxbridge people (well, I’ve only noticed Oxford ones) in Starmer’s crew. Usually not very good ones.
Now that they can’t blame the EU, our politicians have no excuse not to deliver. Just need a new party that challenges the other two, might take a bit more pain to get to that though.
Don’t like Oxbridge people? Just wait until Starmer’s dinnerlady brigade really show you what incompetence is.
Brexit could never, on its own, be the solution to these problems. It’s just a first step towards the revolutionary de-centralisation and democratisation that’s needed.
The bigger struggle to loosen the grip on our lives of the incompetent and greedy Oxbridge elite is yet to come.
For places like Boston where there is clearly work available, and thus clearly profits being made locally, how come the profits don’t seem to stay in the town. Someone is doing good business, but unlike in other times where good business created benefactors who invested in the local community for culture and sport, places like Boston don’t seem to get the benefit of their success. Where’s that money going? An economically active town should be on the way up, not living on the margins.
There isn’t work there though, at least not work that pays enough to live on. The wages are just about ok for Eastern Europeans who’ll live in cramped conditions for a couple of years, sending money home to set themselves up financially before moving back, but they’re not enough to support a family.
Money being sent home primarily to build property and support wider family.
I’ve often wondered how much money leaves the UK economy entirely in this manner, it’s a common theme for immigrants from every corner of the world to send money home after all
I’ve often wondered how much money leaves the UK economy entirely in this manner, it’s a common theme for immigrants from every corner of the world to send money home after all
I wasn’t referring to the workers. Someone is paying the people to work. They wouldn’t be doing that if they weren’t making money – good business if the labour’s cheap. Where are those benefactors?
If it’s like Norfolk, Holland. Dutch farming corporates own the farms.
If it’s like Norfolk, Holland. Dutch farming corporates own the farms.
Money being sent home primarily to build property and support wider family.
I wasn’t referring to the workers. Someone is paying the people to work. They wouldn’t be doing that if they weren’t making money – good business if the labour’s cheap. Where are those benefactors?
There isn’t work there though, at least not work that pays enough to live on. The wages are just about ok for Eastern Europeans who’ll live in cramped conditions for a couple of years, sending money home to set themselves up financially before moving back, but they’re not enough to support a family.
For places like Boston where there is clearly work available, and thus clearly profits being made locally, how come the profits don’t seem to stay in the town. Someone is doing good business, but unlike in other times where good business created benefactors who invested in the local community for culture and sport, places like Boston don’t seem to get the benefit of their success. Where’s that money going? An economically active town should be on the way up, not living on the margins.
I voted to remain not because I was in favour of the direction of travel in the EU but because I had no faith that the political class in the UK would actually be able and willing to take advantage of any freedoms they might gain. The whole process of reducing immigration has proceeded at a glacial pace because important sectors want immigration and there is no appetite to make hard work attractive and rewarding for the native population. The state employed class continues to expand.
Yep. Symptomatic of the contradictions within right wing thinking and Brexit advocates. They didn’t all want the same thing, but didn’t want to share that because their electoral constituency would have abreacted. Red wall vs Smaller state always going to unravel at some point.
But Jeremy, immigration has NOT proceeded at a glacial pace. within the last 12 months alone its speeded jup dramatically, from approx 250k net – to last year twice that.
Yep. Symptomatic of the contradictions within right wing thinking and Brexit advocates. They didn’t all want the same thing, but didn’t want to share that because their electoral constituency would have abreacted. Red wall vs Smaller state always going to unravel at some point.
But Jeremy, immigration has NOT proceeded at a glacial pace. within the last 12 months alone its speeded jup dramatically, from approx 250k net – to last year twice that.
I voted to remain not because I was in favour of the direction of travel in the EU but because I had no faith that the political class in the UK would actually be able and willing to take advantage of any freedoms they might gain. The whole process of reducing immigration has proceeded at a glacial pace because important sectors want immigration and there is no appetite to make hard work attractive and rewarding for the native population. The state employed class continues to expand.
“‘The problem with Boston,’ Anton says, is not that people from the EU have come to live here, but that there is no infrastructure to support them.”
This is like saying the problem in a plane crash wasn’t that the plane fell out of the sky, but that nobody built an airport under it.
This isn’t about Brexit; it’s about continued unrestrained immigration. We cannot solve international poverty by evacuating the Third World to the West.
“‘The problem with Boston,’ Anton says, is not that people from the EU have come to live here, but that there is no infrastructure to support them.”
This is like saying the problem in a plane crash wasn’t that the plane fell out of the sky, but that nobody built an airport under it.
This isn’t about Brexit; it’s about continued unrestrained immigration. We cannot solve international poverty by evacuating the Third World to the West.
“Today, it is the locals who feel their town has turned against them — and many have given up on trying to win it back”
Well, they tried their political solution. Expect an extremist resurgence in places like this when the democratic, ballot box path fails in such a visible manner. Then the New York Times might a truly have something to whine about.
The people in these towns are old or vulnerable. The young and ambitious who have the energy to turn to extremism are all gone. Only those who have no choice but to stay have remained.
The people in these towns are old or vulnerable. The young and ambitious who have the energy to turn to extremism are all gone. Only those who have no choice but to stay have remained.
“Today, it is the locals who feel their town has turned against them — and many have given up on trying to win it back”
Well, they tried their political solution. Expect an extremist resurgence in places like this when the democratic, ballot box path fails in such a visible manner. Then the New York Times might a truly have something to whine about.
How is rising crime Brexit’s fault? The point here surely is that people feel let down because the promises made on behalf of Brexit (lower immigration, lower rates of crime), have not been kept.
If this is a Remainer article I’m struggling to see how any of this would be improved by re-joining the EU.
Another tedious article by another journalist who lives and works in London.
I don’t think you need to be an immediate ‘Rejoiner’ to think Brexit has not delivered and quite probably made things worse for a place like Boston. We won’t be rejoining anytime soon, so we have to make the best of the situation.
But the first step to crawling out of a hole is recognition alot of Brexit promises were misleading.
correct!
I don’t think you need to be an immediate ‘Rejoiner’ to think Brexit has not delivered and quite probably made things worse for a place like Boston. We won’t be rejoining anytime soon, so we have to make the best of the situation.
But the first step to crawling out of a hole is recognition alot of Brexit promises were misleading.
correct!
How is rising crime Brexit’s fault? The point here surely is that people feel let down because the promises made on behalf of Brexit (lower immigration, lower rates of crime), have not been kept.
If this is a Remainer article I’m struggling to see how any of this would be improved by re-joining the EU.
Another tedious article by another journalist who lives and works in London.
Brexit or not, immigration or not; isn’t it the job of the police to maintain order and safety in places like this?
Who are they?
I don’t think police numbers are even back to where they were before Theresa May thought it would be funny to cut them by 30,000. And that’s against the backdrop of a larger population.
Who are they?
I don’t think police numbers are even back to where they were before Theresa May thought it would be funny to cut them by 30,000. And that’s against the backdrop of a larger population.
Brexit or not, immigration or not; isn’t it the job of the police to maintain order and safety in places like this?
Boston’s crime rate has increased by 25% — yet last week, Lincolnshire Police, the lowest funded force in the UK, announced it was cutting PCSO numbers by almost half
How is this happening? This is just absolutely crazy.
It is. Just like voting to put up trade barriers, (including funding more bureaucrats to manage that), and thus have lower growth and lower tax revenues to pay for things like Police was too. I wonder how that happened?
Add to it we remain more reliant on Gas than our European neighbours – gas bought on the spot-market and exacerbated by our lack of storage strategy – and hey presto we have greater inflation than others. Thus further depressing what we can fund.
And finally a Home Office led by politicians more interested in slogan, chasing inflatables and chucking red meat to supporters than in the hard yards of overseeing reduction in crime.
Please remind me exactly what “trade barriers” the UK has *chosen to put up* since 2016. If the EU has seen fit to try to punish us by creating trade barriers, that is something quite different. I understood that we left with a free trade agreement with the EU and wanted to introduce no new tariffs or quotas – we were happy with the trading and taxation relationship as it was pre-2016.
Indeed, it was not actually necessary for any of that to change. We were already compliant with EU standards and regulations (in fact, far more compliant than many EU countries who don’t take these things as seriously as we do). A working system was in place. Any change to that was unnecessary and costly with no real benefit. If the EU, for purely political reasons, has chosen to increase tariffs or create additional trade friction with the UK that merely confirms the self-defeating nature of the EU and why its share of international trade continues to decline.
You will doubtless come back with some riposte about the “inseparability of the four freedoms”. But there is no actual reason that these are or must be inseparable – it is an article of political faith and no more than that. If it doesn’t work in practice (and I don’t believe it does), it will eventually have to be dropped – or the EU decline will continue.
I had this very conversation with my late MP Heidi Allen, who I distinctly recall telling me she fully supported Theresa May’s Brexit policy and the Lancaster House speech. She didn’t. She’s gone now. Curiously after joining every other party apart from the Lib Dems – which was where she really belonged !
It’s the standard retort of Brexiteers – ‘it’s not us, it’s them’. No you chose to become a 3rd party country to the Single Market. Nobody made us do that. We choose it in full knowledge of what that meant.
Essentially you are repeating the ‘we’ll have our cake and eat it’. It didn’t happen and was totally naive.
It’s the standard retort of Brexiteers – ‘it’s not us, it’s them’. No you chose to become a 3rd party country to the Single Market. Nobody made us do that. We choose it in full knowledge of what that meant.
Essentially you are repeating the ‘we’ll have our cake and eat it’. It didn’t happen and was totally naive.
Why is that happening though? Who decided that the area with the highest crime gets the lowest funding and then more cuts. Where does that get actually decided? Is that council level or government or what?
Central Govt grant.
A little bit related to fines etc more locally, but overwhelmingly a Treasury/Home office funding allocation decision. So essentially the Ministers responsible for last couple of years settlement – Johnson as PM, Sunak as Chancellor and Patel as Home sec
What’ll be interesting to see is whether Braverman looks to address this and how. Given huge investment needed in managing immigration/asylum one suspects she’s going to be stretched unless more funding allocated to Home office. And if that the case the question is from where and how.
No but I can’t believe boris etc make trivial decisions on regional police budgets. They might say how much the police will get overall but who decides what region gets what?
Home Office, and signed off by SoS. Funding allocations usually also go in PM Red Box for info or approval. How much money you give to Policing is always a political decision and they have to sign it off.
Chances of Boris being on top of his papers unlikely I agree. (Sunak apparently much better).
If PM and Ministers wanted to change or tweak allocations they could. One suspects they avoid it and ends up in the ‘too difficult’ box.
How Police forces then deploy their funding more a local decision albeit steered by national priorities and guidance.
Thanks, not being obnoxious I just really don’t know, I don’t have a clue how money gets allocated around the country. So do the police get a budget per region or county or something and then they split it? Is it a local or a London type decision cutting pcsos in a particular region?
There is something called the Police Allocation formula. It has weightings for population density and the types of crime committed – how much time, I think, certain types of crime are assumed to take to tackle e.g violent crime vs road traffic stuff. Cities will have more of the former, and rural areas often more of the latter. The formula picks this up. There are then additional grants for specific things if there is a national drive on a certain thing.
There’s 43 Police forces. They are not coterminous with local authorities which is why we have Police commissioners elected, albeit in big Met areas the Mayors have a role – e.g: Met Chief reports to London Mayor, although London Mayor doesn’t control the funding.
The total sum of funding is retained by central Govt. Whatever that sum is then the formula provides the allocation whether cake is getting bigger or smaller. Govt can review and change the formula if they wish. That can then be scrutinised in Home Affairs sub cmtee in Parliament.
Of course if population rapidly changes or big changes in type of crime committed in an area the formula can lag behind. But politicians always retain right to then alter it or make additional locality grants.
Thanks for taking the trouble, I’m learning, that’s pretty mental, especially about the formula, it does sound like it’s a bit hit and miss, if crime has increased and that formula has resulted in a cut, mind boggles.
Thanks for taking the trouble, I’m learning, that’s pretty mental, especially about the formula, it does sound like it’s a bit hit and miss, if crime has increased and that formula has resulted in a cut, mind boggles.
There is something called the Police Allocation formula. It has weightings for population density and the types of crime committed – how much time, I think, certain types of crime are assumed to take to tackle e.g violent crime vs road traffic stuff. Cities will have more of the former, and rural areas often more of the latter. The formula picks this up. There are then additional grants for specific things if there is a national drive on a certain thing.
There’s 43 Police forces. They are not coterminous with local authorities which is why we have Police commissioners elected, albeit in big Met areas the Mayors have a role – e.g: Met Chief reports to London Mayor, although London Mayor doesn’t control the funding.
The total sum of funding is retained by central Govt. Whatever that sum is then the formula provides the allocation whether cake is getting bigger or smaller. Govt can review and change the formula if they wish. That can then be scrutinised in Home Affairs sub cmtee in Parliament.
Of course if population rapidly changes or big changes in type of crime committed in an area the formula can lag behind. But politicians always retain right to then alter it or make additional locality grants.
Thanks, not being obnoxious I just really don’t know, I don’t have a clue how money gets allocated around the country. So do the police get a budget per region or county or something and then they split it? Is it a local or a London type decision cutting pcsos in a particular region?
Home Office, and signed off by SoS. Funding allocations usually also go in PM Red Box for info or approval. How much money you give to Policing is always a political decision and they have to sign it off.
Chances of Boris being on top of his papers unlikely I agree. (Sunak apparently much better).
If PM and Ministers wanted to change or tweak allocations they could. One suspects they avoid it and ends up in the ‘too difficult’ box.
How Police forces then deploy their funding more a local decision albeit steered by national priorities and guidance.
No but I can’t believe boris etc make trivial decisions on regional police budgets. They might say how much the police will get overall but who decides what region gets what?
Central Govt grant.
A little bit related to fines etc more locally, but overwhelmingly a Treasury/Home office funding allocation decision. So essentially the Ministers responsible for last couple of years settlement – Johnson as PM, Sunak as Chancellor and Patel as Home sec
What’ll be interesting to see is whether Braverman looks to address this and how. Given huge investment needed in managing immigration/asylum one suspects she’s going to be stretched unless more funding allocated to Home office. And if that the case the question is from where and how.
Please remind me exactly what “trade barriers” the UK has *chosen to put up* since 2016. If the EU has seen fit to try to punish us by creating trade barriers, that is something quite different. I understood that we left with a free trade agreement with the EU and wanted to introduce no new tariffs or quotas – we were happy with the trading and taxation relationship as it was pre-2016.
Indeed, it was not actually necessary for any of that to change. We were already compliant with EU standards and regulations (in fact, far more compliant than many EU countries who don’t take these things as seriously as we do). A working system was in place. Any change to that was unnecessary and costly with no real benefit. If the EU, for purely political reasons, has chosen to increase tariffs or create additional trade friction with the UK that merely confirms the self-defeating nature of the EU and why its share of international trade continues to decline.
You will doubtless come back with some riposte about the “inseparability of the four freedoms”. But there is no actual reason that these are or must be inseparable – it is an article of political faith and no more than that. If it doesn’t work in practice (and I don’t believe it does), it will eventually have to be dropped – or the EU decline will continue.
I had this very conversation with my late MP Heidi Allen, who I distinctly recall telling me she fully supported Theresa May’s Brexit policy and the Lancaster House speech. She didn’t. She’s gone now. Curiously after joining every other party apart from the Lib Dems – which was where she really belonged !
Why is that happening though? Who decided that the area with the highest crime gets the lowest funding and then more cuts. Where does that get actually decided? Is that council level or government or what?
It is. Just like voting to put up trade barriers, (including funding more bureaucrats to manage that), and thus have lower growth and lower tax revenues to pay for things like Police was too. I wonder how that happened?
Add to it we remain more reliant on Gas than our European neighbours – gas bought on the spot-market and exacerbated by our lack of storage strategy – and hey presto we have greater inflation than others. Thus further depressing what we can fund.
And finally a Home Office led by politicians more interested in slogan, chasing inflatables and chucking red meat to supporters than in the hard yards of overseeing reduction in crime.
Boston’s crime rate has increased by 25% — yet last week, Lincolnshire Police, the lowest funded force in the UK, announced it was cutting PCSO numbers by almost half
How is this happening? This is just absolutely crazy.
Let’s call the thing by its name. The local population abandoned the land after WW2 – moved on for better wages, better housing and regular work.
The government introduced a visa scheme – Seasonal Agricultural Worker Scheme, SAWS – to plug the gap. The seasonal workers came, earnt what they regarded as a good sum and left again. This worked reasonably well for sixty years or so.
Then Blair destroyed it, opening the floodgates. Eastern Europeans came in hugely increased numbers, expecting to stay full time, with full social services for their families, without regard for the supply of work.
He also destroyed the mechanism by which labour trafficking and exploitation of labour by gang-masters were controlled.
The present situation has been deliberately created by successive administrations. The local population are now being punished for their temerity in voting against the status quo.
Let’s call the thing by its name. The local population abandoned the land after WW2 – moved on for better wages, better housing and regular work.
The government introduced a visa scheme – Seasonal Agricultural Worker Scheme, SAWS – to plug the gap. The seasonal workers came, earnt what they regarded as a good sum and left again. This worked reasonably well for sixty years or so.
Then Blair destroyed it, opening the floodgates. Eastern Europeans came in hugely increased numbers, expecting to stay full time, with full social services for their families, without regard for the supply of work.
He also destroyed the mechanism by which labour trafficking and exploitation of labour by gang-masters were controlled.
The present situation has been deliberately created by successive administrations. The local population are now being punished for their temerity in voting against the status quo.
At what point are we able to say Britain is not a safe place for immigration at this level?
At what point are we able to say Britain is not a safe place for immigration at this level?
If Todor can only just about afford to rent a bug infested one bedroom flat, yet chooses to stay in Boston, it shows just how bad things must be back in Sliven and surely this is a major factor in the immigration there more than the UK’s failings alone (of which there are many!). 2,000 of his compatriots liked the sound of crowding into a caravan and working long hours for minimum wages so much they came over too! The bungling idiots in charge of this country were in place long before brexit, nobody has got a handle on this situation despite it being evident for a good 10-15 years before the referendum so I’m not convinced this problem can be blamed on brexit really, it’s been 20+ years in the making.
With regards to funding Lincolnshire has, iirc, about 750,000 population.Leeds as a city alone has 790,000 – it’s not surprising that Lincolnshire has the lowest budget for policing in the UK and I would imagine it’s bottom of the pile for every funding source going based on a proportional amount of money per head.
If Todor can only just about afford to rent a bug infested one bedroom flat, yet chooses to stay in Boston, it shows just how bad things must be back in Sliven and surely this is a major factor in the immigration there more than the UK’s failings alone (of which there are many!). 2,000 of his compatriots liked the sound of crowding into a caravan and working long hours for minimum wages so much they came over too! The bungling idiots in charge of this country were in place long before brexit, nobody has got a handle on this situation despite it being evident for a good 10-15 years before the referendum so I’m not convinced this problem can be blamed on brexit really, it’s been 20+ years in the making.
With regards to funding Lincolnshire has, iirc, about 750,000 population.Leeds as a city alone has 790,000 – it’s not surprising that Lincolnshire has the lowest budget for policing in the UK and I would imagine it’s bottom of the pile for every funding source going based on a proportional amount of money per head.
So disappointing to find Unherd going along the BBC route. Please examine what is going on in the world, especially in Euroland? Nothing is ever said that is negative about the EU. The BBC would never consider any programme that is for Brexit, and this is staining a lot of perceptions…
Peter I have to agree. this is the THIRD misguided/ill-informed Pro-EU article I have read within the last couple of weeks on UnHerd (Bearing in mind, I cannto read ALL of the articles so there are probably more).
The other two were quite (very) poorly researched and what I would call ‘Junior level’ Journalism.
One was babbling on comparing UK Defence (where everything was a shambles and costs way too much) compared to Germany where everythign is swweetness and light (but he forgot to mention The Germany Army practicing with broom handles – and sending (initially) hats/helmets to Ukraine in support.
He then went on to make the most unbelievable defence comparision that Spain, Italy and Portugal all get better value for their defence money – and yes, this was supposed to be a serious article. (Needless to say none of the ”commentators” thoguht so).
Another article was veyr simialar to this one here – something about leaving the EU and how terrible it all (unrelated) was now we had left.
I am beginning to re-consider my subs to unherd – not that the owner of Unherd will be bothered with his (well earned) £600m
Just wait until they wheel Oliver Bateman out of whatever broom cupboard they have stashed him in, I have no doubt that he’ll struggle to resist this topic, as it’s just so suited for his brand of churnalism.
Edit: Nevermind, I see Bateman is back in Trump Derangement land again, because that’s another topic we really need more of in Unherd
The BBC have been at it this week as well with their ‘three year anniversary’ negativity.
Peter I have to agree. this is the THIRD misguided/ill-informed Pro-EU article I have read within the last couple of weeks on UnHerd (Bearing in mind, I cannto read ALL of the articles so there are probably more).
The other two were quite (very) poorly researched and what I would call ‘Junior level’ Journalism.
One was babbling on comparing UK Defence (where everything was a shambles and costs way too much) compared to Germany where everythign is swweetness and light (but he forgot to mention The Germany Army practicing with broom handles – and sending (initially) hats/helmets to Ukraine in support.
He then went on to make the most unbelievable defence comparision that Spain, Italy and Portugal all get better value for their defence money – and yes, this was supposed to be a serious article. (Needless to say none of the ”commentators” thoguht so).
Another article was veyr simialar to this one here – something about leaving the EU and how terrible it all (unrelated) was now we had left.
I am beginning to re-consider my subs to unherd – not that the owner of Unherd will be bothered with his (well earned) £600m
Just wait until they wheel Oliver Bateman out of whatever broom cupboard they have stashed him in, I have no doubt that he’ll struggle to resist this topic, as it’s just so suited for his brand of churnalism.
Edit: Nevermind, I see Bateman is back in Trump Derangement land again, because that’s another topic we really need more of in Unherd
The BBC have been at it this week as well with their ‘three year anniversary’ negativity.
So disappointing to find Unherd going along the BBC route. Please examine what is going on in the world, especially in Euroland? Nothing is ever said that is negative about the EU. The BBC would never consider any programme that is for Brexit, and this is staining a lot of perceptions…
Sounds like immigrants menacing the streets is the problem. Does Boston have a police force? Will locals just stand by and watch as young foreign men take over their town? How is leaving the EU responsible for this? Obviously, UnHerd is clinging to remain fantasies, but why? I’ve never understood what any sovereign nation has to gain by taking orders from bureaucrats in mitteleuropa. Surely trade deals can be made without this futile attempt to compete with the United States. Heck, there isn’t even a mutually beneficial defense advantage. What is the point? Perhaps UnHerd can provide articles answering those questions.
Here’s how Brexit contributes (if not the sole cause) – firstly we can’t immediately send Asylum seekers back to the country through which they entered the EU as we pulled out of that European arrangement in our wisdom. And because we haven’t invested and sorted out processing capacity we have them placed all over the country. Secondly Brexit been a massive Public Policy distraction. Home Sec is responsible for Policing. She and predecessors will have spent more time and energy on Border control issues and Brexit generated additional bureaucracy rather than sorting out law and order and policing instead. Even Govt ministers only have so much bandwidth and it’s got burnt on the wrong priorities. Thirdly we’re poorer than we otherwise would be and can’t invest therefore to the degree we may have been able to.
The added issue is Brexit promised to help places like Boston. How long they got to wait?
Here’s how Brexit contributes (if not the sole cause) – firstly we can’t immediately send Asylum seekers back to the country through which they entered the EU as we pulled out of that European arrangement in our wisdom. And because we haven’t invested and sorted out processing capacity we have them placed all over the country. Secondly Brexit been a massive Public Policy distraction. Home Sec is responsible for Policing. She and predecessors will have spent more time and energy on Border control issues and Brexit generated additional bureaucracy rather than sorting out law and order and policing instead. Even Govt ministers only have so much bandwidth and it’s got burnt on the wrong priorities. Thirdly we’re poorer than we otherwise would be and can’t invest therefore to the degree we may have been able to.
The added issue is Brexit promised to help places like Boston. How long they got to wait?
Sounds like immigrants menacing the streets is the problem. Does Boston have a police force? Will locals just stand by and watch as young foreign men take over their town? How is leaving the EU responsible for this? Obviously, UnHerd is clinging to remain fantasies, but why? I’ve never understood what any sovereign nation has to gain by taking orders from bureaucrats in mitteleuropa. Surely trade deals can be made without this futile attempt to compete with the United States. Heck, there isn’t even a mutually beneficial defense advantage. What is the point? Perhaps UnHerd can provide articles answering those questions.
Lost direct rail connection to London and got carved up by a dual carriageway.
I think that’s your problem right there, sir, neither the immigration nor the Brexit.
Lost direct rail connection to London and got carved up by a dual carriageway.
I think that’s your problem right there, sir, neither the immigration nor the Brexit.
How many of the locals in Boston are living on benefits? If they won’t work on the land or in the food factories, someone has to. Lincolnshire has always attracted itinerant field labour – my great grandfather escaped into Lincolnshire and was hired in market places after he deserted from a contingent of men being held in Nottingham Castle before being sent to fight the Boer War. I once went for an interview at a school in Gainsborough that had a special unit for gypsy children – this was 40 years ago.
Casual, seasonal field labour does not fit with the benefits system and the benefits system needs to be made more flexible to address this. Then, proactive policies need to be put in place to get the locals working in the fields and food factories so that migrant labour isn’t needed.
There was no point in voting for Brexit because ‘they’re taking our jobs’ if you’re not prepared to do the work yourself.
You may have a point about SOME people ‘taking jobs’ but there was no realy evidence that was a majoy problem – as you say, if locals wont pick cabbages then who will?
For most people it was about tens of billions in subs (overseas aid) being paid out each year – plus no control of our Laws. Nope, in case anyone says – The European Parliament is knobbled by The EU by way of threats not to pay billions to non-contributing countries that effectively over rode UK objections.
You may have a point about SOME people ‘taking jobs’ but there was no realy evidence that was a majoy problem – as you say, if locals wont pick cabbages then who will?
For most people it was about tens of billions in subs (overseas aid) being paid out each year – plus no control of our Laws. Nope, in case anyone says – The European Parliament is knobbled by The EU by way of threats not to pay billions to non-contributing countries that effectively over rode UK objections.
How many of the locals in Boston are living on benefits? If they won’t work on the land or in the food factories, someone has to. Lincolnshire has always attracted itinerant field labour – my great grandfather escaped into Lincolnshire and was hired in market places after he deserted from a contingent of men being held in Nottingham Castle before being sent to fight the Boer War. I once went for an interview at a school in Gainsborough that had a special unit for gypsy children – this was 40 years ago.
Casual, seasonal field labour does not fit with the benefits system and the benefits system needs to be made more flexible to address this. Then, proactive policies need to be put in place to get the locals working in the fields and food factories so that migrant labour isn’t needed.
There was no point in voting for Brexit because ‘they’re taking our jobs’ if you’re not prepared to do the work yourself.
It seemed obvious in 2016 and now, in retrospect, seems indisputable, that Brexit was never anti establishment but rather a spat between two factions within the establishment itself. I don’t think that Brexit would have gained the support of Conservative, free market believers if it had threatened real fundamental change. Rather it was a convient redirect away from the home grown underlying issues onto a cultural battleground where they could win without having to admit to past failures or invest in actual change (Catchy slogans, hard hats and hi viz jackets on their own do not amount to levelling up.)
On the contrary, I think hard hat levelling up Johnson really was, and is, serious, about the UK being country rather than part of the United States of Europe.
Remember he made his mark as a journalist, before becoming a politician, as a Brussels correspondent. He would jot down what they were saying in Brussels and repeat it verbatim…it was hilarious stuff.
Of course for 25 years EU was the excuse for all our failings so far as coterie of right wingers were concerned. The playbook of mendacious politicians is find a scapegoat. And unfortunately it’s a track record with some success in short term at least.
The thing to watch for is when the same people start to switch ‘scapegoat’ as they realise the one they had been riding no longer believed.
Yep!
Yep!
On the contrary, I think hard hat levelling up Johnson really was, and is, serious, about the UK being country rather than part of the United States of Europe.
Remember he made his mark as a journalist, before becoming a politician, as a Brussels correspondent. He would jot down what they were saying in Brussels and repeat it verbatim…it was hilarious stuff.
Of course for 25 years EU was the excuse for all our failings so far as coterie of right wingers were concerned. The playbook of mendacious politicians is find a scapegoat. And unfortunately it’s a track record with some success in short term at least.
The thing to watch for is when the same people start to switch ‘scapegoat’ as they realise the one they had been riding no longer believed.
It seemed obvious in 2016 and now, in retrospect, seems indisputable, that Brexit was never anti establishment but rather a spat between two factions within the establishment itself. I don’t think that Brexit would have gained the support of Conservative, free market believers if it had threatened real fundamental change. Rather it was a convient redirect away from the home grown underlying issues onto a cultural battleground where they could win without having to admit to past failures or invest in actual change (Catchy slogans, hard hats and hi viz jackets on their own do not amount to levelling up.)
“…the only constituency in the UK that does not think it was wrong to leave…” I doubt that.
“…the only constituency in the UK that does not think it was wrong to leave…” I doubt that.
I cancelled my subscription today. UnHerd is becoming a Guardian with a paywall sadly.
What took you so long? I cancelled my recurring subs ages ago
Painful isn’t it hearing the Brexit lies get increasingly found out.
That aside, be cautious about just inhabiting an echo chamber. Nobody’s neurons were strengthened by that.
In my experience UnHerd pretty right leaning, which is fine as I want my perspectives tested.
I think you are correct here – I have been alarmed at a numebr of ill-thoguth out articles recently. I had thoguht it was a one-off, then two-off now three-off and all within a short time.
I dont want to pay for this sort of ill-thoguht out/researched rubbish.
What took you so long? I cancelled my recurring subs ages ago
Painful isn’t it hearing the Brexit lies get increasingly found out.
That aside, be cautious about just inhabiting an echo chamber. Nobody’s neurons were strengthened by that.
In my experience UnHerd pretty right leaning, which is fine as I want my perspectives tested.
I think you are correct here – I have been alarmed at a numebr of ill-thoguth out articles recently. I had thoguht it was a one-off, then two-off now three-off and all within a short time.
I dont want to pay for this sort of ill-thoguht out/researched rubbish.
I cancelled my subscription today. UnHerd is becoming a Guardian with a paywall sadly.
Of course it’s pure coincidence that the IMF “forecasts”, which have been consistently wrong for years, come out hot on the heels of an opinion poll designed to elicit the “Bregrexit” answer, and all the Remoaner leftard journos, with their scarcely concealed snobbery and hatred, pop up at once to fight the great war against that pesky democracy. After all, it was the largest vote in UK democratic history that made it a little bit less convenient to get to their Tuscan villas.
Of course it’s pure coincidence that the IMF “forecasts”, which have been consistently wrong for years, come out hot on the heels of an opinion poll designed to elicit the “Bregrexit” answer, and all the Remoaner leftard journos, with their scarcely concealed snobbery and hatred, pop up at once to fight the great war against that pesky democracy. After all, it was the largest vote in UK democratic history that made it a little bit less convenient to get to their Tuscan villas.
Another strange (seemingly) anti-Brexit article from Unherd. Except this one argues the case the other way it seems to me.
Already in another UnHerd Anti-BREXIT aerticle, I said the POLL answer depends upon the question and I have no idea what questions were asked of whom.
Anti-Brexit hysteria:
There are indeed some shocking, heartwrenching tragedies you have informed us of – but ask yourselkf the question ”Did Brexit cause these?” – its a bit like the tragedy of a Polish guy in 2016 getting ”stabbed to death in a Racist anti-EU assault after the Brexit result” – and yet, when the FACTS were known – it turned out to be nothing of the sort! It turns out there was a fight in a Chip shop (or other) and the tragedy unfolded as a resuly of that – no one knew what the origins of the victim actually were at the time.
Boston:
You appear to be slamming the Brexit result – but then lay out before us facts (or otherwise) from well before the unfettered access to The EU was stopped (January 2020).
What your article has failed to provide is evidence on what the immigration stats were up to or between 2016 and 2020 – and since 2020. because all I can see is historical (almost hysterical) information of immigrants/numbers and associated crime. What are the Stats POST- BREXIT?
Boston Crime:
It is an absolute tragedy that gang-land warefare has been declared on the streets of Boston, some even orchestrated by overseas Masters. – Please explain how that is BREXIT related? if anything, BREXIT has stopped other gang/turf ward being played out on our streets – due to unfetted access now being denied.
Check out other places in the EU (Sweden/Netherlands/France/Germany etc) who have also had mass eastern European immigration (and indeed middle eastern) and check their crime/murder rates over the last 10/15 years – compare with priir to mass immigration. Its not just BOSTON!
UK Immigration:
Within the last 12 months the UK welcomed 500,000 LEGAL migrants to our shores. Thats adding a City the size of Liverpool or Manchester within 12 months. How can it be that we are short of labour because you say – The EU doors have closed? Add to that the KNOWN Illegals, then add the unknown ones – of which there are surely very many.
Romanian Wages:
you say they earn £350 a week in UK and cant pay bills. well stop smoking on the corner of streets for a start – saving £12 per packet of fags. Doubtless they all offer each other fags from their packets as well – If that is paid at minimum wage – thats 35 horus a week. Why not Work overtime? get an additional job – we hear everyone is crying out for staff?
In Romania that £350 a week is roughly a months wages as at January 2023.This is why they stay here – not because of BREXIT or anythign else. Those law abiding Romanias are welcome to pick cabbages or their noses, as long as they remain lawful and do not call upon the State for out of work tax-payer funding – another EU demand we no lon ger have to abide by.
The Locals:
You talk about the locals now fearing to venture out because of ”pre-Brexit” immigration. Surely since the free for all immigration of anyone (crime gangs included) into the UK from anywhere in the EU has ended – there are fewer illegals or touble makers on the streets of Boston?
1.2 million Brits left UK to live in EU – 8m EU Citizens came to UK (Stats available if you really want them).
In many ways Boston HAS taken back control – simply because the unfetted access that was legally allowed beforehand has now stopped. Your article is full of history – it would have been a much better article on immigration and its effects (lack of or otherwise) on Boston today. Since your article was supposed to be ”whats happened since the vote” – as opposed to everythign you write being the opposite.
Another strange (seemingly) anti-Brexit article from Unherd. Except this one argues the case the other way it seems to me.
Already in another UnHerd Anti-BREXIT aerticle, I said the POLL answer depends upon the question and I have no idea what questions were asked of whom.
Anti-Brexit hysteria:
There are indeed some shocking, heartwrenching tragedies you have informed us of – but ask yourselkf the question ”Did Brexit cause these?” – its a bit like the tragedy of a Polish guy in 2016 getting ”stabbed to death in a Racist anti-EU assault after the Brexit result” – and yet, when the FACTS were known – it turned out to be nothing of the sort! It turns out there was a fight in a Chip shop (or other) and the tragedy unfolded as a resuly of that – no one knew what the origins of the victim actually were at the time.
Boston:
You appear to be slamming the Brexit result – but then lay out before us facts (or otherwise) from well before the unfettered access to The EU was stopped (January 2020).
What your article has failed to provide is evidence on what the immigration stats were up to or between 2016 and 2020 – and since 2020. because all I can see is historical (almost hysterical) information of immigrants/numbers and associated crime. What are the Stats POST- BREXIT?
Boston Crime:
It is an absolute tragedy that gang-land warefare has been declared on the streets of Boston, some even orchestrated by overseas Masters. – Please explain how that is BREXIT related? if anything, BREXIT has stopped other gang/turf ward being played out on our streets – due to unfetted access now being denied.
Check out other places in the EU (Sweden/Netherlands/France/Germany etc) who have also had mass eastern European immigration (and indeed middle eastern) and check their crime/murder rates over the last 10/15 years – compare with priir to mass immigration. Its not just BOSTON!
UK Immigration:
Within the last 12 months the UK welcomed 500,000 LEGAL migrants to our shores. Thats adding a City the size of Liverpool or Manchester within 12 months. How can it be that we are short of labour because you say – The EU doors have closed? Add to that the KNOWN Illegals, then add the unknown ones – of which there are surely very many.
Romanian Wages:
you say they earn £350 a week in UK and cant pay bills. well stop smoking on the corner of streets for a start – saving £12 per packet of fags. Doubtless they all offer each other fags from their packets as well – If that is paid at minimum wage – thats 35 horus a week. Why not Work overtime? get an additional job – we hear everyone is crying out for staff?
In Romania that £350 a week is roughly a months wages as at January 2023.This is why they stay here – not because of BREXIT or anythign else. Those law abiding Romanias are welcome to pick cabbages or their noses, as long as they remain lawful and do not call upon the State for out of work tax-payer funding – another EU demand we no lon ger have to abide by.
The Locals:
You talk about the locals now fearing to venture out because of ”pre-Brexit” immigration. Surely since the free for all immigration of anyone (crime gangs included) into the UK from anywhere in the EU has ended – there are fewer illegals or touble makers on the streets of Boston?
1.2 million Brits left UK to live in EU – 8m EU Citizens came to UK (Stats available if you really want them).
In many ways Boston HAS taken back control – simply because the unfetted access that was legally allowed beforehand has now stopped. Your article is full of history – it would have been a much better article on immigration and its effects (lack of or otherwise) on Boston today. Since your article was supposed to be ”whats happened since the vote” – as opposed to everythign you write being the opposite.
JRM (Mogg) has been saying all day of coruse we have had Brexit benefits including (but not exclusively):
1) £190bn in liabilities that otherwise would have been paid/owed to EU for COVID (plus approx £70bn in normal EU subscriptions)
2) UK has avoided 8,000 new laws
3) record catches of Fish
On a point of interest, most people dont know the following:
1) Thatcher rebate was ending in 2021
2) Part of UK’s VAT take is paid to EU – in addition to subs
3) 75% of all impoprt duties were also paid over to EU – in addition to subs
JRM (Mogg) has been saying all day of coruse we have had Brexit benefits including (but not exclusively):
1) £190bn in liabilities that otherwise would have been paid/owed to EU for COVID (plus approx £70bn in normal EU subscriptions)
2) UK has avoided 8,000 new laws
3) record catches of Fish
On a point of interest, most people dont know the following:
1) Thatcher rebate was ending in 2021
2) Part of UK’s VAT take is paid to EU – in addition to subs
3) 75% of all impoprt duties were also paid over to EU – in addition to subs
You missed a trick, England. It’s over now. You can’t go backwards. A flooding of immigrants that weigh down your infrastructure, crashing your healthcare and welfare systems and schools while sending crime rates soaring? Ha. Sounds familiar to the U.S……
You missed a trick, England. It’s over now. You can’t go backwards. A flooding of immigrants that weigh down your infrastructure, crashing your healthcare and welfare systems and schools while sending crime rates soaring? Ha. Sounds familiar to the U.S……
The trouble with this article is its bad-faith confusion of necessity and sufficiency. Brexit was necessary for reducing immigration. But this article, like countless other Remainerist articles, criticises Brexit on the grounds that it failed to bring about, that is to say was not sufficient for, the desired reduction.
The trouble with this article is its bad-faith confusion of necessity and sufficiency. Brexit was necessary for reducing immigration. But this article, like countless other Remainerist articles, criticises Brexit on the grounds that it failed to bring about, that is to say was not sufficient for, the desired reduction.
But of course it is not Brexit that has caused the problems in Boston or failed to resolve the problems that already existed but have grown exponentially. It is politicians and the civil service establishment aided and abetted by most of the mainstream media, globalists and the CBI, that have monumentally failed to implement anything approaching the Brexit the majority voted for in 2016. At the same time the government has failed at every turn, on every policy and has totally wasted the opportunity of a lifetime with a huge majority left unused and wasted.
But of course it is not Brexit that has caused the problems in Boston or failed to resolve the problems that already existed but have grown exponentially. It is politicians and the civil service establishment aided and abetted by most of the mainstream media, globalists and the CBI, that have monumentally failed to implement anything approaching the Brexit the majority voted for in 2016. At the same time the government has failed at every turn, on every policy and has totally wasted the opportunity of a lifetime with a huge majority left unused and wasted.
The ‘Brexit’ riff consistently elicits a regurgitating of the old divisive rants. If we ban it many of the comments here would vanish and perhaps we would then get to the nub of the problem which is the ineffectiveness of our politicians to address the ‘pull’ factors – eg’s the farmers who want cheap Labour and bigger profits so threaten higher prices to consumers if they don’t get it.) There is a local workforce sitting at home on benefits as wages are too low (unless you are living in a caravan for multiple occupation supplied by the farm) Then there’s the hotel owners on the Lincolnshire coast who had their palms crossed with silver to hand over whole hotels to illegal immigrants and in the process sacking all the staff. Of course the illegal immigrants are complaining about this (obviously a Lincolnshire seaside town is not London where a black economy flourishes and makes it easy to disappear. If they’re not vanishing into thin air there is an army of lawyers waiting to ‘defend’ them in a lengthy appeals process which needs to be revised. The activities of NGO’s – who mostly never have to live cheek by jowl with the results of their endeavours – should be held to account as they are aiding and abetting illegal entry. Use the various mechanisms in place to call out the connivance of some European countries to look the other way as the lucrative ‘Albanian Transport and Cruise Company’ openly transports its illegal cargo across Europe and the English Channel. Australia is also an island which would be awash with its Eastern neighbours if they didn’t have a robust immigration workforce – and a population who understood and didn’t object to the necessity to control their borders. Finally, don’t vest all power in the ‘Whitehall Club’ . We need regional parliaments. Boston 30 years ago was a vibrant and thriving place – a town steeped in history and which welcomed visitors from around the world. Now abandoned by many of the residents who loved this home of the Pilgrim Fathers, the black market flourishes, mostly via illegal, and potentially harmful, alcohol and cigarettes found in the many abandoned shops. It seems that criminality flourishes as across Lincolnshire policing is now very much reduced. Its a lazy argument to bang on about Brexit. I worked in Boston 30 odd years ago and recently returned after. I lived, worked and felt safe in various developing countries. Not so the Boston of today
The ‘Brexit’ riff consistently elicits a regurgitating of the old divisive rants. If we ban it many of the comments here would vanish and perhaps we would then get to the nub of the problem which is the ineffectiveness of our politicians to address the ‘pull’ factors – eg’s the farmers who want cheap Labour and bigger profits so threaten higher prices to consumers if they don’t get it.) There is a local workforce sitting at home on benefits as wages are too low (unless you are living in a caravan for multiple occupation supplied by the farm) Then there’s the hotel owners on the Lincolnshire coast who had their palms crossed with silver to hand over whole hotels to illegal immigrants and in the process sacking all the staff. Of course the illegal immigrants are complaining about this (obviously a Lincolnshire seaside town is not London where a black economy flourishes and makes it easy to disappear. If they’re not vanishing into thin air there is an army of lawyers waiting to ‘defend’ them in a lengthy appeals process which needs to be revised. The activities of NGO’s – who mostly never have to live cheek by jowl with the results of their endeavours – should be held to account as they are aiding and abetting illegal entry. Use the various mechanisms in place to call out the connivance of some European countries to look the other way as the lucrative ‘Albanian Transport and Cruise Company’ openly transports its illegal cargo across Europe and the English Channel. Australia is also an island which would be awash with its Eastern neighbours if they didn’t have a robust immigration workforce – and a population who understood and didn’t object to the necessity to control their borders. Finally, don’t vest all power in the ‘Whitehall Club’ . We need regional parliaments. Boston 30 years ago was a vibrant and thriving place – a town steeped in history and which welcomed visitors from around the world. Now abandoned by many of the residents who loved this home of the Pilgrim Fathers, the black market flourishes, mostly via illegal, and potentially harmful, alcohol and cigarettes found in the many abandoned shops. It seems that criminality flourishes as across Lincolnshire policing is now very much reduced. Its a lazy argument to bang on about Brexit. I worked in Boston 30 odd years ago and recently returned after. I lived, worked and felt safe in various developing countries. Not so the Boston of today
My wife and I were driving from Lincoln to Cambridge last summer and stopped off in Boston for lunch just off the town square. It was with some trepidation since I’d read more than one article such as this. What we actually found was a rather pleasant market town with hardly a foreign language sign in sight. Lunch was lovely and the locals appeared to be perfectly friendly. After lunch and a walk around the town square we continued on our way. I don’t recognise what’s described in this article at all and the NYT article that’s referenced was a blatant hit piece written by their endless list of pro-EU left-wing elites.
My wife and I were driving from Lincoln to Cambridge last summer and stopped off in Boston for lunch just off the town square. It was with some trepidation since I’d read more than one article such as this. What we actually found was a rather pleasant market town with hardly a foreign language sign in sight. Lunch was lovely and the locals appeared to be perfectly friendly. After lunch and a walk around the town square we continued on our way. I don’t recognise what’s described in this article at all and the NYT article that’s referenced was a blatant hit piece written by their endless list of pro-EU left-wing elites.
Blaming the messenger is not a good look! I’m in Boston regularly and Unherd’s poll confirms what many Bostonians and wider Lincolnshire residents know and lament. Boston has lost its heart and it’s character has irrevocably changed for the worse. Some commentators here are splitting hairs and hung up on semantics. The use of the term ‘Brexit’ persists where the enactment and expected outcome of Brexit is not felt or apparent. Bostonians have paid a high price in the impact on their culture and way of life and looked to Brexit to halt or reverse that trend.
Little or no management oversight, and poor governance at central and local level, of increasing numbers of incoming EU workers to Boston, including those with families. have resulted in a huge strain on housing, education, health, the job market. etc. The contempt meted out to ‘little Englanders’ who dared raise their (sensible) heads above the parapet has been a disgrace.
A black market now thrives in cheap (and potentially dangerous) imported/smuggled cigarettes and alcohol sold in many of Boston’s corner shops which are more often now Romanian owned.
Who would want to live in a hell hole like Boston anyway?
have you been there Sir?
have you been there Sir?
Who would want to live in a hell hole like Boston anyway?
The whinging from Brexiteers in the comments section is hilarious. Guys, you won. You knew exactly what you were voting for. Please don’t complain when someone points out the reality of your fantasy.
The whinging from Brexiteers in the comments section is hilarious. Guys, you won. You knew exactly what you were voting for. Please don’t complain when someone points out the reality of your fantasy.
Whether the cause or not it appears Boston community feel Brexit has not done what was promised. Understandably the Article doesn’t probe into whether Brexit actually made it worse or whether it’s just coincidental.
There is however an argument it’s made it worse. Many more now appreciate how foolhardy was withdrawal from the Dublin Agreement. The right to return asylum seekers immediately would not have applied to all those migrants now residing in Boston, but undoubtedly would have applied to some.
The massive public policy distraction of Brexit, is arguably another reason it’s worse. A failure to focus on what really matters to people. One might argue Brexit came with good intent to better help places like Boston, but unfortunately it’s also taken our eye off such places and the help they need.
And thirdly the economic impact reduces our ability to invest in better services, even if that’s just the Home Office policing and processing all the immigration in such an area. Not all the reasons we are struggling with investment currently are down to Brexit, but it sure as hell hasn’t helped much, and the Boston public will be sensing that.
“Understandably”?
The Dublin Treaty was hardly used when we were members.
Agree, and alot of the problem. Was almost as if it’s woeful application was deliberate to fuel uncontrolled immigration concern. But does not mean withdrawal was a well considered policy. It clearly wasn’t.
Agree, and alot of the problem. Was almost as if it’s woeful application was deliberate to fuel uncontrolled immigration concern. But does not mean withdrawal was a well considered policy. It clearly wasn’t.
But who in principle is better placed to understand and tackle the problems Boston faces John? A democratically elected British Government with local MP? Or a 27 State Committee of unelected Cypriot French and Polish bureaucrats working in Brussels? Most nation states in the world believe independence is the best basic starting point for governance in the modern world.
One wonders if a couple of Martians on Mars could have better managed our post Brexit immigration policy better than us?
However also be aware the EU never had any role in our approach to non EU immigration. That’s always been ours and not subject to any Single Market rules. Even when we were in the EU it was of a similar volume. Subsequently it’s increased.
One wonders if a couple of Martians on Mars could have better managed our post Brexit immigration policy better than us?
However also be aware the EU never had any role in our approach to non EU immigration. That’s always been ours and not subject to any Single Market rules. Even when we were in the EU it was of a similar volume. Subsequently it’s increased.
It was EU policy which first destroyed Boston. When they talk about ‘immigrants’ they do not have an issue with asylum seekers, who at least make their home in the city. The issue is people who just go there for the casual farm labouring, sleeping in dormitories, and then go home with the cash.
It has ruined the local economy.
They want change, but going back to what destroyed them in the first place? I think not.
Single Market allowed free movement with some Article caveats we largely never deployed in the UK – e.g all jobs must be advertised locally first etc, as they do in other EU countries.
More importantly though you probably need to chat to the local employers, esp in Farming, why they relied so much on seasonal EU workers and whether feel that ruined the local economy or the reverse? I daresay you would prefer to avoid that conversation and instead just berate the EU.
Single Market allowed free movement with some Article caveats we largely never deployed in the UK – e.g all jobs must be advertised locally first etc, as they do in other EU countries.
More importantly though you probably need to chat to the local employers, esp in Farming, why they relied so much on seasonal EU workers and whether feel that ruined the local economy or the reverse? I daresay you would prefer to avoid that conversation and instead just berate the EU.
“Understandably”?
The Dublin Treaty was hardly used when we were members.
But who in principle is better placed to understand and tackle the problems Boston faces John? A democratically elected British Government with local MP? Or a 27 State Committee of unelected Cypriot French and Polish bureaucrats working in Brussels? Most nation states in the world believe independence is the best basic starting point for governance in the modern world.
It was EU policy which first destroyed Boston. When they talk about ‘immigrants’ they do not have an issue with asylum seekers, who at least make their home in the city. The issue is people who just go there for the casual farm labouring, sleeping in dormitories, and then go home with the cash.
It has ruined the local economy.
They want change, but going back to what destroyed them in the first place? I think not.
Whether the cause or not it appears Boston community feel Brexit has not done what was promised. Understandably the Article doesn’t probe into whether Brexit actually made it worse or whether it’s just coincidental.
There is however an argument it’s made it worse. Many more now appreciate how foolhardy was withdrawal from the Dublin Agreement. The right to return asylum seekers immediately would not have applied to all those migrants now residing in Boston, but undoubtedly would have applied to some.
The massive public policy distraction of Brexit, is arguably another reason it’s worse. A failure to focus on what really matters to people. One might argue Brexit came with good intent to better help places like Boston, but unfortunately it’s also taken our eye off such places and the help they need.
And thirdly the economic impact reduces our ability to invest in better services, even if that’s just the Home Office policing and processing all the immigration in such an area. Not all the reasons we are struggling with investment currently are down to Brexit, but it sure as hell hasn’t helped much, and the Boston public will be sensing that.