I like Angela Rayner. See our latest article on her demise. As some who started life in a council house, who pulled myself up by my bootstraps, with a wife from Manchester, I identify with Angela’s straight talk on many things. I was therefore even more dismayed to hear her spinning myths and lies on LBC this week about Brexit. Angela came up with many of the Brexiteer arguments in this interview. Here are some of her ‘whoppers’.
The will of the people must be respected
Horseshit. We are fast approaching the point where 70% of people in Britain believe that Brexit has failed. Angela appears not understand that democracy is NOT a project. It is a process. She would not even be an MP if democracy were a project as women would not have a vote or be able to participate in society. We would be more like Saudi Arabia under Angela’s view of democracy.
We can’t just rejoin
Bollocks. Whilst it’s true that all takes time, the only thing preventing us from starting the process is a backbone in politics. Read our article on the matter at Byline Times.
I met with four Labour Councillors campaigning in my area on Sunday. All said they fundamentally disagreed with the exec. Are they prepared to do anything about it? Of course not. We need ‘different’ and not more of the same. What matters is the beginning of the journey, not the end point.
We can’t rejoin on the same terms
This was perhaps Angela’s cleverest deception. By not being specific, she allowed people to fill in the dots by themselves … for example “oh we’ll lose the pound, Shengen, pints”, and many other myths put forward by the Brexiteers. These feed the Labour project fear narrative and Angela should really know better.
It is true that Old Albion will need to learn some appropriate humility as part of the joining process, instead of the English exceptionalism which characterised the Brexit vote. However, it is unwise to place more constraints in the way of success than is necessary before negotiations begin. When I reflect on the conversation I observed with Barnier, I know that rejoining is possible. Yes, it will be difficult and everything will be on the table. If Britain decided that it must keep the pound for example, I’m sure it would be considered. Since all is a trade, the EU may come with some other things we may have to move on to keep the pound, perhaps in the finance domain, perhaps an asymmetric trade-off. For example, we have just seen concessions on Northern Ireland traded with changes to the Erasmus scheme. Nonetheless, what we must do is establish the principle of rejoining and political will to do so. Once that is secured, we must then leave the negotiators to do the work, as we did in the Brexit negotiations. See our book on Rejoining the EU.
I travel quite a bit on a bus. Upon boarding on Friday I was confronted by a man about 60 who was on his phone, swearing and shouting loudly at the front of the bus in the doorwell the driver. I sat down a few metres away and quickly noticed another man of similar age with his young grandchildren. The other man continued swearing and cursing foreigners. I spoke softly to him:
“Language Timothy, there are children present”.
He replied “Fucking muslamics and foriengers, fuck off c…nts – stop listening to my phone calls you fucking w…nker”. It was hard not to hear him for all the passengers on the bus as he was making sure everyone knew what he was saying! He moved towards me but then backed off.
There were about 15 people on the bus of all ages and races. I initially ignored his provocation and dropped eye contact, but he continued the abuse so I repeated my request. He raised his voice adding further racial abuse. Then the grandfather spoke to him saying that he had young children who were physically afraid by this time. He continued. A young nurse sitting opposite him behind the driver then asked him to be quiet. He moved towards her spewing more abuse and telling her to shut her mouth.
I decided this was enough and told him to stop abusing women and get off the bus. I was about to take further action when he decided to get off, still shouting foul abuse.
Farage Riots
This is what Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and Brexit has brought to Britain. I had not been quick enough to record his shouting but felt the need to make a public apology on his behalf to all the other passengers on the bus. The response was quite remarkable from people of all colours and ages. It seemed that nobody wanted his racism in the community. I made a recording of this below:
If only he realised that Brexit Begat Boats and so on. but he was too thick to know anything, let alone the Dublin Agreement.
Inspired by this bizarre incident I formulated the Gammon English DNA test !! Provocative, but we must work inside their belief systems to reach them.
The only Brexit racist in the village
This is not an isolated incident where I live in Kent. Last week, I encountered an OAB (Old Age Brexiteer) on my bicycle with a union jack skirt caught shouting “F off Paki” to an Indian Sikh in Chatham. I intervened and later apologised to the Indian gentleman who said that the OAB couldn’t help himself and it was a problem of humanity. I replied that this did not make it agreeable or acceptable. Paradoxically, the OAB voted to make himself poorer via Brexit. Nigel and Boris “forgot” to mention this in the “sales pitch”. Let’s keep this in context. It was ONE old age man out of 67 million who claims to speak for all of us!!!! He does not
China Crisis
Even more disgusting is this example of a Chinese Restaurant in York:
Once again, the true spirit of Britain has come to counterbalance the knuckle dragging racists:
Brexit racists make a lot of noise (literally) but are a very small number. If this were a football match, the score on the bus would have been Multicultural Britain 15 : Racists 1. We must not be swayed by these thugs.
Farage Riots cost Britain dearly
The Farage Riots in 2024 cost £32 million. The 2025 ones probably a lot more. All money that will not be directed towards improving Britain. But the lowlifes who protest don’t understand that. Perhaps the rioters should be made to pay the bill? They certainly should not want to be receiving healthcare from forins …. We need a better Britain in a better Europe for a better World. Read our article on the subject. If you found this article useful, please support our work.
And finally, common sense
In a late entry after this was posted, please watch Zoe Gardner providing bucket loads of common sense on the subject of hotels, asylum seekers and disinformation:
For many years now, I have offered people an online leaders’ debate about Brexit and the notion of a better Britain as a means of helping them climb down from the Brexit mountain (all part of the Brexorcism process!). Whilst 1:1 personal encounters are largely positive and we even managed to broker a town hall meeting with a Labour MP from our activism, there is always more to do, so I offer the facility of an online debate to anyone who wishes to conduct a reasoned debate on what sort of country we wish to become.
Jools was captivated by the idea after he had started moaning about “illegals” on Rupert Lowe’s LinkedIn page. I asked him to write to me. He did. After a brief encounter below on e-mail, he admitted that he did not know much about politics and Brexit to proceed. This was a great shame, but I congratulated him for his candour and he went away reasonably happy that he had avoided the encounter …
Jools did not call and I considered the matter closed at that point … until, a few weeks later, he started spounting the same disinformation on LinkedIn again. Without realising it was the same person, I corrected him. The atmosphere changed and he started writing endless mails of personal abuse … here are a few … I especially like the fact that Jools entitled all of the mailings with the header SCUM 🙂 Reminded me of the man who called LBC just to shout at the interviewer recently. They are still angry about winning.
The death threat is funny. And the fact that Jools decided to buy my book just so he can add a bad review on Amazon is even funnier and just a bit sad … Quite literally, Brexit is an act of self harm. Jools is buying my book just so he can place a bad review on Amazon. It’s pure Alan Partridge !!
“Trade Spray” then felt he needed to enter the debate … 🙂 I am compelled to accept the title “big fanny” 🙂 He’s doing his best as they say.
What does this prove?
As I have demonstrated many times, online Brexorcisms are largely ineffective. See below for an extract from the book of Brexorcism on the problems of trying to change minds online.
A Brexorcism is a social process, NOT a social media process for the most part. The only things that work on social media are devices such as satire, comedic exaggeration, direct challenge, referral to the person’s networks and public humiliation as I sometimes practice on Linkedin. There is a consequential risk of emboldening the victim as they love nothing more than the ‘salty tears of Remoaners’ so each case must be judged on its merits. Too many people do this sort of thing to ‘win’ which is the wrong outcome.
Some people can only understand complex issues as being binary in nature i.e. left or right. For the record and Jools’ sanity, I’m not a lefty, communist, Starmer lover, homophobe, Putin lover, I don’t live in Dubai etc. 🙂
Jools seemed eventually to be frightened of being exposed. A little strange as he took the first step by contacting me and admitting some foibles and lack of knowledge.
Oh well …. keep working on them. I had a much better encounter on the street yesterday with an elderly woman who is worried about who might move into the street, claims to be a Christian, loves Trump, hates Trans, Woke people, wants freedom and the rule of law but wants judges jailed and international courts shut, and believes that there was a good Brexit out there somewhere but nobody could quite identify what it was ….
In the run up to the 2024 general election, I was told by numerous Labour voters and activists “Look, just vote Labour. It’s going to be alright. As soon as they get elected, they will end Brexit”. Although I did not believe them (and have been proved to be right), I agreed that the Tories needed to go. So I made sure thatmy election campaign did not harm Labour and then waited. I’m still waiting. In this article, I take a dispassionate view of Labour’s first year in power.
A good start marred by sheer incompetence
Labour got off to a good start, facing down “The Farage Riots” to great effect. It is to Labour’s actual decisions that I have the greatest issues. Decisions which barely touch the sides of our problems in Rebooting Britain, but which have generated so much heat and given the far right media so many easy wins. For example : The pensioners heating allowance last winter. Worth a measly £1.2 billion (Yes, I’d like to have £1.2 bn but it’s petty cash in the grand scheme of things). This generated so much heat for so little financial gain … in fact if the heat generated by public and media reaction had been stored we could have heated the whole country for several winters!! Worse still, Labour have now backtracked on it, long after the damage to the Labour brand has been done.
Death by 1000 Brexit ameliorations
Labour claim to have kept their Brexit red lines but in fact broken them in several areas. See Labour’s Red Lines. This has not gone unnoticed by Farage and the Alt Right Wing press. Even though Labour’s strategy on Europe amounts to “death by 1000 Brexit ameliorations” rather than more fundamental fixes, they have gained just as much damage to the Labour brand as if they had applied to Rejoin the EU. Brexit costs us £140 Billion every year in lost opportunity and taxes. This dwarfs the pensioners’ heating costs, PIP, social care etc.
Shameful behaviour
The PIP fiasco was yet another disastrous decision, presumably informed by the triumph of ideology over pragmatism and an adherence to the doctrines of Morgan McSweeney. On this subject, I find it hard to tell the difference between Starmer’s government and the Tories. I could go on about rollback on climate commitments, social care, toadying to Trump due to our Brexit weakness and Labour’s point blank refusal to provide safe routes for migrants, instead preferring to up the ante about undocumented migration, in order to pray at Nigel Farage’s fascist altar.
Sympathy for the devil?
Yes, we have had 14 years of managed decline via austerity on steroids amplified by Brexit, and most people do not understand how long it takes to turn the economic cycle round, so it’s slightly unfair to expect Labour to be able to waive magic wands on all the issues competing for their attention. However, there was no need for Labour to prey upon our most vulnerable citizens in order to look tough for a few knuckle dragging gammons in the so called red wall. There are plenty of other good choices to be made. There is no way Labour can discuss growth without confronting the Brexit elephant in the room. See our work in Somerset for the Labour MP there. Labour are also shamefully complicit in the genocide in Gaza and for trying to criminalise old age pensioners who use the word Palestine as part of civil protests.
Death by 1000 ameliorations is still death
We were asked to give an interview for Dubai TV in Arabic regarding the Kensington Treaty. This is an agreement between Chancellor Merz and Keir Starmer on defence and security, climate, economics, trade and STEM co-operation. Starmer chose to highlight the rather thin issue of some basic co-operation on migration control to appease Farage. Here is the raw interview. We simply need to apply to rejoin EU fullyto overcome the problems facing Brexit Britain. Death by 1000 Brexit ameliorations is still death, albeit a slow one.
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This article in The Guardian is being shared widely by Rejoiners at the moment. It is a good piece of academic analysis. Yet I have some problems with a couple of the points it makes (I guess that’s unsurprising!!). It’s a long piece, so buckle yourself in for a long ride. Here’s what I really like about the piece:
Consonance
The article correctly states that the Brexit mindset is a complex interwoven set of beliefs (coalitions within coalitions) that keep getting reinforced by our populist media. I articulated this via my ‘Brexit Brain’ model below. Quite why I coined the phrase ‘Brexorcism‘ to describe the complex quasi-religious mindset change process in the book Reboot Britain.
“It’s really hard. We see tremendous stability over very long periods of time. A choice like Brexit provides endless stimuli to feed that brain activity. It’s coalitions within coalitions within coalitions…” Darren Schreiber.
The Brexit Brain – Read more by clicking the brain.
Thus, normal approaches to change management are not valid: ‘Carrots and sticks; are often used to change simple levels of behaviour and performance at work. For example, if you pay people more, they might work harder for a while. Put them under threat, they may also work harder, go on strike, work less or leave the company etc. But changing Kwasi-religious beliefs such as Brexit is a whole different ball game. It’s not a rational choice as the Guardian article rightly explains.
Whole brained change
I advocate a blend of so-called left (more analytical) and right brained (more emotional) thinking to reach deep into the Brexit psyche of my ‘clients’, what is known as a ‘hearts and minds’ approach in business consulting circles. Using hard hitting emotional headlines to grab people by the heart and longer more analytical approaches to ensure that their heads fall in line with their hearts. The dual approach is epitomised in the book Private Eyelines, a book targeted at leave voters to help them understand how they were lied to. p.s. DO NOT buy the book on Amazon. I get a £2.00 royalty on a sale of £32.99 for six months work, as Amazon keep all the profits! Whilst I don’t write books as an income source, I also don’t write them to boost Amazon’s profits. If you wish to buy a copy direct at an author’s discount, talk to me direct via reboot@brexitrage.com. By the way the left-right brain divide has been questioned but the idea of whole brain thinking (analytical and emotional) is a handy notion to help us think about the need to reach head and heart.
“A man with a conviction is a hard man to change. Tell him you disagree and he turns away. Show him facts or figures and he questions your sources. Appeal to logic and he fails to see your point.” Leon Festinger.
Another truism in the article is the belief that all leave voters are unresponsive to dialogue, thick or closed. This reveals itself in oft quoted statements by some Remainers, who say things like “You can’t educate pork”, “I’ve tried everything” and “They are thick as mince”. Truth be told, some Remainers lack the skills, patience and time to conduct effective Brexorcisms. Also it really matters who you choose as your ‘client’. There really is no point working on a ‘Nigel Farage type hardcore Brexiters’ but many leave voters are not hard leavers. Selection of your targets is key, both in terms of where they sit on the Remain – Leave continuum and to what extent they are key opinion formers for others who follow their views.
“When you pathologise the other side, there’s no point in reaching out to them” Brian Hughes.
Relationship and rapport is key
The article goes on to say something terribly important. “If there is a way through this, he suggests, it is to break down the myths of us and them.” A successful Brexorcism only operates on the basis of a strong relationship and a basic bond of trust. If you are going to challenge beliefs, you need a massive ‘bank balance’ of relationship power to succeed. This is why Steve Bray and his cult have changed very few minds by ‘shouting at people’ in Parliament, upsetting sympathetic media people into the process. In case of doubt, I started on the street with Steve at No 10 Vigil. He quickly spotted that the real action was at Parliament instead of Downing Street and set up a splinter group. Later on, I tried to gain him a permanent platform with other figures at Channel 4 News which he rejected. Of course, Steve’s activities outside the House of Commons have other functions. However, his finest moments were when he quietly but firmly ask politicians difficult questions using a Socratic style and a ‘servant leadership’ approach. But everything counts. We need to use all the therapeutic communication styles as discussed by John Heron in Reboot Britain. Social settings such as cafes, pubs etc. are often more helpful than formal settings, hence my comments about the sauna below, although the sauna is not the only environment in which you can change someone’s mind about Brexit!
In the article, Carol Tavris confirms the view that ‘consonance’ or rapport is vital as a starting point for a successful Brexorcism. The conversation is a healthy mixture of what Comms people call ‘pull’ and ‘push’ strategies or what musicians and psychologists call consonance and dissonance. Finding some common ground is extremely important or giving away trivial wins in order to build a connection. One of the difficulties I notice in some activists is their fundamentalist need to ‘win’ all the arguments with leave voters. It’s better to let them have some small wins in the dance of Brexorcism.
“When we argue with somebody about their beliefs, the absolute crucial thing to avoid is making them feel foolish. If you say something like, ‘How could you be so stupid?’, that will almost always make your listener become even more committed to their belief. If you say instead, ‘Well, many of my own expectations turned out not to be the case too’, that might be a place to start.”
Dissonance
The Guardian article suggests that we must fully convert people to become Rejoiners. This is akin to a religious conversion or what I call a 360-degree Brexorcism. This is fundamentally incorrect. All we need to deliver as a ‘MVP‘ (Minimum Viable Product” is to move people from the idea that Brexit is a good idea towards ambivalence or doubt about the value of Brexit, a 180-degree Brexorcism. This is a much easier task. This converts in behavioural terms to people not voting in another referendum / General Election to support a Brexit party or possibly voting for a pro-Rejoin party to balance out their previous vote. Obviously a full conversion to the cause would be a much stronger position but, as the article points out, it is much more difficult. This is like trying convert a moderate Christian to Islamic fundamentalism when we only need to go as far as agnosticism, not even atheism.
Our approach to Brexorcism has validation from low-profile approaches to change which were reported on by the BBC some while back. A Brexorcism blends ideas from psychology, sociology, anthropology and therapeutic interventions. People who tell me that you cannot change the minds of Brexit voters simply have not understood the fundamentals of Brexorcism which requires large doses of skill, patience and time. I’m offering a free masterclass on the topic for North Hertfordshire for Europe on Sunday November 19th at 5.00 pm via ZOOM. Contact me to reserve your place. I am also willing to give keynotes and masterclasses on our UK tour to develop a cadre of Brexorcists. This is vital if we are to move the dial faster on Brexit regret by a General Election.
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Brexorcism
The will of the people has changed
My other major beef with the article is that it suggests that “though there is some anecdotal and polling evidence that there has been a shift in sentiment, and that remain might now prevail, the same polls show very little appetite to reopen the question.” This is incorrect on two levels:
There has been a seismic shift from 4% to 24% of people that believe that Brexit has failed. By 2024 it is quite feasible that 70% of people will believe that Brexit has failed. At that point politicians will no longer be able to look the other way.
Whilst it’s true that there is currently no appetite to reopen the Brexit question, this is merely a feature of where we have got to in the cycle. Also, of course, a sense of foreboding that another referendum would re-open all the family feeds / social angst and so on. However, another bloody referendum is not the only way to settle the matter. It is also quite certain that not opening up the difficult question will mean that the wounds of Brexit will remain with us for generations to come. Some kind of healing could actually take place with a grown-up recognition that Brexit has failed and that rejoining the EU is both possible and desirable. There is an embedded assumption that we MUST do this via a referendum. It ain’t necessarily so. See this article for London for Europe and Reboot Britain on the choices we face.
Myths and Riffs of Brexit
I note that the last remaining Brexiters are putting forward a number of myths to silence debate. Sadly some remainers also buy into these myths due to learned helplessness. For example:
‘Learned helplessness’ on the part of Remainers plays into a passive acceptance of the idea that Brexit is done and it cannot be undone. This is the belief that we don’t deserve to join anew as it might be considered anti-democratic etc. However, a referendum won through fraud, fake social media ads and which was judged illegal by the Supreme Court had it been mandatory is not the high-water mark of democracy. Leavers were not satisfied by a super majority (67.2% on a 64% turnout) in the initial referendum to join the EU in 1975. Nor should we.
Learned Helplessness summed up. We must not subscribe to it.
Indonesia– our structural deficit
Learned helplessness prevails in a vacuum of leadership and a lack of coherent strategy. Whilst the Remain movement was relatively united in the summer of 2019 after a number of victories, the 2019 election fragmented people again along political party lines. There are now as many proposals on how we rejoin as there are pundits. I describe the organisational structure of the Remain movement as being like Indonesia i.e. 17 000 islands and a few bigger ones. But all operating independently. The bigger beasts such as the European Movement compete with other actors such as Best for Britain. Others prefer to plough their own furrow. Some have been asleep at the wheel, calling for Remainers to make the most of Brexit. Yet, the only good Brexit is a dead Brexit. The consequence of being ‘Indonesia’ is that we find it hard to do things at scale. Fragmentation of strategy / structure and poor leadership also mean that we spend as much time arguing internally about strategy as we do in acting on Brexit and Rejoin. I set out five goals which we coalesce around on a monthly basis. It ain’t perfect but we do our best to provide clarity and collaborative leadership across a group of people from Europe. Join us some Mondays at 8 pm UK time via ZOOM. See also our article on Strategies to Join EU anew.
17 000 islands. A few bigger ones.
Five goals to join anew.
Not fade away
One specific point in the article which is not quite correct is the mention of BBC Question Time’s Brexit special event in Clacton. The journalist stated that the audience was made up entirely of those who voted leave. He went on to suggest that this was presumably to ensure the debate would not simply descend into an all-too familiar slanging match. We actually attended the event and talked with people on the street in Clacton. Levels of ‘Bregret’ were widespread in Brexity Clacton outside the event. They were also quite easy to get from people who realised that they had been taken for fools. The Brexit voting audience were also happy to speak with us after the event and many were of the view that Brexit had failed and that they were lied to. It is therefore a mistake to assume that all Brexiters attending BBC QT are now fully committed to Brexit.
This was mirrored in Brexit voting Deal the other week and on BBC Any Questions in Tory voting Southend on 17 August 2023, where the audience failed to applaud any of the statements made by the Tory panel member. Having been at the centre of some extreme nastiness by Brexiters, including the ex Met Policeman who issued threats of violence, spray painted my house and attended with a knife, I observe from Brexit voting Kent that the slanging matches have largely subsided. However, the article is correct when it infers that the products of Brexit won’t go away by not talking about it. See our Brexit iceberg below. Like it or loathe it, Brexit is the smelly dump and stain in the toilet bowel of life that won’t flush.
The Brexit Iceberg.
Brexit will continue to traumatise a generation if we do not burst the boil of Brexit one way or another. I believe in facing problems rather than sweeping them under political carpets. Labour in particular will be culpable for assisting the tragedy of Brexit if they continue to look away. Much in the way that the vast majority of good German people were silenced through fear during Hitler’s populist uprising. Fence sitting on Brexit is assent.
“The Tories will crow about Brexit being done. The Labour frontbench will solemnly observe that past tense, and avoid the B-word, as if it is a triggering trauma for the party and the country, best left undisturbed.”
Brexit is the smelly dump and stain in the toilet bowl of life that won’t flush
Lost consonance
As an aside, I found the opening paragraph about ‘Brexit hard man’ Steve Baker an unusual lead into the Guardian piece. I saw Mr Baker’s attempt to draw sympathy from the public to be a calculated attempt to humanise him as a piece of electioneering and not a window on his tortured Brexit soul. No decent Christian would agree with the human principles on which Brexit is founded. Like everything else with Brexit, it’s just another set of illusions. For example, The European Research Group (ERG) does no research. The weaponisation of asylum seekers to appeal to racists and people with feeble minds is not what Jesus would have done. and so on. Baker uses his faux Christianity as a shield and has now turned into a snowflake to gain sympathy from his constituents using the Brexit confessional box. Baker’s so called mental illness, beard growth and acne were mobilised as excuses. Krishnan Guru-Murphy’s analysis was correct when he pointed out that Baker was a C…nt.
Baker explained “I felt repugnant, hateful, to blame for all of the troubles that we had, absolutely without any joy, constantly worried about everything to the point of mental torment. A constant state of panic attacks and anxiety”. So he should, for all the pain he has inflicted on our children and those having anxiety, depression and lost careers / jobs / livelihoods due to Brexit. In fact, Baker should be in jail alongside Rees-Mogg who promised us cheap training shoes, Farage who promised a boom in fish and chips and Johnson who said that Brexit would make my wife’s breasts bigger. I’ve checked several times. They haven’t.
Charles Radley is mounting a campaign to persuade some MPs to change to a pro-EU party (e.g. Lib-Dem, Green, SNP, Plaid Cymru). First we are targeting those Labour constituencies where the MP is known to be pro-EU and where a pro-EU party came second in 2024. But we plan to do much more in terms of lobbying MPs across Britain with books and other resources. Can you help? Please fill in the questionnaire at this Google forms link so we can organise our campaigning most effectively. Thanks !
This piece was first written in 2024. It’s still as relevant (perhaps more so) under the Brexit Labour Trump Government … The only good Brexit … is a dead Brexit … it has become painfully clear that Brexit has not delivered any of the so-called freedoms, nor solved any of Britain’s problems or opened up opportunities of equivalent or better value when compared with our previous membership of the ‘club’. Read Rejoin EU: Reboot Britain for more on this. Better still, mail copies of the book to MPs or support our project to do so.
Even the Financial Times find it necessary to court proven liars such as Matthew Elliot in their recent film on the subject. Elliot attempts to make the argument that Brexit has not delivered because our mainstream politicians are not willing to seize opportunities, but then fails to identify any. It’s a thinly disguised argument to invite the Brexit ultras to the table, and with it, full fat fascism to Little Britain. Watch the FT film at the end of this article. Before that, watch this two minute short piece which sums up what Brexit was really about. My film is devoid of academic references as these tend to need much more time, but the supporting facts and validation can be found at the accompanying article Populism will eat itself.
Music soundtrack by Peter Cook. Available on Bandcamp with all proceeds going towards our campaign.
Brexit has failed
The film has already produced a visceral reaction from a leave voter who has clearly been affected by the film’s dystopian machine-styled soundtrack (deliberate) and the speed / brevity of the messages. He appears to have been somewhat triggered by the experience, which is good. Sadly, ‘Alan the Hat’ has no collateral in terms of his own research, content etc. Nor does he have any followers on his You Tube channel. I aim to provide a good (free) service and admittedly packed a lot of text into two minutes. Alan clearly has problems reading big words and sentences that are more difficult than “the cat bit the dog”, so I have provided a summary of the points below so he may study them in greater detail.
Brexit in 2024 – a summary
Tory gaslighting on an industrial scale fuelled Brexit. It continues via a daily stream of dead cats to take people off the scent of Brexit. Examples incude the need to incarcerate legal migrants, identity politics, constant scandals etc.
Brexit delivered 4.5% GDP LOSS into perpetuity and a broken NHS which Boris Johnson promised to fix, with the fabled £350 million per week on the bus. Brexit has damaged our resilience as a nation and therefore our ability to settle strikes with public sector workers and so on. Growth is for the birds in such circumstances. We are once again the sick man of Europe.
Cost of living impacts have Brexit as a major contribution. Food inflation has reached 20% There are more to come once border checks come in later in 2024 … In the next 28 days we will see further inflation on goods imported from Europe and barriers to trade for exporters. See Brexit Inflation. The Brexiteers’ explanation of this is that Brussels are ‘punishing’ us. Get real, we are now no longer a member of the golf club hence there are associated costs and barriers. The Golf Club analogy I made in 2018 is prescient here:
We are now a third country. Membership had benefits.
Brexit has delivered broken businesses, broken promises, broken lives and broken livelihoods. It is not true to say that Brexit Breaks Britain as this implies that Brexit is done. It is not and I deliberately choose the phrase Brexit’s Breaking Britain as it is more accurate.
Brexit weaponised an increase in racial tension from Brexit extremists such as Patel, Braverman, Badenoch, Anderson, Gullis, Mordaunt, Mogg, Farage, Tice Truss et al. They are responsible for killing people seeking safety from warzones.
Brexit has meant broken promises to farmers, fishermen, police, teachers, social carers et al. As a small example, the British replacement for the Common Agricultural Policy does not compare in any way to what we had, faults and all. Listen to the farmer in the FT film below for more on his topic.
Perhaps one of the real reasons for Brexit is yet to materialise … ‘Singapore on Thames’ beckons, with the ‘sale of the century’ via SEZs and a return to a feudal society. If you want to understand what an SEZ is, read @EuropeanPowell’s explanation of what you are about to receive whilst you are being gaslit by tales of royal cancers and gender reassignment..
Extract from @EuropeanPowell’s work. Follow him on Twitter.
Brexit is not done per Boris Johnson’s lie of an ‘oven ready deal’. Impacts will continue for the next decade.
Liz Truss’ experiment in Brexonomics cost an uncool £70 billion and ruined young people’s hopes of home ownership in just 49 days. Just imagine what the Brexit hardcore could achieve.
Boris Johnson used COVID to literally ‘mask’ Brexit impacts … what I termed a ‘Britastrophe‘.
Johnson must have jumped for joy when COVID hit. It was an opportunity to kill 30 000 OAPs in care homes whilst operating as a mass distraction for ‘getting Brexit done’. Click the image for more on our Britastrophe.
Brexit means a loss of freedom of movement, student exchange scheme and more travel friction / costs. All of this is self inflicted as part of our so-called democratic referendum.
Both the Tories and Labour are presently engaged in distraction, distortion and dead cattery, in their attempts to erase the mistake of Brexit and secure votes. Brexit has so far claimed five Prime Ministers. It will also claim Keir Starmer.
Brexit will continue to break Britain unless we Join the EU anew. We can do this. The door remains open and even The Telegraph are now recommending it.
All the while, Labour are asleep at the wheel of Brexit misfortune. Keir Starmer cannot deliver his transformation without recovering our resilience.
‘Stop the boats’ has failed. It was yet another dead cat to channel people’s anger in the Daily Mail / Excess. In any case, better answers to migration are available. See our immigration algorithm.
The damage of Brexit is cumulative and much of it irreversible. Labour’s talk of rejoining from 2032 is therefore disingenuous and despicable.
We are essentially Sunakered. Listen to our dialogue with James O’Brien on this point.
Brexorcisms still needed
Do have a look at the FT film which overall gives a good coverage of the state of our Brexit nation. I am disappointed at the lack of fact checking of some of the statements by Matthew Elliot. Where the film falls short is in the area of leadership, preferring instead to look for incremental adjustments which will not address the elephant in the room. A few mealy mouthed journalists apologise for Keir Starmer’s “management by focus groups”. Peter Foster makes the error that, since nobody wants to talk about Brexit, it will go away as an issue dividing families. Perhaps he needs to study the psychology of ‘closure’ a bit more carefully. Sure, the word Brexit can be airbrushed out of public discourse and there has been a concerted effort by politicians on most sides to do so, but the ‘dark mark’ of Brexit will be left on society unless the issue is resolved. Resolution can come through a number of means and not just another referendum. As I said in 2019, “Let’s Talk About Brexit“, maybe the title of their film acknowledges this need. Martin Wolf comes out head and shoulders above the rest of the journos and politicos with an honest appraisal of the mess that we’re in. We do need to talk about Brexit. Conduct a Brexorcism today.
Worth 30 minutes of your time.
Don’t just take my word for it. Here’s Brexit in numbers from official Government figures and other trusted sources:
Some of our books. Click the image to check them out on Amazon.
Rachel Reeves’ financial statement aka emergency budget landed yesterday. Labour have abandoned their principles of support for those in most need in society. And yet, a simple remedy to our woes is at hand … to end Brexit and apply to Rejoin the EU immediately. Brexit is costing us £140 Million every year. Much more than the floor sweepings she is trying to hoover up from the poor, needy and vulnerable.
Trumpaction costs
Worst of all, buggered by Brexit, Labour are forced to go with a begging bowl to TrumPutin. What transaction costs will Trump require to cut Labour a bit of slack? The price will be high for sure as transactional (trumpactional) negotiation is all that Trump understands.
Will Britain allow US crap food to be dumped on our kids?
Will Britain be expected to place further distance from Europe?
Will Britain have to withdraw support partially or wholly from Ukraine?
Reeves should know that by dealing with Trump, she is dealing with Putin.
Reeves and Moartar
There are better answers than kowtowing to psychopaths … Rejoin the EU, starting NOW.
Britain cannot indulge in full-on direct trade wars as we are now weakened by Brexit as we are now about as important as Panama. We can however be more creative than that, by indulging in what are known in the trade as “assymetric actions”. The most obvious one is applying to Rejoin the EU. We must also postpone the state visit. There are many other things that Trump wants to run his MAGA America First industry. We could simply redirect these resources to other countries. We are not stronger than Trump, but we can be cleverer. At this point in time Reeves and Starmer are in the “Chamberlain position”.
Unite and Survive Trump
This is what lies ahead if Britain doesn’t stand up to Trumputin:
Labour’s Brexit Jurassic Theme Park.
Brexit Hannibal Lecter Starmer 2024.
Your poor huddled masses, let’s club ’em to death. And get it over with and just dump ’em on the boulevard. Lou Reed.
Buy us a coffee (or more) via WISE, BACS, Go Fund Me etc. if you wish to help us do more.
We recently gained this endorsement for the book Reboot Britain from Lord Heseltine:
“Thank you for your letter of 19th February. I am glad you are undertaking this work which is both needed and timely”.
The Rt Hon the Lord Heseltine CH
Please send the book to MPs and influencers in advance of the Rejoin EU debate on March 24. Get copies at Amazon. Or get 60% author discount copies direct via reboot@brexitrage.com If you want us to send the books, please support us via PayPal, Go Fund Me or BACS via e-mail.
We are also planning some events to mark the debate. These need support as well. Give us our star back …
Last week was a bit of a bumper ride. I attended the UK in a Changing Europe (UKICE) event in London on Tuesday, then Stella Creasy’s Labour For Europe event on Thursday. I also spoke with James O’Brien on Brexit Day 31 January !! We have also started some musical and activist projects. Settle in for a long read ….
Before we begin, We are supporting Robert McMaster’s petition to force a debate about Rejoining in Parliament. The petition had stalled at 69 000 signatures with virtually no activity. In just three days we restarted the flywheel, adding 13 000 to the total and more since. Please sign and share, then send copies of our book to MPs and influencers. 60% author discount copies for those who don’t wish to use Amazon via e-mail reboot@brexitrage.com
Watch our latest videos on the project:
UKICE event highlights
UK in a Changing Europe hosted an event with Sir John Curtice, Prof Anand Menon, Prof Catherine Barnard and Sarah Hall, hosted by the BBC’s Jo Coburn. Labour stayed away from the event which surprised me. Catherine Barnard began by confirming our own view that the problem with Brexit is political paralysis and suggested that lawyers would be happy to sort the ‘wiring’ out if the politicians ever developed backbones (my words, not hers). John Curtice explained why Labour are reluctant to move the Overton window to bring Brexit back into view, stating that a referendum would consume a lot of political energy. Our settled view is that if Labour don’t confront the Brexit elephant in the room, there will be no substantial growth and therefore no second term. Anand Menon suggested that there would not be sufficient time for any Rejoin benefits to flow through. I believe that this is based on the liberal elitist assumption that a referendum is needed and therefore a lot of time would be needed to orchestrate such a decision. Also, the strategic intent to rejoin would be sufficient to boost confidence in business and markets, so I beg to differ with courtesy Anand. Views like this from academics, prominent Remain figures such as Jon Danzig and ‘peaceful warriors’ play straight into Labour’s hands when they say that that nobody wants to go back through the arguments over rejoining. Yet we all know the polling data. Yes, people don’t want to go back through a lengthy national soul searching process again, but this assumes that one is needed. From my own research, I find that the vast majority of people would not be that troubled if Brexit were made to go away quickly and without fuss. We say, let Parliament do the job they are paid to do. A referendum may only be needed as a confirmatory step, and then a simple, short process with fully fact checked information. See Reboot Britain for the reasons we say this.
On the other side of the debate, I find that some Remainers unwittingly reinforce and mirror the views of Remoaners, some of whom have pathologised victimhood, as articulated by this view from one of our co-authors Paul Cawthorne:
Curtice importantly confirmed our view that the time is now to campaign for rejoin. The entire session is below on video. Although I took comfort from Catherine Barnard and John Curtice’s remarks, overall the tone of the debate was one of ‘learned helplessness’, perhaps informed by fears and fantasies about what the far right might do if Labour were to take decisive action to stem the flow of blood from Brexit rather than apply more bandages. Leadership is needed from Labour rather than followership aka management by driving through the rear view mirror. My question to the panel can be found at 1.05.47 ish onwards. I gave books to Jo Coburn and John Curtice and our 1:1 conversations were candid about the need for leadership rather than handing the country to Farage and his wolves.
Stella Creasy’s Labour In Europe Event
Undoubtedly Labour have not stooped to the depths of depravity that 14 years of Tory rule have delivered in terms of divide and conquer politics, austerity on steroids and victimisation of vulnerable people via Brexit on crack cocaine. So the Tories should have been an easy ‘support act’ for Labour to follow. Labour’s first moves in power have however been somewhat awkward, as brilliantly parodied by Larry and Paul. That said, we must not underestimate the difficult of turning a super tanker round mid ocean after 14 years of degradation with some people still on deck trying to lock the ship onto icebergs.
In Labour’s search for “growth by 1000 ameliorations” whilst ignoring the Brexit elephant in the room, they will find it difficult, dare we say impossible to deliver the levels of growth required to win a 2nd term in office. By the end of the evening, Stella Creasy seemed a little rattled by an audience of remainers for ‘going on about Brexit’. Possibly in a moment of sheer frustration, she brought up the bogey man of rule by Elon Musk if we did not ‘get over it’. She seemed somewhat irritated by the encounter and took me to task over my suggestion that Keir Starmer needed more confidence to take tough decisions. This was the essence of my question to Stella:
I stood for Parliament in 2024 against Labour. I say against but my candidacy was solely to split the Tory vote in a safe seat. I recommended that people vote for Labour at all Hustings events, something that political candidates don’t do. Having spoken with Labour MPs and MEPs I am told that Labour’s strategy will be to consider rejoining in 2032. When I explain to them that (a) all the Brexit damage will be complete by then (b) much of it will be irreversible like some chemical reactions and (c) since there is no appetite to discuss Brexit in 2024, no one will be able to connect their lived experience with Brexit as a contributory cause in 2032, Labour MPs agree with me that the idea of rejoining later is disingenuous at best. At the hustings Naushabah Khan (Labour) stated that Brexit did not come up on the doorstep in defence of Labour’s position. I agreed, stating that all the front of mind issues that did come up on the doorstep (Cost of Living, NHS, social care etc.) had at least one foot in Brexit as a contributory factor. I used the Brexit iceberg to illustrate my point. Nashabah did not challenge my analysis. The Conservatives and Labour passively colluded to move Brexit out of the Overton window in favour of its offspring.
Brexit is the turd that won’t flush whether we pretend we can’t smell it or not.
Brexit Iceberg
Our internal sources tell us that Keir Starmer is naturally cautious and need a lot of support to make bold decisions. By fearing Farage, Starmer is “managing by driving through the rear view mirror” rather than leading. And when he says we won’t rejoin in his lifetime, he means his political lifetime. It may come soon without a little more risk taking. Perhaps this week’s incremental moves in Brussels are a kind of “national focus group” to test reactions. If nobody blinks, he moves another inch and so on. The right wing media and the Farage extremists have all cried “surrender” just because he went to Brussels at all … if that’s the reaction to an entirely trivial set of proposals, he may as well be hung for a sheep than a lamb. See sunk costs in the book.
I came away a little disheartened by the tone of the event which appeared to be telling us that ‘mum and dad knows best’. Although I would rather have open heart surgery without an anaesthetic than vote Reform UK, I came away with a strong understanding as to why others would. The more that people in Labour tried to defend the indefensible, the more toxic the comments became via the online chat. In hindsight, I think this dialogue may have been better handled in a real life event than on ZOOM, where feedback can go unheard and views build up like a pressure cooker. I was pleased however to see that my MP was brave enough to share my reactions to the event on social media and Nigel Farage is incandescent that Starmer signed a paper in the same building that Edward Heath used many years ago. Nigel really cares about the people of Britain of course but seems trapped by the iconography …
My MP Naushabah Khan
Rejoin EU
Brexorcists in Chief
On Friday I had a dialogue with James O’Brien about the last Remaining Brexiteers. There are not many people flying the flag for Brexit now, some 11% in fact. They mostly now fall into two categories: The people who still believe that the EU is an unelected superstate and who vote for Nigel Farage (himself elected to the EU as an MEP!!) and the racists / xenophobes. Gone are the people who voted for Brexit to stick it to Cameron, the ones who believed in the £350 million on the bus, Mogg’s lies about cheap food and shoes and so on. Are we to die on a hill for these people with Keir Starmer? Here’s the interview with James:
Click to listen to LBC
We also wrote a new song in partnership with Paul Cawthorne in Italy. Brexit’s in the air is a rewrite of the Wet Wet Wet song – the band title is “Slightly Red” to reflect Labour’s current positioning. Don’t just graze on the website, download the track and support our work.
Click to download on Bandcamp
Farage: Make Shit Happen
Finally, we rewrote a Sham 69 song around the story of Nigel Farage’s nephew, convicted for upskirting in the Co-Op in Orpington. How bizarre.
Keep on keeping on
Keep sending hard copies of the Rejoin EU book to MPs, influencers etc. …
