General British politics discussion thread

Yesterday BBC News actually did a piece on how relatively few asylum seekers there are in UK. You don't see that kind of reporting very often, so it must have come as a surprise to your typical Daily Mail reader. No doubt many of them muttered something like..."fake news"...woke BBC"...as they switched over to GBNews.

If auld Dan wasn't a complete gobshte he might realize it was the Tories who "got Brexit done" who deposed the last few PMs not the "remoaners"

Actually he does know that he is just a complete bllshter who appeals to the dumbest in society.

Well they promised Brexit and Britain has left. Maybe the DUP should have copped that the clue is in the phrase 🤣

It's a worse than pathetic response; it's a shoot-yourself-in-the-foot response. The only possible relevance of Brexit here is that, as a result of Brexit, the UK is no longer within the Dublin Regulation, which narrows the options open to it for handling asylum applications. So Starmer is saying "who broke the asylum system?" and Sunak is, in effect, saying "we did, by Brexiting".

Others have pointed out that Sunak has been a consistent Brexiter ever since being elected to Parliament; of the five PMs in the Brexit era he is the only one never to have adopted or expressed a Remainer position at any point in his political career. You'd think, then, that he be sufficiently interested in and aware of what Brexit entails to know better than to mention it in this context. But apparently not.

I've seen it suggested, though, that Sunak's brexitry, though consistent, is shallow. He has only engaged with the issues and practicalities of Brexit to the extent required to satisfy the Richmond Conservative Association selection committee, which is not a very great extent; they are very happy with kneejerk but ignorant brexitry.

Except for the fact Farage himself was banging on about the same trade deals the UK would make out on the "high seas" and the far right clowns believed all that too.

But I thought there is only One True Brexit and they all knew exactly what they were voting for?

I heard the line repeated over and over in London that "England could go around the world making amazing deals if only we were not held back by the EU"

The EU is a protectionist bloc so, in theory, leaving it does open up the possibility of new trade deals.

Of course if you don't already have new deals lined up then its castles in the air.

Liz Truss said a UK-US trade deal could be "years away". I don't know all the details but politically Trump should have fast-tracked a deal since Brexit is associated internationally with his brand of populism.

Trump, and now Biden, don't want it for whatever reason.

Okay well the Ways and Means Committee won't allow it so. I said I didn't know the details. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

Re "protectionist bloc" its how I would describe it. What would you call it? The EU can erect trade barriers, as a bloc, against goods from non-member states. That is why Leavers were furiously promising the UK would get a good trade deal with the EU itself.

Lol