Humphrey Appleby

So no more fish than before, more difficult access to previous markets, and every other industry in the country screwed-up as a result... https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/scotland-fishing-brexit-boris-johnson-letter-b1788133.html And just in case the Brexiteers try to blame this on biased Independent reporting... https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9150705/Scottish-seafood-firms-days-collapse.html You couldn't make it up!

So it never sold anything to the likes of the US then?

I think people claiming "it's about lives" to make political points whilst in reality having absolutely no concern for the desperation of people trying to reach the UK - whether genuine asylum seekers or economic migrants - is very ignorant. I don't recall Merkel encouraging illegal migration. She offered asylum to a large number of Syrians who'd been displaced by a civil war that was largely sponsored by Western nations, and that you apparently can't distinguish the difference (or don't want to) really sums up my point. As for EU countries allowing asylum seekers to pass through - we already determined that this oft-quoted claim that the first country they reach has to deal with their application, is a fallacy. Brexiteers like to claim this so that the likes of France, Italy, Spain and Greece will need to deal with the problem, but that's not addressing the issue nor is it ultimately fair on those countries. That's no doubt why they encourage asylum seekers to move on, and with the UK now not part of the EU, they have absolutely no obligation to care about who turns up on the UK shores.

Like I said, you don't actually give a toss about the lives of others.

Protectionist? You and the other Brexiteers are the ones that want to stop funny foreigners coming to the UK, not to mention British citizens working in the EU... As for exporting to the world - there never were any limitations. Not sure where you think you're going to suddenly magic up a couple of hundred billion pounds of extra trade somewhere, but that's of course one of the many Brexit lies.

Funny how you and the other Brexiteers don't seem to be very concerned about lives when it comes to asylum seekers.

Those jobs have to be paid for, and that’ll add costs to exports which make them less competitive if not uncompetitive. That in turn reduces exports which means less employment opportunities. Not hard to understand is it?

You’ll never get unified agreement on how to run football because there are so many facets - Premier League, Football League, the rest of the professional game, Non-League, Local leagues, women’s football, junior football and so on.. They all have different concerns. Usually these attempted reforms revolve around the Premier League wanting to call the shots, and enhancing the elite side of the game, but the reality is there’s 10-20,000 teams that primarily play for recreationally reasons and can never aspire to elite level.

Assuming it works well and doesn’t have currently unidentified side effects, given the mistakes that were made and then covered up during the clinical trials.

So what’s being allegedly saved on ‘not giving oor money to the EU’ is now being spent on customs bureaucracy instead.

Sounds like there was a routine purge of old or no longer relevant records and someone screwed it up. Not quite sure why arrest records should be retained if people weren't charged with a crime anyway, but one suspects there's somewhat more to this than what's being said publicly.

You have to remember that Brexiteers are desperately clutching at straws to explain the economic disaster they've visited on the UK, instead of the sunny uplands and the 350 million extra per week going to the NHS that was promised... Of course, COVID will be blamed forever more, but it's pretty clear the problems have been exacerbated by Brexit and especially Boris dicking around until the last minute. His ridiculous political posturing has already cost the UK billions of pounds.

A fishy business indeed... https://www.standard.co.uk/business/downing-street-brexit-effects-city-b893017.html

The importance of fishing is quite clearly fairly irrelevant in the context of the overall UK economy, but I could at least appreciate that it's a tough life that requires significant investment of capital with uncertain returns. This is course the reason why few want to go to sea anymore, and why trawler owners were happy sell their quotas and take money to scrap their boats. After watching some of these BBC episodes though, it's clear that - with the odd exception - the UK fishing industry is not only its worst enemy, but actively intent on cutting its own throat. Any sympathy I might have had completely evaporated - seems to be just a parochial, small-minded industry that even out-contradicts the DUP in wanting its cake and eating it, whilst being far more interested in backstabbing than transitioning to modern practices. Yet it's somehow persuaded a minority of the public that the billions of pounds earned by other industries should be sacrificed for their own selfish ends. Frankly, the best thing that could be done is to pay to shut commercial fishing down and leave the fish to sea angling which is more sustainable. People don't actually need to eat fish nowadays - especially oceanic fish - and it would be far better if trawlers were no longer raping the seas. It was also pretty clear that fishing barely even contributes to the running costs of its own communities given that ports were having to diversify by attracting other business (to which of course the fishermen were objecting), so that argument goes out of window too.

Oor fish - apart from the other >=75% that aren't, and the rest are rotting on the quayside as they can't be sent to where they used to be sold..