I would add that Labour’s relaunch reads as a list of policies they would like to enact if the plan works. But I don’t see a plan. In 2025 (in my view) they will have to either set the country on trajectory to rejoin SM and CU or align more closely with US. Rudderless mid-Atlantic is unsustainable.
youtu.be/HelXGkdDVCk?...
The Tories already nailed the UK to the USS Titanic with Brexit. We immediately joined in torpedoing our global lifeboat & growth engine - the one that hasn't had a war in 40 years. Labour just continued it. 8 yrs ago the world enjoyed stability.
Please use Bluesky, Prof Brian Cox! 🙏
Agreed, and surely aligning with the US is a big no given their foreign policy and lower standards on things like food.
I'm old enough to remember being promised that leaving the EU wouldn't mean quitting the single market or customs union, until Theresa May came along with her pointless and arbitrary "red lines" and "Brexit means Brexit" nonsense. A momumenal act of self harm which should be corrected ASAP.
Yes. I’m pretty fed up with ‘red lines’.
Me too! Once the referendum was over, cross party alliances ended, I remember the government at the time refusing to give any information about what they intended because that would “show their hand”. Brexit is a disaster and the refusal to give any consideration to the 48% compounded it.
It has been a relentlessly ongoing and unfinished disaster. With no end yet in sight. God, it’s depressing. Why do the bad guys always win?
Let's hope they do the former & not the latter.
Entirely correct. Almost finished reading George Monbiot’s book and he makes the same point - Humans need to tell compelling stories that stir us to action.
Should we ever encounter aliens I’m pretty certain that we will have one thing in common - politicians are incompetent or corrupt. After moving to Oz from UK it’s still the same old same old here as it was there
Labour, or what's left of it these days, will soon be booted back out and will never be given a chance again. Or possibly will in about 20 years. This parliament will be over before you know it. They'll still be blaming what they inherited right up to the next election.
I can see a plan, Labour just need time to deliver it. The corporate media have been really incredulous towards them with some harsh criticism. Starmer and Rayner are often very human when they speak in Parliament, but this gets no exposure. Labour have substance, the right have populist slogans.
I don’t agree. I can’t see the big picture - what is the U.K’s place in the world? Are we to regain our place in Europe or attempt to be a lower-tax, deregulated country which is more US facing? The big strategic questions can’t be dodged much longer.
China could become the dominant superpower in the world as early as 2027, so perhaps the USA and Europe will decline. I'm not sure about the UK, but I have faith that Labour will find their bearings. Keir Starmer has already met President Xi and is trying to improve relations with Beijing.
They’ll dodge until is becomes critical. They still fear the Brexit voters.
Come on though Brian, we are a European island and always will be. That means we can never lose our place in Europe. We can only improve it or make it worse. Being part of the US is a delusion. Geography will always be the boss mate.
The problem with closer alignment with the US is we'll probably be made to take some of their math. As a suppository.
And aligning with the USA really isn’t a safe option any more (if it ever was), is it. So EU it is and the less time we waste the better
Meaningful progress seems impossible until the government at least acknowledges reality. It has shown no sign of doing so thus far, which I can only surmise is a political position, designed to appease those sections of the electorate it thinks it can't afford to upset. Short termism is a curse.
Forgive my ignorance (have googled and can't find) but what is SM and CU?
Single market and custom union
Thank you! Worked out Single market but CU was alluding me
It would be nice at least to have a vision .
Why do we listen to journalists when we could listen to Science?