Christopher Owens πŸ”– “Britain was particularly ill suited as a liberal parliamentary democracy to deliberation by plebiscite on such a complex matter as leaving the EU.”


This quote, from TPQ columnist Barry Gilheany, is telling in so many ways.

Nearly a decade on from the UK's decision to leave the European Union, the ramifications and recriminations continue with many people not willing to understand why their fellow countrymen voted the way they did.

Of course, we should criticise the rushed and unnuanced way it was handled as, realistically, it should have been a two-year project culminating in a referendum. Ultimately, the majority voted to leave and the vilification of democracy, of the working class and even the country itself from supposedly ‘right on’ people went into overdrive.

What was exposed was not only a decaying political system that had outsourced every aspect possible to quangos (thus undermining a basic principle of democracy: if you disagree with the decisions of your MLA/MP, vote them out) but also a cultural divide between the urbane, metropolitan types and the ordinary working class.

Paul Embery described this divide in heated terms: 

…I had witnessed up close how the Left had increasingly looked upon traditional working-class voters as some kind of embarrassing elderly relative. They wanted their votes at election time but didn’t really want to be seen in public with them. They - along with the liberal establishment more generally - had come to despise the small ‘c’ conservative instincts of many of these voters and did not understand their desire for cultural, as well as economic, security. The intense deindustrialisation and demographic change visited upon working-class communities over the past couple of decades has served to create vast enclaves inside our country where inhabitants feel an acute sense of alienation and believe that out-of-touch politicians possess no understanding of their grievances and concerns. Brexit was their way of hitting back.

It may have been messy; it may not have been articulate. But such actions by people backed up against a wall rarely are.

Recent events have also seen a rise in right wing nationalism which has seen the EU turn a blind eye to Romania cancelling a presidential election, and El Presidente Trump’s new isolationist policies now mean that Europe can no longer rely on the USA bankrolling their defence.

Meanwhile, Britain has not collapsed as predicted by some of the more hysterical commentators but nor has it really thrown off the shackles of the EU to do its own thing. This contradiction is the core theme at the heart of this thought provoking read from Times journalist Ross Clark.

Speaking on the book tour, Clark made these pertinent points about the current state of the conversation around Brexit:

Since the Brexit vote, week after week, we’ve seen news reports blaming everything that’s going wrong in the UK on leaving the EU. It’s true that our economy is flatlining and that we’re running up higher debts. But that has nothing to do with Brexit – no British government has balanced the books in more than 20 years. The whole narrative that the UK is stuck in economic decline, while the EU is sailing off confidently without us, relies on us not looking too closely at what’s going on across the Channel. Germany is about to enter its third year of recession. France is up to its eyeballs in debt. And we saw what the Italian healthcare system was like during Covid. Britain and Europe are still locked in this cycle of low economic growth. We have an opportunity to escape from it and put ourselves on a higher trajectory of growth, but we haven’t taken advantage of our Brexit freedoms.

Examining various ways in which the EU has strangled productivity (contradictory regulations, a lack of innovation, single currency, high rates of corruption, commitment to Net Zero and no democratic mandate), Clark builds up a compelling image of a bloc that is stagnant overall and, in places, crumbling (such as transport and building).

While most of these apply to Britain as well, Clark is quick to point out Britain (despite middling productivity) is actually outperforming France and Germany in areas such as public transport reliability, low levels of corruption and pupil performance.

He then compares EU countries to the United States and China and the difference in GDP is astonishing: the World Bank estimate for the USA in 2023 is 27,360,935. The highest EU country was Germany with a whopping 4,456,081. By contrast, Britain is 3,340,032, ahead of France and Italy.

Obviously, as Clark points out, America has a very different culture to the EU. One where innovators can thrive and aren’t tied down by bureaucracy (unless they’re in California of course), whereas there is a prevailing view that creativity and innovation (such as gene splicing and GM foods) are stifled by EU regulations.

Interestingly, as Ross reveals, whenever Britain was given the chance to scrap EU regulations, it merely opted to bin ones that were well out of date but were still on the books (such as ones relating to the BSE crisis in 1996).

At times quite heavy on statistics, Far From EUtopia is a skilful, entertaining and provocative piece of propaganda that isn’t afraid to criticise the various Tory and Labour governments failing to utilise the opportunities on offer due to no longer being tied to the EU. Hence why some have ‘Brexit regret’.

One that will provoke many a pointed argument and should be read by those who wish to see an Irexit: England’s difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity.

Ross Clark, 2025, Far From EUtopia: How Europe is Failing – and Britain Could Do Better. Abacus. ISBN-13: Paperback ISBN: 978-0349146966

⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.

Far From EUtopia: How Europe is Failing – And Britain Could Do Better

Christopher Owens πŸ”– “Britain was particularly ill suited as a liberal parliamentary democracy to deliberation by plebiscite on such a complex matter as leaving the EU.”


This quote, from TPQ columnist Barry Gilheany, is telling in so many ways.

Nearly a decade on from the UK's decision to leave the European Union, the ramifications and recriminations continue with many people not willing to understand why their fellow countrymen voted the way they did.

Of course, we should criticise the rushed and unnuanced way it was handled as, realistically, it should have been a two-year project culminating in a referendum. Ultimately, the majority voted to leave and the vilification of democracy, of the working class and even the country itself from supposedly ‘right on’ people went into overdrive.

What was exposed was not only a decaying political system that had outsourced every aspect possible to quangos (thus undermining a basic principle of democracy: if you disagree with the decisions of your MLA/MP, vote them out) but also a cultural divide between the urbane, metropolitan types and the ordinary working class.

Paul Embery described this divide in heated terms: 

…I had witnessed up close how the Left had increasingly looked upon traditional working-class voters as some kind of embarrassing elderly relative. They wanted their votes at election time but didn’t really want to be seen in public with them. They - along with the liberal establishment more generally - had come to despise the small ‘c’ conservative instincts of many of these voters and did not understand their desire for cultural, as well as economic, security. The intense deindustrialisation and demographic change visited upon working-class communities over the past couple of decades has served to create vast enclaves inside our country where inhabitants feel an acute sense of alienation and believe that out-of-touch politicians possess no understanding of their grievances and concerns. Brexit was their way of hitting back.

It may have been messy; it may not have been articulate. But such actions by people backed up against a wall rarely are.

Recent events have also seen a rise in right wing nationalism which has seen the EU turn a blind eye to Romania cancelling a presidential election, and El Presidente Trump’s new isolationist policies now mean that Europe can no longer rely on the USA bankrolling their defence.

Meanwhile, Britain has not collapsed as predicted by some of the more hysterical commentators but nor has it really thrown off the shackles of the EU to do its own thing. This contradiction is the core theme at the heart of this thought provoking read from Times journalist Ross Clark.

Speaking on the book tour, Clark made these pertinent points about the current state of the conversation around Brexit:

Since the Brexit vote, week after week, we’ve seen news reports blaming everything that’s going wrong in the UK on leaving the EU. It’s true that our economy is flatlining and that we’re running up higher debts. But that has nothing to do with Brexit – no British government has balanced the books in more than 20 years. The whole narrative that the UK is stuck in economic decline, while the EU is sailing off confidently without us, relies on us not looking too closely at what’s going on across the Channel. Germany is about to enter its third year of recession. France is up to its eyeballs in debt. And we saw what the Italian healthcare system was like during Covid. Britain and Europe are still locked in this cycle of low economic growth. We have an opportunity to escape from it and put ourselves on a higher trajectory of growth, but we haven’t taken advantage of our Brexit freedoms.

Examining various ways in which the EU has strangled productivity (contradictory regulations, a lack of innovation, single currency, high rates of corruption, commitment to Net Zero and no democratic mandate), Clark builds up a compelling image of a bloc that is stagnant overall and, in places, crumbling (such as transport and building).

While most of these apply to Britain as well, Clark is quick to point out Britain (despite middling productivity) is actually outperforming France and Germany in areas such as public transport reliability, low levels of corruption and pupil performance.

He then compares EU countries to the United States and China and the difference in GDP is astonishing: the World Bank estimate for the USA in 2023 is 27,360,935. The highest EU country was Germany with a whopping 4,456,081. By contrast, Britain is 3,340,032, ahead of France and Italy.

Obviously, as Clark points out, America has a very different culture to the EU. One where innovators can thrive and aren’t tied down by bureaucracy (unless they’re in California of course), whereas there is a prevailing view that creativity and innovation (such as gene splicing and GM foods) are stifled by EU regulations.

Interestingly, as Ross reveals, whenever Britain was given the chance to scrap EU regulations, it merely opted to bin ones that were well out of date but were still on the books (such as ones relating to the BSE crisis in 1996).

At times quite heavy on statistics, Far From EUtopia is a skilful, entertaining and provocative piece of propaganda that isn’t afraid to criticise the various Tory and Labour governments failing to utilise the opportunities on offer due to no longer being tied to the EU. Hence why some have ‘Brexit regret’.

One that will provoke many a pointed argument and should be read by those who wish to see an Irexit: England’s difficulty is Ireland’s opportunity.

Ross Clark, 2025, Far From EUtopia: How Europe is Failing – and Britain Could Do Better. Abacus. ISBN-13: Paperback ISBN: 978-0349146966

⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.

18 comments:

  1. With Britain becoming so closely aligned with EU member states over support for Ukraine, the pros and cons of Brexit is becoming yesterday's debate. Thank you very much Messrs Trump and Putin for pushing Britain towards Remain. What a reward for your interference in the referendum (Putin, I mean) and for the lies and racist scaremongering that your patsies Farage, Johnson, Gove and Cummings peddled. Anecdotally there may have been some condescension of Remain supporters to Brexit voters on their age and low education but I have yet to see the empirical evidence and having seen shaven headed, beer addled Engerland nationalists (because that was the project) grunting "Take Our Country Back" and remembering the race hate crimes that happened after the vote, it is hard not to. Slavi Ukraini. Viva Europa.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sigh.

    "Anecdotally there may have been some condescension of Remain supporters to Brexit voters on their age and low education but I have yet to see the empirical evidence...

    then

    "having seen shaven headed, beer addled Engerland nationalists (because that was the project) grunting "Take Our Country Back"..."

    All in the same sentence.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Chris, while by no means all Brexit voters are racist, it is undoubtedly true that all racists voted Brexit as evidenced by BNP, EDL, Britain First and other far right groups for it. Once again, where is the empirical evidence for this disdain for Brexit voters?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Once again, where is the empirical evidence for this disdain for Brexit voters?"

      https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/08/the-guardian-view-on-brexit-the-government-has-failed-its-time-to-go-back-to-the-people

      https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-voters-stupid-study-voters-b2452491.html

      https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/the-staggers/2016/05/brexit-has-its-roots-british-empire-so-how-do-we-explain-it-young

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbffcwftbZQ

      https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/11/20/the-relentless-demonisation-of-brexit-voters/

      Delete
  4. I mean peer reviewed academic studies, Chris.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Is that the sight of a goalpost being moved in real time?

      Why yes, it is.

      Delete
  5. Do you think all the old school socialists who were against the EU from the start were racists Barry? I don't. I see them as correct, the EU was nothing more that the capitalists wet dream; the removal of borders for cheap un-Unionised labour to cross freely...money is colourblind.

    Regardless, refresh my memory please, I asked you on another thread whether you respect the democratic vote for Brexit or you don't...is that still the case?

    I am on record here on TPQ as saying that even though I'm a Loyalist I would accept the outcome of a democratic poll in NI if it chose a UI, because as much as democracy is an arse it's the best system of Government humans have come up with so far.

    Do you accept democracy?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They were not racists Steve but a lot of people favouring Brexit to Brexit were and are racists. I believe that without the racist surge, given the tightness of the outcome, it would not have been carried over the line.
      I like the idea of a European union although not this one. I think it is as you described. But in the modern world autarky and protectionism ringfenced by by nation states does not seem the best way forward.
      Brexit has not delivered for the most disadvantaged including those who favoured it but not for racist reasons.
      I am not much of a nationalist, feeling that in a world where problems are global that global regimes are needed to tackle them. I think of myself as European before Irish. I'd like to see a global currency and language to make things more convenient. Love it when I go to Spain or Latvia and don't have to change money. That is very subjective . . . and lazy!!

      Delete
  6. Steve. The referendum was constitutionally advisory only, there was arguably no mandate for the Hard Brexit that emerged from Johnson's bullying of parliament. The result was delivered by lies, dark money and Russian people interference but events in the last fortnight had made it irrelevant

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Barry - are there any of these politician that do not lie? I think that this is what people mean when they say politicians are all the same - that they all lie in a bid to lubricate their agenda and more easily achieve their goals.
      I think we should take lying as an integral part of political life. The best means of addressing it is to have mechanisms of accountability and scrutiny which allows society the voter to call them out. That means getting rid of gagging laws.

      Delete
  7. Wales is introducing a law making it a criminal offence for politicians and candidates for public office to lie.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Furthermore the EU Social Chapter instituted labour and environmental protections which deregulatory Brexiteer zealots wanted to tear up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Most of which were already in place through trade union battles.

      Delete
  9. What's interesting about these discussions (which Steve has touched upon) is how the left wing case for leaving the EU has been completely forgotten about. Once a staple of left wing thinking, it has now been replaced by EU fanaticism which is based on a lack of trust for democracy.

    It's also notable that the point Clark makes in the book (that the EU is struggling and Britain, despite the apocalyptic mongering, has actually done OK outside the regulations) has been ignored as well. Barry's point about Britain closely aligning with EU states is irrelevant as there was never a chance that was not going to happen. One of the points of removing oneself from the EU was to remove the red tape and negotiate trade deals with countries that would favour Britain.

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  10. Britain has self har.med through exiting a ready made market of 450 m people on its doorstep in exchange for an expensive trade deal with Australia. Whatever became of the trade deal with the US that Johnson promised? The fishermen feel shafted and businesses who deal with EU member states have seen their red tape burdens multiply to the nth degree

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  11. The EU is an association of 27 (minus Hungary) liberal democracies whose internal decision making processes do need to be improved but that did not justify Brexit. Note that leaving the EU is not on the agenda of Le Pen, Meloni or AfD.

    ReplyDelete
  12. The left wing or Lexit case for the UK leaving in it's isolationism is the flip side of the exceptionalism of the English as British nationalism of the Brexiteer Right. Bennite orthodoxy replaced by pragmatic European ism across the labour movement

    ReplyDelete