Monday 24 June 2024

Frost: 'Nobody says Brexit has been bad for the UK'

Lord Frost responded to a tweet from Nicholas Shakespeare, a novelist, who said if you travel outside the UK you frequently hear people remark that Brexit has been terrible for Britain and usually ask, why did you do it? Frost said he never hears this on his overseas travels and suggests it isn’t true. The replies are fascinating.  Shakespeare’s tweet also pointed out that at the moment, neither of the two big parties are talking about it. In other words, Brexit is a topic of conversation everywhere except where it matters. They must think we're daft.

Anyway, back to the replies.  Firstly, here's Frost's tweet:

He links to his own Telegraph article in which he defends Brexit, finishing with this completely tin-eared comment:

"So when people say Brexit is failing, don’t listen. Point to the evidence, and be proud of what we did to make our country free and independent once again. And vote wisely on July 4."

One might ask: what evidence?  As I write there have been well over 1,000 replies to Brexit's chief negotiator. As far as I can see, the overwhelming majority agree with the original tweeter.   A few typical responses:

The last comment is particularly interesting. I'm sure Brexit does come up in every queue in every airport and let's face it, there are a lot of queues and a lot of airports in Europe and I assume a lot of interaction between travellers caught up in the needless Brexit-created delays.

Young people tend to travel more than retirees like me so it's no surprise that a recent poll from Savanta shows 84% of the 18-24 age group want to rejoin the EU:

Sovereignty is perhaps less important after you've been standing for an hour waiting to get through non-EU passport control whilst watching EU travellers being quickly processed. So, although the two main parties don't want to talk about it, in thousands of queues and workplaces across this country and Europe, people are talking about Brexit - and not in a positive way.

And just to add to this, although I’m long retired, in 2018 when I was in Italy at my old employer’s centenary celebrations, I met an Austrian lady who said exactly that and was curious about why we would want to do it. It just didn’t make any sense to her.

Frost seems unable to comprehend why a nation might want to give up a little sovereignty, which I define as the freedom to do exactly as it wishes, to ease travel, make trade easier and cooperate with its close neighbours to raise living standards.

On 5 July voters are going to send him an unmistakable message.

Finally, to add to Sunak's woes, I hear the Gambling Commission are looking into more allegations that senior figures in the Tory party placed bets on the date of the election when they were in possession of  insider knowledge. 

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