Dec
2022
Beginning to See the Light: My Grand Finale, My Goodbye.
DIY Investor
12 December 2022
‘What you wanted was never made clear
Behind the image was ignorance and fear’
Welcome to the last edition of Beginning to See the Light.
The column has run for 2-yrs, and seen the country experience a hard-Brexit and a Covid inspired lockdown. Both were momentous events whose influence and after-effects will be felt for years to come.
Covid saw over 100,000 UK citizens lose their lives, a number of Tory cronies line their pockets largely due to £9bn wasted on unusable PPE, and forced the Tory’s to become the most centralist ‘big government’ we have known post-WW2.
Lockdown forced everyone to change their working habits, dressing down, ‘WFH’ (working from home), ‘TWATs’ (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday), ‘Zoom’, and ‘Teams’ became everyday language and behaviour.
The effects of the hard-Brexit are still becoming apparent, although every economic indicator points to total failure. Had we agreed a more negotiated exit we may have still had access to the single market which would have been less disastrous.
In truth, Brexit was always going to be nebulous, about nationalism, nostalgia, and empire. Now people have seen through this, polls shows that remain would carry the day if there was another referendum.
The conservatives will never, or at least not for a number of years, admit the folly of Brexit, which is why, if it is to be undone in some way we need strong opposition. Labour might be riding high in the polls currently, but, if they are to win the next election it will be down to successive Tory mistakes rather than Labour being seen as the way forward.
An example, of this is Starmer’s reluctance to revisit Brexit, even though polls sugest he would be pushing at an open door.
‘Brexit is the main reason why the UK is the only G7 country with an economy still below its pre-pandemic size’
Peter Hain, the former Northern Ireland secretary, supported by several other Labour peers, has urged Keir Starmer to do just this; to develop a series of practical policies to address the economic ‘disaster’ of Brexit and prevent it from driving Scotland towards independence.
In today’s ‘Observer’, Hain says that ‘the crises caused by climate change, the Ukraine war, the lack of economic growth and rising energy prices can only be tackled through closer cooperation with our EU neighbours than the current Brexit arrangements allow.’
The evidence of the negative impact of Brexit is all too clear; the governor of the Bank of England, the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development all agree that Brexit is the main reason why the UK is the only G7 country with an economy still below its pre-pandemic size. Labour, as the prospective party of government, has a duty to prepare a detailed plan for Brexit damage limitation.
Hain said, ‘Brexit, supposed to control immigration, has in fact delivered both chronic labour shortages and a dramatic jump in net migration in the year to June 2022, to a record 504,000 – deeply ironic given the racist undertone to much of the Brexit campaign.’
‘It’s high time we all confronted the Brexit fantasy of a ‘sovereign global Britain’. The writing is on the wall. Our destiny lies, if not within then certainly with Europe – and Labour needs practical policies to deliver that.’
Former Labour home secretary David Blunkett backed Hain’s intervention, saying, ‘Peter Hain is quite right to highlight the tremendous economic hit that can be identified as a direct result of Brexit. A 15% drop in trade identified by the Office for Budget Responsibility illustrates, graphically, the loss of resource that could be available to meet the challenge of drastic falls in income and therefore the ability of public employers to offer more generous wage increases and reduce the pressure cooker of industrial action.’
Starmer needs to wake up, he cannot rely on the Tories losing the election. Even though he was a prominent ‘remainer’ prior to becoming Labour leader, he continues to stress that he will not back any return to the EU single market or customs union, let alone contemplate a return to full EU membership.
If we are to re-establish closer links with Europe he will have to accept bringing back the free movement of people between Britain and the EU, which he recently described as a ‘red line‘ for Labour if it got into power.
His reluctance to even begin talking about Brexit and the negative impact it is having on growth, is allowing the Tory’s to maintain control of the narrative. The disaster that is Brexit is being overshadowed by ongoing public sector strikes. Starmer, rather than controlling the situation and getting the government on the back-foot is doing the opposite.
This is allowing the government to play hardball with strikers, making statements such as it is not possible for the government to amend awards decided by the independent pay body for NHS staff. The truth is that they don’t want to, government is meant to govern; it only sits on the fence because it chooses to.
Today, James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, said; ‘Of course, the health secretary wants to talk to the profession about how we can make the job better, how we can improve the NHS performance for everybody. But ultimately pay is decided by an independent pay body.’
Labour’s Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said ministers were being ‘irresponsible‘, and were using the strike to cover up the usual NHS winter crisis which, this year, will be worse than ever.
‘This brings me neatly to the end of Beginning to See the Light, primarily because there is no light at the end of the tunnel’
This brings me neatly to the end of Beginning to See the Light, primarily because there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
The UK is in an awful mess; economic growth continues to be negligible, public services are underfunded and stretched to breaking point, and the wealth gap continues to grow.
OECD figures suggest that the UK has among the highest levels of income inequality in the European Union (as measured by the Gini coefficient), although income inequality is lower than in the United States. (1)
The column will return in the new year with a slightly amended focus on economic growth. Until this is in-place nothing will change. To acheive that Brexit needs to be reversed, either fully or in-part, e.g. a Swiss-style deal.
As Farage became a hero to ‘Vote Leave’ the revised column will be called ‘Heroes’.
Another reason for the title, is that David Bowie’s masterpiece, ‘Heroes’, highlighted how a wall alienated people in Berlin. Brexit has become a wall that is dividing us from our European cousins.
The song itself tells the story of a German couple who are so determined to be together despite the political climate of the day that was preventing them and, in that desperation, they meet every day under a gun turret on The Berlin Wall.
After its release the song became more symbolic, and captured Berlin during the time the city remained divided. It created a poignant moment when, in 1987, Bowie performed a unifying rendition of the track at the Berlin Wall just two years before it’s demolition began — with the power of music for one night only bringing these two opposing sides together.
‘We can beat them, just for one day
We can be heroes, just for one day’
To each and everyone of you compliments of the season, and a happy, healthy, and prosperous 2023.
I hope that in the last two-years the column provoked, anger, agreement, or frustration in each of you. It was borne out of anger and frustration and the new column will continue to campaign for change.
Notes:
@coldwarsteve
Philip Gilbert is a city-based corporate financier, and former investment banker.
Philip is a great believer in meritocracy, and in the belief that if you want something enough you can make it happen. These beliefs were formed in his formative years, of the late 1970s and 80s
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