Wow what a year it has been, not many pundits predicted that did they......
Who would have known we'd be on our way out of Europe and the 45th POTUS would be a certain Donald Trump, not many of us.
So let's start with the referendum which decided we leave the European Union. Now I'm not going to go over the arguments for or against that decision, it's been made, the public decided..so we move on.
Of course lets us not forget the real reason David Cameron called the referendum and passed an act of parliament to bring this about - it was not about you or me or Sid down the street, but all about the Tory party and keeping the waring factions within together.
So what do we now know - well it seems no one expected the result, this is clear from the fact no one had a plan, furthermore we decided a complex question; which as the current Prime Minister said was more than a binary choice, on a question that was a binary choice. Go figure!
Moving forward, we now face what...a hard brexit or a soft brexit, or May's Red White and Blue Brexit (she alone decides that apparently, we must trust her).
Put simply...Low growth a gig economy, over reliance on the service sector and a expanding trade deficit does not make for a sustainable future.
We could suppose be like Norway, and yes we could, if it was a second best option, but good old Margaret Thatcher (and subsequent politicians) pissed that all away when she sold our gas and oil revenues down shit creek rather than what Norway did and invest it in the future.
Lets be honest we don't know what the brexit future holds, nothing like this has happened before, the economist have no model to refer to, we can only hope for the better. One thing for sure we need to keep access to the single market, we need to be Norway lite, not an ideal situation, but better that the other nuclear option a hard brexit.....
What does that mean, it means negotiating to have our seat at the WTO back, you know that democratic trade body with neoliberal globlisation at its heart....you remember the last time you voted for the WTO don't you?
It means imports to our country would be more expensive, as well as our exports, we would see less tax from the city as they move some of their operations abroad, we would have less corporation tax as we try and entice inward investment.
And what would those brexiters say when we still need the same level of immigrants to balance an every growing older population to keep our economy running? .... Don't blame the majority of migrants for the minority that are being exploited, blame those who are exploiting them!
The world is growing closer, lets not build false walls and leave ourselves behind.
