The UK has gleefully left the EU, the country has rejected 48 years in the European customs union, also called the Common Market, and 28 years in the Single Market, the brainchild of well-known Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher.
The 'Single Market'
The Single Market expanded the market available for British exporters without tariff or non-tariff barriers, to 500 million Europeans. Ironic then that the negotiations of the past four years were all the more difficult because of the (somewhat predictable) EU's insistence on defending the Single Market, itself created by the British.
The UK 'was a big player'
With the single market (with regulations set and enforced in Brussels) the UK became a player on the world stage. So, having now left the EU, the UK finds itself outside of the very market it created, and which has now become its competitor.
The UK is now "free", in the words of the UK Prime Minister, but free to do what? There has been much rhetoric about "levelling up the country" but the regions that need levelling up are precisely the ones that are most dependent on exports to Europe.
The UK Tariffs
While the export of goods to Europe will be spared tariffs in the trade deal agreed with the EU, there will be millions of non-tariff barriers that economists have said matter much more. These range from customs formalities, rules of origin paperwork, assessments of standards etc.
The much 'lauded' process of looking outwards for Brexit Britain may not come quickly. While the Scottish and Irish parliaments at Holyrood and Stormont have already rejected the Brexit trade deal, in reality the UK has now replaced a single market of 500 million Europeans free of non-tariff barriers, with a single market smaller than the size of its own country, as there is a trade border in the Irish Sea and Northern Ireland is left in the EU single market.
Non-tariff Barriers
There are also non-tariff barriers between Great Britain and Northern Ireland as a result of this deal. What we know is that the UK Prime Minister has succeeded in taking the UK out of the Single Market and the UK now stands outside a system that it helped invent, with the result that its new single market, is not even the size of the country.
Conclusion
Brexit will have repercussions for everyone in the UK. If you were to read between the lines to understand more of why and what's been done and given what we know about what Brexit means, Brexit was never in our best interests. It was the UK Prime Minister's decision in 2016, and who was advised by the German Chancellor, not to give the UK the vote.
Sovereignty whilst it's been out there in the media and a potential reasoning for the government's decision, is very much something that shall continue to affect us all negatively, as the days, months and years go by. We are poorer for it.
The country needs to understand
Helping us understand what leaving the bloc means is not only important, but it is a symbol of what the UK stands for and what lengths politicians will go to get what they want. My reason for writing about Brexit on my blog, is it helps me bring understanding and that eases my anxiety, because I deal with autism.
Brexit repercussions
It has changed how I and many of us live. Its repercussions will be felt for many years to come, amongst its UK population. The government have achieved what was the inevitable for us.
Our attentions should now be turned to the General Election in 3 years time. We have control to change what's been done by changing who we vote for in the next UK General Election. (Source: http://wwwbbccouk)
Thank you for writing about this. When you say it as you have, it is clear that the UK has left the EU for no good reason and for many bad ones. It is not surprising that no other country who has joined, has ever left.
My personal view is that the decision to leave was wrong and that it is clear that holding the referendum in the first place was simply to satisfy the hard right and an attempt by the then Prime Minister to consolidate his political position.
The last 4 years has taken a terrible toll on this country, and it has fuelled deep seated divisions within UK society. Also there is the real possibility that it may lead to the break up of the UK, which was unthinkable only a few years ago, let alone the economic and social hardships which we will experience for generations.
As you say, we have a general election in 3 years time when I hope this government will be 'shown the door' and a more centralist administration is elected which serve the country not itself.
Thank you for this and your honesty. I tend to work on the proviso that if I struggle, I write about it.
It's two-fold, it makes me feel better, even for a finite time, but I'm also sowing a seed putting my thoughts out to the universe, hoping that may trigger a change. I agree with you.
It is difficult to see a way forward. Moving forward things I am relying on things changing. That politicians will come forward and they start working together to bring about the necessary change, post Brexit.
Given what we have in the world, now would not be the time to split up from our biggest trading bloc. With an already lowered economy in the UK, loss of jobs, a shortage of food and medicine, due to Covid, now would not have been the time to have done it.