Sunlit uplands. Are we there yet?

[JohnL]

If people don't care about Nandos they won't care much about loss of Democracy I guess.

[JohnL]

If you do a search on "Nandos Brexit" you'll see the original reports seemed to blame Brexit but have been altered

For instance

"A Nando's spokesperson said: ?The UK food industry has been ... due to labour shortages linked to Brexit and soaring ingredient costs"

Is in the google search but not in the report itself - so where did this "ghost" text come from.

[Seabag]

Sevenoaks is outraged

[Sephiroth]

Another look into the fevered mind of the deranged

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/08/23/now-not-time-chicken-brexit-end-mass-immigration/

[Earl Aelfheah]

How come people haven?t started panic buying toilet roll?

[TheCat]

Sephiroth Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Another look into the fevered mind of the

> deranged

>

> https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/08/23/no

> w-not-time-chicken-brexit-end-mass-immigration/

I get that you disagree....but why is he 'deranged' for promoting pretty orthodox economic theory? i.e. removal of cheap labour promotes increased investment and an economic shift to higher value industries over the medium term - resulting in a more productive economy. You'd struggle to find a reputable economist anywhere that disagrees with that premise...even an anti-brexit one.

If you dont think the disruption short term is a price worth paying then thats a valid perspective (and largely the focus of anti-brexit economists). But simply rubbishing the entire argument doesnt seem very considered.

[Sephiroth]

because economic theory is all fine and well in theory - but it often doesn't survive contact with reality. And all of these economists who might agree with Lynn are not forming queues to agree with him on the wider points of his article

Higher value industries? yes please - now, what are they? They don't exist in any tangible, meaningful way do they? The govt isn't poised to unveil any

Higher animal welfare and better deals for UK farmers were explicit promises made to Leave voters - following Lynn's recommended course of action puts paid to both of those promises (convenient now the whole thing is done)

And simply saying "chicken is a solved problem - just import it" is ignoring the supply issues the UK is currently facing. He does mention haulage but he doesn't appear to recognise that chicken imported from wherever still needs to reach shops - and if everyone has buggered off to higher value industries or the EU then we still face supply problems

It's all just vapid, wishful thinking. If a country wants to rebalance it's economy it doesn't need something like Brexit to do it. As it is Britain is heading for the same spot it was in before it applied to join the EU - ie poor, disrupted and in need of joining the EU.

[Earl Aelfheah]

If one wants to remove cheap labour, then increase the minimum wage. How does adding loads of red tape and non tariff barriers to trade with your closest neighbours and the world?s largest single market improve the economy? Creating labour shortages, supply chain problems and erecting trade barriers is not a way to encourage a move to high value industries.

[JohnL]

Labour shortages - But right wingers are still saying those WFH will be made redundant as foreign workers can do their jobs.

[Sephiroth]

and it all speaks to the same lack of seriousness that has underpinned the whole thing - never addressing real problems, always conjuring up some distant point in the future where markets will have corrected this sort of thing, with scant regard for the self-inflicted suffering it all causes

We were told last year when we expressed concerns about NI that we were wrong to worry - yet just a few months later UK govt threaten to break international treaties because they didn't understand what was in them and the country was suffering because of them

At some point, Leavers will have to look at a problem, address it and not dismiss it, all the while blaming others

[Sephiroth]

same tone deaf response every time

"A government spokesperson said: ?The British people repeatedly voted to end free movement and take back control of our immigration system. Employers should invest in our domestic workforce instead of relying on labour from abroad?.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/aug/25/the-anxiety-is-off-the-scale-uk-farm-sector-worried-by-labour-shortages

They should stop faffin abaht growing' stuff and just buy it in, innit. In ten years, all those farms could be 'aaaahses, people will have somewhere to live, and we won't have no forrins knocking' abaht. Win win see

[wordsworth]

Sephiroth Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> same tone deaf response every time

>

> "A government spokesperson said: ?The British

> people repeatedly voted to end free movement and

> take back control of our immigration system.

> Employers should invest in our domestic workforce

> instead of relying on labour from abroad?.

>

> https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/aug/25/t

> he-anxiety-is-off-the-scale-uk-farm-sector-worried

> -by-labour-shortages

>

> They should stop faffin abaht growing' stuff and

> just buy it in, innit. In ten years, all those

> farms could be 'aaaahses, people will have

> somewhere to live, and we won't have no forrins

> knocking' abaht. Win win see

Wha?

[Sephiroth]

I was quoting latest stories about supplies whilst making reference to other poster?s comments from last couple of days about how we don?t need to bother farming chicken when we can just import it

[Seabag]

As a straw pole on the subject at this point in time

Are we getting further away, or closer to the sunlit uplands?

[Sephiroth]

"Are we getting further away, or closer to the sunlit uplands?"

if you are a leaver who isn't materially affected in any way, you'll be happy enough. And even enjoy mad comments from govt about scrapping GDPR

if you are a leaver who IS materially affected (like that Scottish fishing guy who still wants brexit, just not one that is affecting his livelihood, sunlit uplands might be pushing it)

everyone else? not so happy

[Seabag]

If guys like this are throwing in the towel, then the slide has just got way more slippery. And I know these people, they?re (or they were) one of my customers. 2 years ago I?d have put them in the ?due to expand into a group? box, easily.

It?s going to be many a case of, not if, but how fast the industry hits the bottom.

https://thecaterer.com/news/hang-fire-southern-kitchen-restaurant-closed-hospitality-staff-shortages

Ffs?

[j.a.]

Innit mate!

There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding by many people of just how intense the staff shortages are.

Haulage, hospitality, construction, farming, food production. These are all areas that have relied on immigration for decades now. See also the NHS, which is now actively recruiting former staff that have returned abroad (I got that from the outgoing head of a major London hospital). Let?s not get started on the dreadful situation social care is in?

The common response is ?raise wages?. Yes, cool, got no problem with that. But do you understand that means we will pass that cost into the customer? As will anyone else in the same position? If you?re fine with stuff costing more then cool, let?s do it. But don?t complain to me when your burger, your brick wall, your farm produce and so on all start costing more.

The industries listed above are not ones associated with massive profit margins. If your answer is that profits should drop to accommodate the public then A LOT of people are going bust.

Also, those industries are not ones where automation and technology can replace humans. You can?t automate building houses, picking strawberries, making coffee, gutting fish or driving lorries. You just?can?t. We need people to do those jobs, and when the govt blithely tells us to invest in the domestic workforce and we then advertise higher wages and lower hours and STILL get ZERO applications (as so many businesses are) then you start to wonder why??

As the recent Sarah O?Connor article in the FT explained, our labour market is pretty broken. It needs deep fixes and we were told Brexit would do this. Well maybe it will, but it hasn?t yet and it doesn?t seem to me to be on the horizon. If it does then great, but thus far all I see is more of the same ?it?ll be fine? blas? nonsense.

How long before people start admitting that we are either going to have to accept stuff costing more in order to pay British people to do the jobs (which strangely they still don?t seem keen on doing even though wages are rising fast) or we have to increase economic immigration?

The alternative is more of what Seabag talks about.

[j.a.]

Deleted - double post

[j.a.]

While me and Seabag are understandably furious about the situation hospitality/catering is in, the trouble in the haulage industry is worse.

We need trucks to get stuff from A to B. We haven?t invented teleportation or robot drivers yet so we need actual humans for the job, and because massive trucks aren?t the same as a bicycle these people need to be skilled. It takes time to become good at anything, and you want the drivers to be good because an accident involving a massive, heavy truck is far worse than one involving a bike.

Now I?m guessing that most Brexiters would like to distance themselves from the overly-simplistic (to the point of dangerous) views that he espouses, but unfortunately he?s representative of what a lot of people think - that these problems are simple to solve.

They aren?t. As I say, we can raise wages all you like - in the end you, the consumer, are paying those wages - but it still takes time to implement.

And the haulage industry was warning you about this a long time ago, you just didn?t listen.

[Sephiroth]

I'm a big fan of people like Redwood (and indeed many Leavers) opposing minimum wage/better wages for decades just simply saying "pay people more"

yep - no-one has thought of that before Johnny boy

[Sephiroth]

and don't we have more barriers on inward goods still to come later this year and start of next?

[Seabag]

This whole thing has been fulminating in the background, but there?s been a great deal of ?wilful blindness? going on, as it contradicted the wishful thinking of the Brexit lie.

It?s mostly too late to do much about the slide we?re experiencing (remember it?s impossible to slide upwards) and given the will this government has shown to fcuk things up, I?m not holding my breath for it to improve for a very long time.

?Just get used to it? is the new U.K slogan

[Sephiroth]

Other countries see Johnson and Brexit

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/finn-mcredmond-myth-of-global-britain-laid-bare-in-utter-shallowness-1.4656129

[JohnL]

Sometimes I think the Irish Media have a sense of Schadenfreude (can't really blame them)

[JohnL]

and talking of trade ambassadors - what's Tony Abbott done for us recently.