Vaccine nationalism and criticising the EU

 

The EU dropped a bollock. A massive bollock. A bollock the size of Jupiter. There, I said it. I am a militant remainer, someone who voted for the UK to stay in the EU in 2016, and would vote to rejoin the EU if the opportunity ever presented itself. But I can still criticise the EU without compromising my views. This is because, like pretty much ever remain voter I know, I can criticise EU decisions while not wanting to dismantle the whole damn thing. 

The bollock to which I am referring is, of course, the vaccine debacle. What started out as the EU being disgruntled over what it saw as AstraZeneca not being able to fulfil the vaccine order from a paying customer quickly degenerated into an unseemly spectacle. AstraZeneca was about 75 million doses short of being able to meet the EU's order of 300 million doses, with the option of a further 100 million. AstraZeneca cited production problems at their Netherlands and Belgium plants. The EU demanded that AstraZeneca should send over a load of doses manufactured here in the UK.

Unsurprisingly, the headlines seen across the UK front pages did not take a measured tone. It was an opportunity to take a huge potshot at the EU while talking up our own vaccination success. Behold, the WWII cosplay language of war and British victory, of explosions - and a Mafia analogy. This was an absolute gift for Boris Johnson - the front pages made him look mighty and powerful, despite lethally mismanaging the pandemic since the beginning, and we could all blame the EU for being mean and evil again. Just like old times!  The fruit was so low-hanging, it was growing with the potatoes.

But then a grown-up entered the room. Michel Barnier, the man who had the thankless task of leading EU negotiations over Brexit, offered his reasonable view that Brussels had overstepped the mark with the UK, and before long, there was a screeching U-turn from the EU. Unlike every embarrassing U-turn Boris Johnson has performed in regard to managing the pandemic, the EU's about-face was swift. There was no EU raid on UK-made vaccines.  

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen was reckless when she effectively called for a hard vaccine border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland - and she has kept a low profile ever since backtracking on this issue. The risk to the terms of the Good Friday Agreement cannot be understated here. But her ill-conceived statement exposed just how fragile peace is and, crucially, how the Brexit deal is poorly equipped to cope when Irish border issues crop up. 

The whole fiasco also exposed the embarrassing absurdity of vaccine nationalism. Yes, the UK is ahead of the EU in rolling out a vaccination programme, which is obviously a good thing. Only a psychopath or an anti-vaxxer would say otherwise. It was a gamble to start the programme three months ahead of the EU but it paid off. The rollout is not perfect - there is plenty of evidence to suggest there is a postcode lottery that means rates of vaccinations are varying significantly from region to region, and the real logistical test will come when it is time to give some people their second shot while new groups are being invited to book their first shot - but we are making steady progress.

And the EU will, of course, catch up with the UK on vaccinations. Belgium, Czech Republic, Malta, and Portugal are already doing pretty well. This is also a good thing. It is in our interests for people across the EU as well as in the UK to be vaccinated in a timely manner. Brexit or not, the geography does not change, we are still part of the wider world, people are keen to travel to Europe for work, for play, to see friends and family, and the virus does not care about national borders. 

Carrying on about a British "victory" over the EU makes us look like idiots, just as the EU made itself look silly by making demands on UK supplies. Crowing about our vaccination figures, as if it's a contest rather than a serious global health emergency that can only be properly managed through international cooperation, is pathetic behaviour for a country where its leaders claim that Brexit makes us more outward-looking.

The EU dropped a bollock over vaccines. Then it did the right thing and backtracked. Tiresomely, Brexiters will bang on for the rest of their lives about the time the EU tried to nick our jabs. But the rest of the world won't care, especially as none of this has affected the EU's humanitarian vaccine efforts in developing countries. The rest of the world will move on while Brexiter Twitter will refuse to let it go, like Miss Havisham in a Union Jack wedding dress. And we'll be left with the ongoing economic and social consequences of a poor Brexit deal, as well as the loss of more than 100,000 people. Some victory, eh?

Photography by Gustavo Fring

Was Brexit meant to be this lame?

 

Remember gung-ho, priapic Boris Johnson of the referendum campaign? The moment my remainer heart sunk, the moment I knew the leave vote might just get up in 2016, was during the debate in which Johnson loudly heralded "independence day!" to a spontaneous, rousing cheer. 

But that excitable rhetoric of "sunlit uplands" and "amazing opportunities outside the EU" has been replaced by a more subdued mood from Brexit's most vocal cheerleaders. Their shoulders are slumped and the confident promises have been replaced by stumbling, mumbling desperation. And, unsurprisingly, the self-serving, grifting con man, Nigel Farage has abandoned the men and women of the fishing industry after using them disgracefully for his own ends in 2016.

The Brexiters' rhetoric now is more like "well, it won't be so bad" or "this is what we're doing to make this a bit less rubbish" - and everything "we're doing" is stuff that we're paying for, stupidly expensive stuff we, the taxpayers, wouldn't have to pay for if we'd simply stayed in the EU. 

Take Nissan's Sunderland plant for the latest example. All of a sudden, Nissan executives were singing the praises of Brexit and announcing that batteries would be manufactured in Sunderland. Last year, Nissan was sending out perfectly valid warnings of the dire consequences of a no-deal Brexit - and luckily for Nissan, the wafer-thin deal covered goods (but not services). Last week, Nissan was all about Brexit.

First, before any leave voter dares accuse me of wanting Nissan to close the Sunderland plant, nothing could be further from the truth. On a personal level, I have friends and family in the area and, even if they don't work at the factory, a 6,000-job employer shutting up shop has implications for them all. And on a broader level, only a hateful sadist would get any joy from seeing the end of a genuine achievement for the north-east from the Thatcher era. Nissan Sunderland is a fiscal multiplier, an unalloyed good for the region, as well as the 70,000 supply chain jobs beyond the plant's gates.

The reality is that the loss of Nissan Sunderland would be a PR disaster for this government. 

Sunderland voted 61.3% to leave the EU, smashing the nationwide 52% leave vote. Ever since, the people of Sunderland have been characterised, often cruelly, as idiots who shot themselves in their collective feet in 2016. A no-deal Brexit would have almost certainly spelled the end of the Nissan plant. The government knew this from June 24, 2016, and they have been generous with our money toward the automaker as a result. In February 2019, business secretary Greg Hand had to publicly concede that Nissan, a company with assets worth US$154 billion, received a government grant of £61 million.

While this is good news for Sunderland, such corporate welfare is unsustainable. Other parts of the UK automotive industry won't be as fortunate and the government knows full well it can't just spunk £61 million every time a big company threatens to leave the UK.

And the rest of this whole Brexit thing is just a bit pathetic really. 

It's obviously a good thing that the country hasn't descended into total chaos. I'm glad I haven't been in a fist fight for the last loaf of bread in Asda or taken to shooting squirrels off the garage roof for dinner. Only the most economically reckless or illiterate disaster capitalists and disaster socialists - almost always people wealthy enough to be insulated from any real hardships - genuinely wanted absolute bedlam after 11pm on New Year's Eve 2020.

Instead, we now have lots of examples of supposedly "little things" that have happened as a result of Brexit. This was always going to be the way it panned out - Brexit as the death by a thousand cuts rather than one massive social and economic explosion wiping us all out. 

These "little things" have been seized on by Brexiters as examples of pampered remainers whining from their ivory towers - it is low-hanging fruit picked gleefully by leave voters in what has degenerated into an embittered culture war. 

Brexiters have laughed at remainers for calling out everything from having to buy dog food in France when taking pooches on holiday to increased postage charges. Apparently, only wealthy remainers have ever taken a dog on holiday to Europe, even though that is clearly nonsense. It's not just about bloody dog food - it is about the added costs of taking a pet on holiday across the channel which are a direct result of leaving the EU. Brexit makes what was once a simple, affordable pleasure for a nation of dog-lovers into something that will become out of reach for many people. It's a microcosm of the sheer joylessness that Brexit is starting to bring to us.

Increased postal costs between the UK and the EU are not just a bit of a pain in the bum - they are genuinely crippling a range of smaller British businesses and you can bet your life they won't be getting a £61 million handout from the government any time soon. But Brexit suffering is only for the little people and the little companies. 

And there are other "little things" that are being minimised by Brexiters desperate to paint remainers as doomsayers. For example, phone companies have not yet started charging for global roaming when we travel to the EU - a dire warning of the remain campaign - but anyone who seriously thinks this will never happen is almost adorably naive.

The loss of access to the fast EU queues at European airports is dismissed by Brexiters by saying it's "worth it" or "anyone would think we never travelled or worked on the continent before the EU!", conveniently romanticising an era where travel was not accessible for a lot of people, where crossing European borders was inconvenient and time-consuming, where it was not easy to work or retire in Europe without a lot of money.

When Boris Johnson pettily pulled the UK out of the Erasmus scheme, even though we could have stayed in post-Brexit, this led to predictable Brexiter howls that this was just for privileged kids. No amount of people stating that they were working class kids whose lives were changed for the better by Erasmus will change their minds.

Similarly, Boris Johnson refusing the EU's magnanimity to allow easy access for British musicians to tour in Europe can be easily dismissed by Brexiters as just muso luvvies complaining. Never mind that the arts contributes way more to the UK economy than fishing or being able to easily work as a performer in Europe helps British artists financially and professionally. This is just another "little thing" we have to put up with for... For what exactly?

Liz Truss can bang on about pork and cheese all she likes but it's not going to bring us trade deals that are close to what we had in the EU. We will still need to abide by EU rules to trade with the EU, but we will have no say in making those rules. 

Boris Johnson can tweet ridiculous photos of himself giving God the thumbs-up while on the phone to Joe Biden but the reality is that a mutually beneficial UK-US free trade deal was not part of that conversation. 

Brexiters can yell "Sovereignty!" without being properly challenged on what it means or informed of the myriad things EU countries do as sovereign nations, such as effectively closing borders to help stop the spread of a deadly pandemic. 

Any Brexiter who dares say they don't mind if the price of groceries goes up as a result of Brexit probably isn't trying to get by on universal credit. Covid-19 delays and "teething problems" can only be blamed for so long when it comes to reduced choice in our supermarkets, higher prices, and fresh foods with shorter expiry dates - these are all direct outcomes from voting to make supply chains with the EU more complicated, bureaucratic and time-consuming.

And anyone who is genuinely excited by blue passports that we could have had without leaving the EU is just too sad for words.  

Nope, it's all just a bit lame, isn't it? It's not, as yet, an abject economic disaster - and the pandemic will be blamed for all manner of things for the foreseeable future - but over the next few years, we're going to see lots of little annoyances add up, in between completely predictable job losses across a range of sectors, even after the virus is under control. 

In the meantime, the movement toward an independent Scotland and a reunited Ireland, with EU membership, will go from strength to strength - and, ultimately, that may lead to the isolated rump states of Wales and England rejoining the EU under terms that won't come close to the benefits we enjoyed as part of a 28-strong bloc. Brexit is already looking pathetic. It is a damp squib wrapped in a wet blanket - and nobody voted for that.

 

Of course COVID-19 is political

The COVID-19 pandemic should not be an excuse to score cheap political points. It is not an excuse to wish death on politicians and their loved ones like a psychopath. It is not the time for ridiculous, batshit conspiracy theories about 5G causing the pandemic. It is not the time for anti-vaxx pedlars of death and disease to spout ignorant, science-denying twaddle. And it is certainly not a time to become a racist bellend. But it is political. It is naive to think otherwise. 

Countries across the world are relying on their governments for leadership, to figure out the best way to manage this terrible virus, to support healthcare systems, to know what the hell individuals can do to stop the disease spreading, to ensure the scientists working on a vaccine and a cure have everything they need, to work out what role charities and the private sector should take, and so on.

This means, obviously, politicians everywhere are making decisions - and it is naive to expect that certain decisions won't be politically motivated rather than for the greater good. In every democracy, this means they should be held to account - every decision that our leaders make affects our health and our wealth. We all have a huge stake in this. And in every country that is not a democracy, this should be the catalyst for increased transparency and public participation as a positive after-effect of the pandemic - after all, if you think the official mortality figures coming out of China or Iran are accurate, I have some magic beans and a time share in Narnia to sell you. Then again, the UK isn't bothering to include care home deaths in official stats so we still need to lift our game in terms of accuracy and transparency.  

In no country should COVID-19 be a time for cultish, blind loyalty to any leader of any political stripe. I'm glad Boris Johnson didn't die of COVID-19. And I'm glad Carrie Symonds, his pregnant fiancee, is doing well. Hell, I'm glad that he is recovering for a few weeks rather than working because that is what every coronavirus patient should be doing after they leave hospital. I am also glad that the attempt to stir up a national round of applause for the prime minister's recovery was a massive damp squib. A nationwide chorus of clapping and pot-banging for one man would have been embarrassing, unnecessary and definitely cultish.

And while Johnson may now join the immune herd for COVID-19, he is not and should not be immune to criticism or scrutiny - and neither should the hapless cavalcade of assorted incompetents, yes-men and women, charisma-vacuums, intellectual lightweights and slippery moral bankrupts who are filling in for the PM at the daily briefings.

It is clear that political decisions have been made which are not necessarily in our best interests, such as declining an invitation to join a European Commission-funded scheme to stockpile essential medical equipment, to have constantly dropped pandemic planning from the agenda since 2016, and for Boris Johnson to have found better uses for his time, such as meeting a dancing dragon for Chinese New Year instead of attending a COBRA meeting - or indeed attending five COBRA meetings on COVID-19.

At a time when we should be re-evaluating our relationship with China on multiple levels, including taking a stand on human rights and animal welfare issues and getting over our reliance on cheap goods often manufactured to low standards and in awful working conditions, the photograph of Boris Johnson gurning gormlessly at the dragon is not ageing well.

Yes, it's true that the relevant cabinet minister chairs COBRA meetings but given these meetings were about a global pandemic, it is negligent at worst and lazy at best for Johnson to simply not bother with these ones. Imagine the outcry in an alternative universe if Prime Minister Corbyn missed five COBRA meetings because he was pottering about on his allotment or attending a Venezuelan solidarity Zoom meeting. The very same people who are demanding we leave poor little Boris alone would be foaming at the mouth at the very thought of Corbyn neglecting his duty so comprehensively. Hell, imagine any prime minister in living memory missing such meetings.

In January, when PPE supply chains should have been bolstered and early scientific advice heeded, Boris Johnson was distracted by January 31's Brexit day brouhaha, something which at the time he thought was going to be his greatest triumph, his most memorable speech, the iconic photograph for the history books - but now it seems like a lifetime ago. That was a political decision as well as a negligent one.

To those who are upset about the much-villified "mainstream media" going over past decisions of recent months, please try to comprehend that it is important to flag up the mistakes that have been made. If only we had a leader who could graciously admit to and apologise for mistakes in the way that Emmanuel Macron did - that would be a good first step on the road to accountability and to quickly learning from mistakes which have surely cost lives. There will almost certainly be some sort of inquiry further down the track as to how the government handled the pandemic, when lockdown restrictions have been lifted or at least relaxed. But for now, we need decisive action from accountable leaders who are prepared to admit to errors and work their arses off to fix them.

Getting upset because The Sunday Times and Reuters have pointed out these failings in great detail is absolutely pathetic behaviour. Michael Gove was on brand on Marr this morning when he admitted Johnson didn't attend five COBRA meetings but gave the mealy-mouthed excuse that cabinet ministers chair such meetings, while simultaneously making a dig at journalists, a more articulate but equally venal version of Donald Trump's constant whines of "fake news". This was political manouevring on Gove's part - he appeared to be Johnson's loyal footsoldier but his defence of Johnson missing meetings would collapse in a light breeze and he knows it. He is not an idiot. Gove, ably assisted by his wife, Sarah Vine, a Poundland Lady Macbeth, would most likely be delighted if the pandemic cost Johnson his job. Again, let's not be naive here.

The next political decision to watch is in regard to an extension to Brexit negotiations, which has a deadline of June 30. The government is adamant that the UK won't ask for an extension but they may be left with little choice if the EU decides it has bigger virus-shaped fish to fry for the rest of the year. The British economy can recover from COVID-19 or it can recover from a no-deal Brexit after December 31 this year, but to try and get through both economic and social shocks, most likely concurrently, will be wantonly destructive. We have no choice but to deal with COVID-19 but we do have a choice about taking a more responsible approach to Brexit. Either way, it's a political choice and it will affect us for years to come.




Image: Mikhail Denishchenko

What next after the Johnson triumph?

"Get Brexit done!" That's what cut through at this election as swathes of once-safe Labour seats fell to the Conservative Party, particularly in the north of England. Just as "Take back control!" was an appealing, simple message during the EU referendum campaign, after three years of abject incompetence in trying to leave the EU, "Get Brexit done!" sounded very appealing.

It doesn't matter now that plenty of useless architects of the Brexit negotiation shitshow have kept their seats in parliament, or that if the spectacularly self-serving Boris Johnson and others had voted for Theresa May's still-terrible-but-better-than-Johnson's-deal, we'd be out of the EU by now. That's all completely irrelevant.

It doesn't even matter that "Get Brexit done!" - as if it's going to be quick, easy and painless, and then we can just get on with other things - is a massive, simplistic lie. It worked. It resonated with people. Labour wasn't able to compete on that playing field, even if it would actually make sense for Corbyn to stay neutral during a second referendum campaign and then implement the result untainted by how he campaigned - that was a major stumbling block for Theresa May. Corbyn's Brexit stance became irrelevant. And, ironically, he has always been a Brexiter.

Jeremy Corbyn has to resign. He should have resigned in his concession speech, clinging to a few shreds of dignity. Labour has lost two elections on his watch.

It doesn't matter what he promised in his manifesto. Out on the doorsteps, especially in the north of England, the Midlands and South Wales, he is not appealing to voters. It doesn't matter how deeply you analyse his manifesto. Out on the doorsteps, the feedback is that he's too far to the left, he's an overgrown student protester, he comes across as being happiest when he's churning out pamphlets on a creaking old Gestetner in an Islington basement rather than leading a country.

Boris Johnson, meanwhile, was able to get away with puking out endless, easily disproved lies, promises that will be impossible to keep even with a healthy majority, hiding in a fridge, pocketing a reporter's phone, refusing to be interviewed by Andrew Neil and running away from small groups of protesters for bullshit security reasons, mostly because people cut him some slack. He's a truly terrible human being, a self-serving, over-promoted charlatan and a pathological liar, but people still fall for the contrived lovable rascal act.

And let's not forget anti-semitism in Labour. It is there and it is real. It is still not being properly addressed and this was not lost on large numbers of Jewish voters, as well as non-Jewish voters who are not prepared to throw their Jewish friends under a bus. There is plenty of racism and bigotry among Conservative Party ranks and it would be naive to deny that, but it's never a good look for anyone to resort to whataboutery when their own issues with racism are called out. It's not good enough to dismiss charges of anti-semitism with a wave of the hand and a sniff or to minimise anti-semitism as somehow being a lesser form of racism. Labour needs to deal with this issue properly as part of its process of renewal.

If Labour can't work out what has gone wrong from the top down over the last few years, it will not be an effective opposition in the days, months and years to come. It will not be in a position to hold a Boris Johnson government to account. A strong, credible opposition is essential for a functioning democracy in a civilised society. We do not have this right now, and at this moment, we need this more than ever.













Photography by DPP Business & Tax/Flickr

Britain: the spoiled toddler of Europe

We got home in the early hours of this morning from a brilliant holiday on the Greek island of Rhodes. Everywhere we went, my Australian self and my British husband did not have to trouble ourselves with knowing a word of Greek, apart from "Yamas!" when the beers arrived. 

Waiters, bar tenders, hotel receptionists, hotel cleaners, the woman in the mini market, people urging us to have fish pedicures and walk through a giant lion's mouth to enter a club in Faliraki, the guys who take the money for the sunloungers on the beaches, the cheerful car hire bloke - they all spoke good English. Better than good. Way better than anything I could burp out in Greek. And then you'd see them talk to other people and effortlessly swing from Greek to French to German to Italian and back to English for the monolingual people.

Because that is what Brits (and Australians and Americans...) have come to expect - that everyone will speak English. 

I couldn't sneer at the Greek waiter who said "Lovely jubbly!" as he took our order at a beachside taverna, even though I find Jamie Oliver chronically irritating. After all, he took the time to learn a popular English catchphrase for our benefit. If I was waiting on tables in London and that waiter turned up, I wouldn't be able to muster a single Greek catchphrase to welcome him. I could manage some schoolgirl German, maybe some French and Italian babble that would make me sound like a reject from 'Allo, 'Allo, but I'd be flattering myself if I thought I could hold entire conversations with our nearby neighbours in their own language.

But the cliche of the British tourist expecting to be pandered to, coddled and pampered like an obnoxious toddler is true. You do see British holidaymakers talking loudly and slowly, creating halitosis mirages in the faces of bemused Europeans. It's embarrassing (and I'm only British by presumption and association when I travel with my husband) but it's a microcosm of how Britain expects to be treated by the European Union.  

And we have been treated very well as members of the EU. We are not compelled to have multilingual road signs. Our driving distances are measured in miles, not metric. We can order a pint rather than 568 millilitres of beer. We have kept the pound as our currency rather than adopting the euro. We are not part of the Schengen zone. We have the power to deport Europeans for reasons of security and if they are a burden on the welfare system. We would have had even more rights in terms of deporting EU citizens under the deal David Cameron negotiated before the referendum - if we'd voted to stay in the EU. Ironically, he did a better job of negotiating with the EU than any of the lazy, low-information charlatans who have turned up to Brussels since the referendum still expecting special treatment.

It is pitiful to see Brexiters whine about the EU being mean to them when all they are doing is enforcing what it means to leave the EU. The four freedoms are indivisible - if you voted to leave the EU, you literally voted to give up those freedoms. You can poke your bottom lip out and wobble it all you like, but that is what you did. At least have the courage and awareness to own your shit.

If we do end up leaving the EU on October 31, we don't yet know the level of chaos that will ensue. Only a masochist would want things to go badly. But there are some things that will become more difficult, things that many of us haven't even considered. There are no cheaper, smoother alternatives for British companies who benefit from supply chains through Europe - and this is not just for exporting to the EU. Anyone with a map of the world can see that the port of Antwerp offers an easy route to Africa, for example. 

There is a world of crap facing the travel industry too. Trust me, I report on it for a living. Bus drivers who drive in Europe will need EU-approved certificates of professional competence as UK certificates would become invalid in a no-deal Brexit. Insolvency protection for UK retailers selling to EU customers and vice versa will become way more complicated, such as those who sell travel products. UK travel companies will need to take out insolvency protection for each EU market into which they sell. EU-based tour operators will need to be ATOL members. UK travel agents will need proof that non-UK organisations they work with comply with separate UK regulations.

But supply chains and ease of working for bus drivers and insolvency protection for the travel industry and Antwerp - that's all boring, right? If anyone read the paragraph above in its entirety, I'd be stunned. Here's the link to a story I wrote on it if you can be arsed.

No matter what I write, there are still plenty of people who are fetishising any possible hardships, spouting tedious bumper sticker slogans about how we survived two world wars and we just need to invoke the Blitz spirit. Except WWII ended 74 years ago. People who have never fired a shot in defence of anything are carrying on as if they were there, underneath Luftwaffe bombs and enduring rationing. It was a bloody awful time. 

We survived? My arse, we did. We didn't have to do anything because most of us weren't yet born or we were too young to really remember - and for that we should be grateful for the generations before us. But in the online peanut galleries, it is the Brexiters who are claiming a monopoly on respecting the sacrifices of our largely long-dead soldiers. That's bullshit.

The desire in particular to see young people suffer post-Brexit is particularly vile. When did people stop wanting the next generation to have a better, easier life?  My grandfather, who saw the horrors of WWII up close in Papua New Guinea and Japan, was always grateful that his son and daughter and my sister and I did not have to go to war. He did not want us to see what he saw and he did not want our young adulthoods blighted by war and suffering because he was decent and rational.

And as the days grind on, ever closer to October 31, it's obvious Boris Johnson, our wretched joke of a prime minister, has nothing to offer. He has no real desire or ability to negotiate anything with the EU. All he has is meaningless arse-waffle about "believing" and "getting on with it" and "clean breaks". It's the Brexiters who are all about the feelz, even when the attempts by the government to negotiate a deal that won't damage the economy collide with reality and dissipate into a fine powder of delusion.  

This country is behaving like a spoiled toddler. I hope we're not the poorer for it. If the Brexiters prove me wrong, fine. So be it. But spare me the WWII analogies - they're historically ignorant and you're embarrassing yourself like a prime minister who runs away from a bunch of middle-aged protestors in Luxembourg.

   

Photography by Eyesplash/Flickr

What's a remainiac to do?

At the time of writing, the dreadful but effective Brexit Party was polling at  around 31%, incoherent Labour at 23%, resurgent Lib Dems at 16%, hapless Tories at 9%, the possible-surprise-package Greens at 9%, the dismal Change UK at 4% and the busted flush that is UKIP a puny 2%.

So, we have with Brexit and UKIP, two definite, unambiguous we-want-Brexit at all costs taking up 33% of the votes.

The other 67% features the unambiguous pro-remain/pro-people's vote/pro-revoke Article 50 parties at 29%. But here's the bit that's harder to quantify - who is pro-remain among those who still plan to vote for one of two increasingly pathetic major parties?

Among the 23% for Labour, there is a strong pro-remain component - there are still plenty of people, and not just Labour MEPs, who are pushing the line that a vote for Labour is a vote for a second vote and the best way to quell the charge of the Brexit Party in Brussels. And there are pro-remain Conservatives who may well be resigned to the fact that Theresa May's Brexit deal is as good as it will get for the UK outside the EU, but would open a quiet bottle of champagne if this whole Brexit shit-show was called off.

Those who are pro-remain probably add up to quite a bit more than the 33% Brexit/UKIP conglomerate. A Survation poll from May 17 revealed 51% support for remaining in the EU. This same poll found 68% of Labour voters and 47% of Conservative voters support remaining.

Obviously, we all know we can't put blind faith in polls but with around 67% of voters apparently not interested in either of the hardline Brexit parties, it would appear there is no appetite for a hard Brexit and possibly a diminishing appetite for any Brexit at all.

Thursday's European election will, most likely, be a protest vote for most people. If we leave the EU, as planned, on the new deadline of October 31, our latest batch of MEPs will only represent us for a few months. But for almost all of us, whether we're remainers or leavers, Thursday's vote is a chance for us to be heard. There is a lot of impotent rage right now. It has to come out somewhere and I'd rather it came out in the ballot box than on in riots on the streets.

For pro-remain voters - and I make no secret of being one of these people - it's a frustrating time. We don't want to see Nigel Farage emboldened any more. We look at him and his diabolical collection of candidates in utter despair. Ann Widdecombe hates women so much that she changed religion when the Church of England started ordaining us as vicars and, despite professing to be a Christian, she has no issue with pregnant women giving birth in shackles. Claire Fox takes a deliberately contrarian view on child pornography which is so awful that it's unclear whether she genuinely believes children would not be traumatised if they had to participate in simulated sex for the purposes of gratifying absolute sickos or she is just trolling for attention. Annunziata Rees-Mogg has had a long career writing articles about how to get rich off other people's misery. Lucy Harris has cheerfully said we'll just have to deal with 30 years of economic hardship as a price worth paying for Brexit.

To these awful charlatans, along with Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg, Brexit hardships and job losses are for the little people. If you genuinely believe any of these people give a damn about you, I have a box of fishnet condoms in the boot of my car to sell you.

But it's too easy for me to sit here and slag off these people. I could sit her all night pulling them apart forensically but it's not going to make a difference. It won't change minds. It won't win hearts. If anything, every time a milkshake is thrown, it strengthens the resolve of the "LEAVE MEANS LEAVE!" crowd.

My fellow remainers and I should be pushing a positive case for remaining in the EU. This should have been the case back in 2016. There are so many benefits we will lose, many of which have not occurred to most people, particularly in the event of a disastrous no-deal Brexit.

International Development Secretary Rory Stewart was seen the other day quite rightly pointing out that a no-deal Brexit is not a destination -  it is stunning that he is not seen as a more serious leadership contender than Boris bloody Johnson among Tory members, but I digress. A no-deal crash-out is a starting point for a long, onerous process of negotiating with the EU, and with the rest of the world without the support of the EU. The inevitable outcome will be a deal with the EU that is not much different to Theresa May's deal, only it will leave the UK in an even weaker position. It will probably break up the UK.

A no deal Brexit is not a lark. It is not something to be flippant about. We will be the only country in the world trading under WTO rules for God-knows-how-long now that Mauritania is no longer solely trading this way. Surprise, surprise, this is because Mauritania is seeking to trade freely and closely with geographical neighbours in northern and western Africa and as part of the ever-closer African Union. Mauritania's example reflects a positive case for being part of close economic and free trade unions with the countries closest to your shores.

But none of this is being distilled by one pro-remain party that remainers can all galvanise around. Instead, our votes will be cast in different directions - there is certainly a strong groundswell of support for the Liberal Democrats, whether those who are voting yellow with a clothes peg on their nose or they are simply energised by the #BollocksToBrexit slogan. And I predict the Greens will do better than expected on Thursday.

As for Change UK, it has scooped up plenty of smart people who have, it now appears, thrown their political careers on a bonfire. It's a shame - it could have been so good. There was a frisson of hope and energy when people started defecting from the Labour and Conservative benches. A lot of we remainers really wanted it to be good - like a new Amy Pohler movie. But it has not been good. Not even the logo is good. The black lines on a white background look like a flag to wave while opposing gay rights, which I am guessing is not the vibe they were going for. And the message about changing politics has been swept up in a tidal wave of critics yelling that the party is all about preserving the status quo rather than changing a damn thing.

That's the problem with pro-remain messaging. Few of us think the EU is perfect but we do believe the benefits are still immense, that we should stay in, retain our influence in the world, play our role in reforming the EU where required, emphasising how we are made stronger by the four freedoms, and not see a diminished UK make desperate trade deals with the US, Russia and China. It's just that it's bloody hard to encapsulate this complex and nuanced message on a bumper sticker, bus or billboard.

On the other side of the fence, the simple soundbites such as "take back control", "leave means leave, "let's go WTO" and "no deal, no problem" have cut though the noise. And remainers, all of us, may have left it too late to fight back with better arguments, with positivity and at the ballot box.

Tony Abbott's Brexit blather unpicked

Tony Abbott, former Prime Minister of Australia, well-known misogynist, homophobe and climate change denier, stuck his head over the parapet on Brexit and his Spectator article keeps doing the rounds online. It's tiresome and ridiculous so I thought I'd break it down. Just to be clear, to quote the hapless Theresa May, Tony's words are in black and my words are in red.

It’s pretty hard for Britain’s friends, here in Australia, to make sense of the mess that’s being made of Brexit. The referendum result was perhaps the biggest-ever vote of confidence in the United Kingdom, its past and its future. 

OK, Tony, I'll stop you there already. Sure, people in other countries are baffled by Brexit for a wide range of reasons but it's the bit about the vote being a vote of confidence in the past that is especially pitiful. It is about nostalgia for "good old days" that weren't that good at all - it is a hankering for a time when the UK was known as "the sick man of Europe", when manufacturing was in a terrible place, when GDP lagged dramatically behind those of Germany, France and Italy, and trade with European partners was constipated. But you know what reversed all those trends? Joining the EEC and then the EU!   

But the British establishment doesn’t seem to share that confidence and instead looks desperate to cut a deal, even if that means staying under the rule of Brussels. Looking at this from abroad, it’s baffling: the country that did the most to bring democracy into the modern world might yet throw away the chance to take charge of its own destiny.

Oh, please. Enough with the "British establishment" - the loudest pro-Brexit voices such as Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg are the very definition of the establishment. It is a campaign that has largely been led by a moneyed elite who will be largely unaffected by a catastrophic Brexit, probably never expected the Leave vote to win and, as such, had no interest in taking responsibility for the outcome or doing the serious, intellectually and economically rigorous work required to not make Brexit the car crash we are now witnessing.

And the "under the rule of Brussels" rhetoric is Daily Express-in-bumper-sticker nonsense which ignores the fact that we have elected MEPs and the power of veto as EU members. Sadly, the work of MEPs has been pitifully under-reported over the years or deliberately mis-reported, particularly by Boris Johnson when he was play-acting at journalism as an EU correspondent. And when I say "mis-reported", I mean "made shit up".

Let’s get one thing straight: a negotiation that you’re not prepared to walk away from is not a negotiation — it’s surrender. It’s all give and no get. When David Cameron tried to renegotiate Britain’s EU membership, he was sent packing because Brussels judged (rightly) that he’d never actually back leaving. And since then, Brussels has made no real concessions to Theresa May because it judges (rightly, it seems) that she’s desperate for whatever deal she can get.

Let's get one thing straight, Tony - David Cameron was frequently terrible, but his negotiations with the EU as Prime Minister gave us the best deal of all EU members.

Here is a helpful list:

1. We have kept our currency. 

2. It was written into EU law that the UK was exempt from any documents referring to an "ever-closer union". 

3. Newly arrived EU citizens are banned from claiming jobseeker's allowance for three months and have to go home if they haven't found a job within six months. 

4. If EU workers lose a job through no fault of their own they are only entitled to jobseeker's allowance and housing benefit for six months. 

5. Access to benefits for newly arrived EU workers was limited for a period of up to four years from the commencement of employment. 

(Newsflash! By a long, long way, the old age pension makes up the biggest proportion of the UK's welfare bill, people born here are more likely to be on benefits than people who have arrived from the EU, and the proportion of people in work who still need welfare to get by keeps rising)

6. As we are outside the eurozone, the UK is not required to fund euro bailouts and will be reimbursed for central EU funds used to prop up the euro.

The EU’s palpable desire to punish Britain for leaving vindicates the Brexit project. Its position, now, is that there’s only one ‘deal’ on offer, whereby the UK retains all of the burdens of EU membership but with no say in setting the rules. The EU seems to think that Britain will go along with this because it’s terrified of no deal. Or, to put it another way, terrified of the prospect of its own independence.

Christ, here we go again with the EU "punishing" the UK for leaving. To enjoy full access to the single market and the benefits of the customs union, we have to abide by certain rules, such as freedom of movement. 

And the pitiful whining about how we will have "no say in setting the rules" needs to stop - if you voted to leave, you voted for the UK to have no MEPs, no representation in any EU institution, and therefore no say in the rules. But we will still have to trade with the EU post-Brexit - even Brexiters realise this - and to do so, our goods and services have to meet certain standards. It's just that we won't have any say in those standards but having no say is literally what you voted for when you wanted to render MEPs unemployed. 

But even after two years of fearmongering and vacillation, it’s not too late for robust leadership to deliver the Brexit that people voted for. It’s time for Britain to announce what it will do if the EU can’t make an acceptable offer by March 29 next year — and how it would handle no deal. 

Sit down, Tony. You're peddling myths again, starting with "if the EU can’t make an acceptable offer by March 29 next year". We're the ones who are leaving, the onus is on us to tell the EU what we want from this brave new post-Brexit world. If our demands are seen by the EU as giving the UK rights over and above EU members, why the hell would the EU say: "OK then, you can leave the EU while still retaining the benefits of membership with none of the responsibilities, you wacky kids!"?

Freed from EU rules, Britain would automatically revert to world trade, using rules agreed by the World Trade Organization. It works pretty well for Australia. So why on earth would it not work just as well for the world’s fifth-largest economy?

Another lie from Tony! But there has been so much utter tripe spouted about the giddy, giddy joy of trading under WTO rules that it comes as no surprise that Tony has glibly said "it works pretty well for Australia". Australia does not trade solely under WTO rules, which would be the default plan if we crash out with no deal. Australia has multiple free trade agreements including those with New Zealand, China, South Korea and the USA, and negotiations have started for an agreement with, you guessed it, the EU. 

The only country in the world that trades pretty much exclusively under WTO rules is Mauritania, a country most people struggle to find on a map (hint: it's in north-west Africa) and is frequently confused with the honeymooners' paradise of Mauritius (hint: the Mauritanian economy does not do well out of tourism, let alone tourism from honeymooners). Mauritania has an economy heavily reliant on agriculture, fisheries and iron ore. While a significant hydrocarbon discovery off its coast, which it shares with Senegal, has the potential to transform Mauritania, this project is still in the very early exploration stages. The Mauritanian economy, as it currently stands, is not one the UK should seek to emulate in a hurry.

In any case, Mauritania, while still being hamstrung by WTO rules, is part of the growing trend across Africa to form economic blocs of neighbouring countries, as well as being part of the African Union. So committed is Mauritania to having a seat at that particular table it hosted an African Union summit in June this year. The EU has been very busy in recent years signing Memoranda of Understanding with blocs across Africa - and these MoUs are a vast improvement on some of the terrible trading arrangements Europe has had with African countries in awful years gone by. The forming of blocs across Africa, as well as a strengthening of the African Union, is helping African trade enormously. Good Lord, it's almost as if forming close economic ties with your nearest geographical neighbours might be useful! Who'd've thunk it? 

A world trade Brexit lets Britain set its own rules. 

No, Tony, it means we will crash out with no deal, endure absolute bedlam across multiple industries and have to trade under the limitations of WTO rules until we get our shit together and sort out trade deals with the 50+ countries with which the EU has trade deals. Surely even you know, Tony, that trade deals aren't sorted out over a cup of tea and a slice of Victoria sponge. They can take years and when we're not negotiating them with the support of our fellow EU members, it won't be as easy. And there is no point trying to make a start on these amazing deals before it's clear what our relationship with the EU will look like - that will influence what sort of hand we will have going into any trade deal negotiation.

It can say, right now, that it will not impose any tariff or quota on European produce and would recognise all EU product standards. That means no border controls for goods coming from Europe to Britain. You don’t need to negotiate this: just do it. If Europe knows what’s in its own best interests, it would fully reciprocate in order to maintain entirely free trade and full mutual recognition of standards right across Europe.

Sure, Tony, we can "just do it" but that won't make negotiating trade arrangements with the 50+ countries we already have deals with as part of the EU any easier. See my previous comment. And see my even earlier comment about how we still won't have any say in standards across Europe if we leave the EU. Bloody hell, I am repeating myself now. It's like dealing with a slow-witted child.

Next, the UK should declare that Europeans already living here should have the right to remain permanently — and, of course, become British citizens if they wish. This should be a unilateral offer. Again, you don’t need a deal. You don’t need Michel Barnier’s permission. If Europe knows what’s best for itself, it would likewise allow Britons to stay where they are.

Oh, Tony, Tony, Tony. This is so naive it's almost adorable. Yes, of course the government could simply guarantee the rights of all EU citizens currently in the UK to stay and become British citizens with those funky red, I mean, blue passports. But, given that the perception and quite possibly the reality is that plenty of people voted leave to reduce the number of Europeans living here, and given that the Conservative Party is still obsessed with pandering to anti-immigration elements, that is not what is actually going on. EU citizens will have to go through the bureaucracy of applying for settled status, if they have lived here for five years, and "pre-settled status" if they have been here for less than five years, at a cost of £65 per adult and £32.50 per child under 16.

Hurrah! More bureaucracy!   

Third, there should continue to be free movement of people from Europe into Britain — but with a few conditions. Only for work, not welfare. And with a foreign worker’s tax on the employer, to make sure anyone coming in would not be displacing British workers.

Tony, see my list above about the limitations of welfare for EU citizens before you start embarrassing yourself any further. 

As for a foreign workers' tax, how exactly will that be enforced? How will employers prove their European employees are not displacing British workers? What if they are forced to sack European workers and they can't find British workers to fill the positions? Will those companies be compensated or just taxed into oblivion? That doesn't sound conducive to economic growth. I thought you were a low-tax, limited government conservative, Tony, yet here you are proposing a new tax that would potentially damage businesses and create additional administration for an already stretched civil service.

Hurrah! More bureaucracy! And a fun new tax!

Fourth, no ‘divorce bill’ whatsoever should be paid to Brussels. The UK government would assume the EU’s property and liabilities in Britain, and the EU would assume Britain’s share of these in Europe. If Britain was getting its fair share, these would balance out; and if Britain wasn’t getting its fair share, it’s the EU that should be paying Britain.

Sigh... Here we go again with the "let's just bugger off into WTO wonderland without paying a penny" claptrap. The "divorce bill" is not a fine for leaving the EU - it is about meeting financial obligations in a responsible manner. If we leave without paying the bill like an indignant diner who is angry with the restaurant because they don't like the colour of the tiles in the loo, that will not help our international standing, particularly when it comes to negotiating future trade deals outside the EU. It's going to be hard enough to negotiate 50+ trade deals without the support of our fellow European negotiators without further diminishing our international standing by behaving like petulant toddlers.

Also, spoiler alert, Tony: Britain was getting its fair share from the EU and then some.

Finally, there’s no need on Britain’s part for a hard border with Ireland. Britain wouldn’t be imposing tariffs on European goods, so there’s no money to collect. The UK has exactly the same product standards as the Republic, so let’s not pretend you need to check for problems we all know don’t exist. Some changes may be needed but technology allows for smart borders: there was never any need for a Cold War-style Checkpoint Charlie. Irish citizens, of course, have the right to live and work in the UK in an agreement that long predates EU membership.

The hard border isn't just about tariffs or pre-EU agreements, Tony. It's about inspections of goods as they cross the border once the UK is out of the customs union. Once we are out of the EU, we are out of the customs union - again, this is literally what people voted for when they voted leave so I have no idea why any Brexiter is crying about this. Hell, it's almost as if some people had no idea what they were really voting for, and didn't realise we are facing the prospect of UK trucks held up at every border in the EU for inspection as they try to transport goods easily around the continent, even with "smart borders".

Oh, and there is the not-insignificant issue of a hard border risking reigniting the troubles in Northern Ireland. But don't just take my word for it. Click here to hear from a retired member of the Irish Defence Forces on the risks and woeful lack of preparation on the side of the republic. Combine this with moronic, dismissive rhetoric on Ireland from the likes of Jacob Rees-Mogg and equally poor preparation for a hard Brexit by the UK and it soon becomes clear that this isn't as simple as just bunging in a few cameras and scanners. 

Of course, the EU might not like this British leap for independence. It might hit out with tariffs and impose burdens on Britain as it does on the US — but WTO rules put a cap on any retaliatory action. The worst it can get? We’re talking levies of an average 4 or 5 per cent. Which would be more than offset by a post-Brexit devaluation of the pound (which would have the added bonus of making British goods more competitive everywhere).

Tony, levies of 4 or 5 per cent add up when we're talking about goods worth millions of pounds. As we face economic uncertainty and ongoing skyrocketing costs just to deal with the bureaucracy of Brexit, additional levies are not going to be helpful. As for the devaluation of the pound, we could always make like Germany and Sweden and ensure we manufacture high quality goods rather than relying on a tanking currency to help exports, but you've always loved simplistic, race-to-the-bottom ideas, haven't you, Tony?

UK officialdom assumes that a deal is vital, which is why so little thought has been put into how Britain might just walk away. Instead, officials have concocted lurid scenarios featuring runs on the pound, gridlock at ports, grounded aircraft, hoarding of medicines and flights of investment. It’s been the pre-referendum Project Fear campaign on steroids. And let’s not forget how employment, investment and economic growth ticked up after the referendum.

Tony, we haven't actually left yet. We still do not know what our relationship with the EU will look like with just 131 days to go until we leave the EU - sure, there was hyperbole about a Brexit armageddon but we won't know for sure how bad it will be until this ongoing saga is resolved. Under every credible economic model, the UK economy will shrink post-Brexit. It's just a matter of how bad the shrinkage will be, something a Prime Minister well-known for appearing in public wearing Speedos after swimming in cold water should know all about.

And the employment figures have been bolstered by the growth in zero-hours contracts, Tony. In Australia, this is known as the casualisation of the workforce - and, no matter what you call it, is is a trend that does work for some workers in certain circumstances but overall, it leads to economic uncertainty and limitations for so many others. 

But you were never one for workers' rights, were you, Tony? That may explain why you didn't weigh into the debate about whether EU workers drive down salaries in the UK - someone might just ask you about endorsing and enforcing a higher minimum wage to make low-skilled jobs more appealing to British workers, which is something which needs to happen at Westminster level, not at EU level, and might make you look a little bit socialist.

As a former prime minister of Australia and a lifelong friend of your country, I would say this: Britain has nothing to lose except the shackles that the EU imposes on it. After the courage shown by its citizens in the referendum, it would be a tragedy if political leaders go wobbly now. Britain’s future has always been global, rather than just with Europe. Like so many of Britain’s admirers, I want to see this great country seize this chance and make the most of it.

Give over, Tony. You're delirious.

Photography by Sittoula (a.k.a. Sitt) Sitlakone/Flickr

The "You know what? Fuck it!" era of politics

We are now in the "You know what? Fuck it!" era of politics. This is being exhibited during elections and referenda and by politicians themselves as throwing caution to the wind - or simply blurting out exactly what's on their mind rather than fudging and waffling.

The YKWFI trend can be good or bad, depending on your viewpoint, and you might be delighted with certain manifestations of YKWFI while despairing at others. These moments are not necessarily limited to one end of the political spectrum.

Brexit in the UK and the election of Donald Trump as US president are the two most obvious manifestations of YKWFI. This is not to insult those who voted leave or for Trump - indeed, for many people, to have the YKWFI moment in the privacy of the voting booth in either the EU referendum or the last US presidential election was not necessarily because of stupidity or paucity of intellect* or lack of serious thought and soul-searching before polling day. For many, the YKWFI moment was borne of desperation, of years of feeling neglected, of wanting change even if might seem unpalatable to others, of figuring their vote could lead to an outcome that was a risk worth taking. 

But it's not just voters who are having YKWFI moments. Obviously, Donald Trump's still-fledgling political career has been one big YKWFI moment after another, usually tweeted from his toilet. Anna Soubry, rocking a drunk-office-worker-at-All-Bar-One-at-5:45pm-on-a-Friday vibe, said exactly what she thought about Trump (a "dickhead"), Jacob Rees-Mogg (he's running the country) and Boris Johnson ("he should have been sacked weeks ago") on Channel 4's The Last Leg a few weeks ago. 

Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, meanwhile, told audience of The Last Leg that there are "some nice Tories", implying there are plenty of bloody awful ones too. 

And speaking of the bloody awful Tories, the Cro-Magnon spectre of Dominic Raab had a YKWFI moment combined with a potent brain fart when he told Andrew Marr to "forgive me if I don't keep a laser-like focus on the substance" of what EU representatives are saying in relation to the rights of EU and UK citizens. Except, as the new Brexit secretary, that is exactly the kind of thing he needs to focus on - still, within days of his appointment Theresa May had a panic-stricken YKWFI moment of her own and watered down his job description. Raab has a great future outside of politics as the bouncer of a nightclub with a misspelled name, such as Pryzm or Khlamydya. 

Theresa May, who usually comes across as the quivering lovechild of an unconvincing used car sales man and a virgin at an orgy, then had another YKWFI moment on Marr when she revealed that Donald Trump told her she should "sue the EU". It was the boldest, coolest thing she has perhaps ever done. She seemed relieved when she said it. And she said it twice, with the gusto of my late Aunty Nance deciding to have a second sherry at Christmas. 

She may be an incompetent Prime Minister but in that one YKWFI moment, she exposed Donald Trump as an undisputed idiot. To simply sue the EU is a typical Trumpian YKWFI reaction. As someone who favours bullying capitalism, his solution for eliminating competition or getting out of paying his bills is to lawyer up and drive smaller businesses to the brink. Trump would not have been able to elaborate on any relevant laws for suing the EU or explain exactly what Theresa May was meant to sue the EU for - instead, he would just assume she could foist that task onto a hapless lawyer.       

Regardless of how Brexit pans out, it will finish her with rocks and hard places at every turn - if we leave the EU with no deal next year and chaos ensues, she will be blamed because everyone else who should be taking responsibility has resigned; if anything close to the Chequers deal-that-was-really-just-an-absurd-laundry-list happens, she will have no credibility with anyone; and if she decides to call the whole thing off, that will delight half the country and enrage the other half, give or take those whose reaction will be "meh" with a hint of "whevs". 

Whether Theresa May will have any more YKWFI moments between now and March 29 remains to be seen, but she has nothing to lose if she does. Whether the rest of the country will lose as a result of any future YKWFI moments she may have is anyone's guess. 

* Disclaimer: The YKWFI Brexit voters who Googled "what is the EU?" the day after the referendum or voted leave but didn't really want to leave the EU and bovinely moaned and gasped about this on the news on 24 June 2016, however, are not deserving of sympathy. They genuinely are stupid.

Photography by Bill Smith/Flickr

Merry Christmas and a happy new year! It's taxation by stealth.

Abu Dhabi, 2010. I receive a speeding fine - not an unusual occurrence when I lived in the Middle East, I confess - but on this occasion, there is no way that my car could have been caught on a camera at 2am on an Abu Dhabi road travelling at 100km/h in an 80 zone. On the date of the supposed offence, my car was safely parked in the car park of Volkswagen's UAE head office in Dubai. This is because I was testing one of their cars for a review during that particular week.

The only way it could possibly have been my car was if someone broke into it without damaging the lock, hot-wired it, again without doing any noticeable damage, drove it from Dubai to Abu Dhabi in the middle of the night, got snapped by a speed camera, and then drove it back to the Volkswagen office car park, parked it in the exact same spot, and returned my driver's seat and mirrors to the positions favoured by my 5'1", corgi-legged self.  

Still, I paid the fine. Compared to Australian or British speeding fines, it wasn't too expensive, I was well-paid, the points system for traffic offences was way more generous than Australia or Britain, and the process for appealing vexatious speeding fines is a bureaucratic palaver for which I had neither the time or energy.

I know I am not the only person to have lived in the UAE and paid a phantom speeding fine. The governments of the seven emirates probably do pretty well out of these fines.

But before anyone outside the UAE dismisses my phantom fine as part and parcel of life in a country that is not a fully fledged democracy or writing it off as the result of corruption in a far-off land, ask yourself if you think such a thing could ever happen in your own country. Would your government find ways, either by accident or design, to get their hand in your pocket for some extra revenue, above and beyond what you legitimately pay via such things as income tax or VAT?

I fear this is happening in Britain right now. This is not the fear of a paranoid, conspiracy theorist. Let me give you an example of what happened to me over Christmas.

My parents and my sister and brother-in-law, all living in Australia, sent Christmas presents to the UK for my husband and I. The gifts were items of clothing and jewellery, not ivory furniture, weapons or hard drugs, so hardly the sort of thing that would ring alarm bells for HM Revenue and Customs. But instead of these parcels, which would have fitted through our letterbox, being delivered to our house, we got red cards from the Royal Mail informing us to collect the parcels from the nearest mail collection centre. 

On two brisk Saturday mornings, we walked across the park and on both occasions, could only collect the parcels after paying £17 in "customs duty and/or import VAT" for receiving goods from outside the European Union. This struck us as bizarre, especially as the customs forms that our loved ones filled out in Australia clearly had a tick in the "Gift" box. I am hardly likely to go into business by trying to sell on the Wonder Woman apron my sister gave me, rather than exporting it to me, for Christmas. At the same time as this farce, a friend posted us some novelties from Cyprus, a fellow EU member state for now. The parcel came through the letterbox, it didn't cost us a penny.

Somewhat miffed about being £34 poorer for the privilege of receiving Christmas presents, we looked into the matter and found out that you can try to claim back incorrectly charged customs duty. We now have to fill in a form for each parcel and provide a load of documentation. This includes (and I am looking at the form as I write this):

● Customs black and white charge label

● Customs declaration form

● invoice/receipt or other evidence of value (such as eBay page or Paypal receipt) of the goods

● for returned goods - evidence of refund on goods returned, certificate of posting, cost of repair etc

● for overseas students - confirmation from University/College of course details and permanent address outside the European Community

● for antiques - verifiable evidence of age

If the parcel contains one or more personal/private gift(s) from someone abroad, please provide written confirmation from the sender, including details of the gift(s), its/their value and the intended recipient(s).

Rather like appealing a phantom fine in the UAE, this is a palaver but we're going to go through with it and hopefully recoup the £34. It's a matter of principle.

But I do wonder how many other people who received Christmas presents from outside the EU got a similar festive surprise this year? And it's not as if people only receive gifts from outside the EU at Christmas - I am now looking forward to paying needless tax on any birthday presents from Australia in a few months time. 

According to www.gov.uk, you do need to pay 2.5% customs duty on gifts worth between £135 and £630, and there are special rates for gifts worth more than this, depending on what they are or where they came from. But for most of us, we are not expecting or receiving gifts worth more than £135. That would be a very expensive T-shirt and apron from my sister and brother-in-law.

And of the people who received a bill for customs duty on Christmas presents from outside the EU, how many simply paid up without question? How many people were aware that you don't have to pay customs duty on gifts? And of those, how many knew how to go about claiming the money back? It's not as if this was advertised at Christmas. You do need to go digging around online to find the information you need and then download the form, print it, fill it in and post it, along with the aforementioned documentation, to a sinister-sounding government department called "Border Force", located in Coventry.

For people without internet access, for people with literacy issues, for people who need to get letters from relatives abroad who might struggle to write letters in English, for people who simply didn't think to question this charge, it's not hard to see why many people wouldn't try to claim the money back. It just goes straight into the government coffers, unchallenged.

And if a hard Brexit goes ahead, it does not take a great leap of imagination to picture more and more people getting a red card from Royal Mail and bill to pay for presents from friends and family across the Channel. Can anyone seriously imagine this government going out of their way to inform people about their rights in regard to gifts from Europe?  

Consider this a warning. If you have received a bill for customs duty on a gift, click here for the link you need to download the form and obtain the information you need about the rules on this matter.

Photography by Petr Kratochvil