From Brexit to Just Stop Oil, our readers from across the county give their weekly take on the biggest issues impacting Kent in their letters to the editor...

When will the penny drop over Brexit?

A political status quo is sustained by mythology – until it isn’t, and it either (a) is no longer fit for purpose, or (b) is revealed as never having been fit for purpose.

The prevailing myth from after the war until the early 1980s, was that a strong state could deliver strong welfare benefits, with full employment and nationalisation, with no need to opt for anti-capitalist revolution.

This myth worked until it no longer served the purposes of a globalised, rapidly deindustrialising, post-imperial Britain.

The myth under which our politics now labour is that Brexit is an unquestionable good thing, that the structures of the EU are not conducive to a sovereign nation state, and that being removed from the EU totally will yield benefits, economic, social and political.

We are not yet quite free to openly criticise Brexit (for risk of demonisation and ostracism) and our political structure is still intimately tied with the Brexit experiment.

But this is failing, in the same way as the communist experiment started to fail in the Soviet Union.

It will take intellectually courageous politicians and reformers to not be afraid to stand up and diagnose the rot that has set in with Brexit.

The moment Brexit was enacted, it led to repeated coalitions of chaos, as prime minister succeeded prime minister to lead cabinets devoid of talent. The British economy took an immediate, potentially fatal, hit.

Our society was immediately carved into entrenched polarities.

Most know that Brexit is a failure – the polling reflects that.

Similarly, most knew that communism was a failure even before this was openly discussed in the political mainstream. It took two or three decades for the nail to be finally struck into the coffin of communism. It is likely to take the same amount of time for Brexit, though we have the advantages of an open society compared to the Soviet Union.

Alexander Wallace

"It will take intellectually courageous politicians and reformers to not be afraid to stand up and diagnose the rot that has set in with Brexit..."

Our reasons for leaving EU are being ignored

In 2016, when the result of the Brexit referendum became clear, an anonymous senior civil servant was reported as saying ‘it will never happen’.

He was proved wrong de jure, but de facto he may yet be proved correct, as those who refuse to accept a democratic decision persist in doing all they can to prevent it being properly implemented, regardless of the wishes of the British people.

The majority of politicians loved being a member of the EU, as it opened up for them personally a route to obscenely well-paid sinecures in the European Parliament, where they could strut upon a wider stage, without overly concerning themselves with nuisances like representing constituents.

The bureaucrats were even more fond of the EU as, should they be able to secure a post in the latter’s monstrous bureaucracy, they would be guaranteed large salaries, and the power to implement whatever they wished, as no effective democratic oversight would exist.

The EU is corrupt, incompetent and undemocratic, yet still what Lenin called ‘useful idiots’ in the UK seek to tangle us once again in its web. This vociferous minority seize upon every economic problem to claim that it is all the fault of Brexit, despite the fact that the EU is enduring worse. They are either consciously ignoring, or unconsciously incapable of understanding, that those who voted to leave were not motivated by economic issues, but by the recognition that they were losing control of their democracy, and being ordered around by those in Brussels who could not be voted out, as is the case with Westminster.

However, we can see that the siren voices are attempting to draw us back towards the situation which existed before the referendum, whether by sly suggestions that we adopt a Swiss-style relationship with Brussels, rejoin the single market, or go the whole hog and return with our tails between our legs.

Had those of us who resolutely opposed EU membership been able to secure a true parliamentary majority, not one founded on unreliable Tory MPs, we should have by now fully escaped the dead hand of Brussels, and be enjoying the fruits of freedom. As it is the selfish elites, who have never really accepted that the British people want no part of the EU, are well on their way to betraying all the hopes of Brexit so that they might benefit, whatever the cost to the rest of us.

Colin Bullen

We need to face up to mistake and rejoin

Six years ago the UK voted to leave the EU.

It must be apparent to all by now that the promised benefits of a high wage, high productivity and a low-tax economy have not materialised, in fact what has happened is the reverse.

The UK economy has crashed and is now suffering the effects of high inflation, loss of trade, loss of investment and loss of tax revenue; tax revenue that could have been used to support public sector workers.

While it is true that the UK has been impacted by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, so have our European ex-partners, whose economies are now recovering, while the UK enters into a period of recession.

There really needs to be a hard examination of the financial facts, rather than blindly following the untruthful and shameful slogans that led the UK to leave the EU in the first place.

On its present course, the UK faces a future of rising national debt and falling living standards; what would help to mitigate this gruesome reality is free access (again) to the world’s largest trading economy with the elimination of the self-imposed trade barriers that Brexit brought with it.

The stone cold reality is; we need to rejoin the EU.

Kathy Collins

Extremists didn’t win votes for women

Two weeks ago I wrote condemning the actions of Just Stop Oil and included the statement “if you cannot change things by peaceful protest you have not got a case”.

Cllr Stuart Jeffery, writing on behalf of the Green Party, disagreed, suggesting a look at history using the women’s right to vote protests as an example.

I notice that Cllr Jeffery is careful not to mention suffragettes.

Is this because the extremists in the suffragette movement have been widely accused of actually harming the campaign when they carried out acts of bombing and arson?

Whilst violent action may have grabbed the headlines the true reasons for the eventual achievement of voting rights for women have been largely overlooked. Ironically, violence actually helped the votes for women cause, not their own but in that terrible conflict of the First World War.

With the fittest men in the forces, women showed that they were not mere housewives but more than capable of taking those men’s places.

With a split in the suffragette movement it was the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies employing more “constitutional” methods and the enhanced status of women that arguably succeeded in gaining limited voting rights, which were later extended.

Addressing other points raised, it is not that climate change with its disastrous consequences is not believed but how to deal with it.

To suggest that the government is not interested in tackling climate change is blatantly untrue, just look at the investment in planting trees, electric cars, solar panels etc.

It is easy to suggest that more should be done but where would the money come from in the present economic crisis?

Rather than arresting those trying to temporarily replace some of the now expensive or unobtainable resources, we should be supportive.

Remembering that the UK is responsible for less than 1% of global emissions, we should back the government in the international climate talks. Just Stop Oil is undermining our position by suggesting that we are not fully supportive.

Brian Barnard

Stop fuelling demand for migrant gangs

In our country we have many citizens that are going to have trouble in paying for their energy usage when their bills arrive in the new year. Sadly, there will be many that have money worries in the lead up to Christmas.

We also have many schoolchildren who rely on a free school meal every day.

Then why are we “accepting” hundreds of migrants into our country when we struggle to help our current population?

Can I ask also why the migrants do not seek asylum in France, which is a very safe and friendly country, having travelled through Europe to get there.

May I suggest that they have been told by whoever that they should get to the UK to be given money and a house.

The current situation cannot go on, with the British government giving millions of pounds of wasted taxpayers’ money to the French to “help” in the ongoing attempts to stop the people that supply unseaworthy boats at a very exorbitant cost.

If there was not a demand for the so-called gangs’ services then they would not be able to profit from their misery. Why is there a demand?

Anthony Clements

Covid can’t be blamed for everything

It seems that all the big problems that we are currently facing have either been caused or severely aggravated by government policies.

The NHS backlog and long wait times for ambulances have been aggravated by the government policy of closing down residential care and nursing homes.

This has resulted in bed-blocking with hospitals being unable to discharge patients who no longer need hospital care but are not able to look after themselves.

The shortage of doctors has been aggravated by the policy of not training enough doctors, yet places in UK medical schools are limited with many applicants competing for each place.

The government prefers to poach trained doctors from abroad thereby exacerbating shortages in less developed countries.

Inflation and government debt has been deliberately boosted by Quantitative Easing. Since 2010 the Bank of England has spent almost a trillion pounds on Quantitative Easing with the express goal of increasing inflation and driving down interest rates at a time when both were at near record lows.

In comparison, the National Audit Office has estimated the cost of Covid at £321 billion and the Energy Price Cap has an estimated cost of £100-150 billion.

Of course, the government prefers to put all the blame for our current financial situation onto Covid and world energy prices as it can claim that these factors are beyond its control.

House prices and mortgage rates have made housing unaffordable for both potential owners and renters. The government’s Quantitative Easing policy, turned houses into investment assets for businesses and speculators rather than a means of shelter for individuals. Building more houses will not solve this problem any more than building more roads solves traffic congestion.

The above problems were all entirely predictable but were ignored for presumed, short-term, political benefits. Such is the way of our politicians. Currently, they are intent on destroying agricultural land and the countryside despite signs of global warming and impending food insecurity.

Derek Wisdom

County’s proud football history

Against the backdrop of the FIFA World Cup, I would like to celebrate the globally significant football legacy of our county, a county that is perceived, I believe, as a soccer backwater.

Dover-born Cuthbert Ottaway, who also played cricket for Kent, was the first England captain in the first international football match in history. I have made emotional visits to his grave in Paddington Old Cemetery, and the West of Scotland Cricket Club, in Partick, where that first game versus Scotland was played.

Bromley-born William Leslie Poole is described as ‘The Father of Uruguayan Football’. This small country is a giant in footballing terms. I learned of William Leslie Poole while reading the book ‘Origin Stories: The Pioneers Who Took Football To The World’, by Kent-based author, Chris Lee.

And Newell’s Old Boys, the greatest Argentine club outside the Buenos Aires conurbation, are named after Strood-born Higham-raised Isaac Newell, who emigrated to the city of Rosario as a 16-year-old, Newell’s are a production line of footballing and managerial talent, as evidenced by this current incarnation of ‘La Albiceleste’ national team, led by Scaloni on the touchline, and Messi on the pitch.

Even at the top of the Premier League, you see Arsenal. Founded south of the Thames, in historic Kent, they were the first ever winners of the Kent Senior Cup in 1889-90.

Adrian Pope