The voters were right about Brexit. We now need a government to use the freedoms we have gained.

Happy anniversary. We gave enjoyed some big wins from Brexit despite a Uk establishment resentful of the decision to leave and keen  to blame any mistake they make on Brexit.

1. We are now an independent country. We can make our own laws  and set our own taxes. We now need a government that will do that.

2. We are now saving £17 bn a year of taxes we had to pay to the EU, after paying them too much to get out owing to feeble UK negotiating.

3. We can control our own borders. Large scale migration from the EU has stopped. Governments have angered many voters by not controlling legal and illegal migration from the rest of the world, as we can do.

4. The UK has greatly boosted its trade since the 2016 vote, leaping ahead in services to second place  in the world after the US. We can now sign trade treaties like the TPP which contain helpful service sector clauses. The EU did not help us with that.

5. The UK is no longer liable for EU debts. The EU is currently increasing borrowings by a massive Euro 800 bn.We have enough state debt of  our own  without adding that burden

6. The UK was able to go it alone and produce the first vaccine against covid.The EU programme did not produce its own .

7. The UK has taken VAT off some green products and is now free to cut other unhelpful VAT impositions,

8. The Uk has cancelled a lot of import tariffs, helping UK consumers.

9. The UK is free to cut the gross  burden of EU laws. Time  to get on with that.

10.EU technology policy is to regulate and tax US companies whilst failing to innovate and grow tec businesses itself. The UK can have a better regime to promote home tec and work well with the US majors.

11. We can now take control our fishery, give more permits to UK vessels, and ban the ultra large EU industrial vessels to conserve more fish.

 

54 Comments

  1. Mark B
    January 31, 2025

    Good morning.

    Sorry Sir John but there is too much there for me to counter.

    Perhaps if you saved it for the 1st April we may have seen it all for the joke that it is. Albeit not a particular funny one.

    1. Ian Wraggg
      January 31, 2025

      We are blackmailed by Brussels for fishing access in exchange for electricity.
      We can’t remove VAT on energy because of the Windsor Agreement.
      Northern Ireland is now a colony of the EU and we have to follow the EU on environmental laws.
      We are a long way from being unshackled from this beast. Deliberately so due to Boris TCA and the Windsor Agreement.

    2. Lemming
      January 31, 2025

      Brexit has meant one thing and one thing only – huge new costly barriers to trade with our largest export market (by far). Massive losses, no gains

      1. Mickey Taking
        January 31, 2025

        Yes the protectionist policies to hold EU back from developing into a wise and growing political and economical bloc are alive and well. If only we had really left, and Labour were not plotting to rejoin by stealth.

      2. Denis Cooper
        January 31, 2025

        “Massive” as in one or two percent, or maybe only a fraction of a percent, of GDP, and maybe a gain not a loss, in fact the correct word would be “marginal” rather than “massive”. Unlike the long term loss of economic growth potential caused by the 2008 global financial crisis, incidentally when Labour was last in office:

        https://globalbritain.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Ewen-Stewart-Chart-1-UK-GDP-per-capita.jpg

      3. a-tracy
        January 31, 2025

        We have a free trade agreement, the EU trades more with the UK than we do with it, if that ‘free trade agreement’ needs improving, give us your top three examples of what needs sorting out.

      4. Original Richard
        January 31, 2025

        Lemming:

        But we did and still have a £100bn/year trading defici with the EU!

    3. Frank
      January 31, 2025

      Are you ok?

      1. Ian B
        January 31, 2025

        @Frank +1

  2. agricola
    January 31, 2025

    Labour, Conservative, Lib/Dem , and the Greens all want a closer and cosier rwlationship with the EU, ably abeted by the Civil Service and the CBI. So if you wish to fulfill your list to full advantage, Vote Reform. If polls are to be believed the electorate have got the message, and will increasingly vote Reform.

    1. Original Richard
      January 31, 2025

      agricola : Correct.

  3. Denis Cooper
    January 31, 2025

    Happy Anniversary!

    But once again I have to plead for a cross-party non-party campaigning group to be set up to fight against the growing attempts to take us back under the thumb of the EU. It could be called the clunky “Campaign Against Rejoining the EU”, but “Keep Control” would be better and follow on from “Take Back Control”.

    I don’t know the right people, and nobody ever listens to anything I say, so I can only follow not lead on this.

    Reply There are various groups doing this. I like Facts4eu.

    1. Denis Cooper
      January 31, 2025

      Facts4EU does excellent imaginative research, as does Briefings For Britain, and I mentioned them both here:

      http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2021/02/15/going-for-growth-4/#comment-1210480

      “Firstly, only a small minority of businesses are suffering from that extra red tape.

      Taking an extreme view:

      https://facts4eu.org/news/2020_oct_truth_about_UK_exporters#

      “99.3% of all UK businesses do NOT export to the EU”

      While looking at it more broadly:

      https://briefingsforbritain.co.uk/the-government-should-ignore-the-special-pleading-from-business-by-john-longworth/

      “Only 8% of UK businesses export to the EU. These exports represent just 13% of the economy. In fact, 17% of the economy is related to exports to the rest of the world and 70% is domestic. Even a so-called ‘hard’ Brexit – which is actually global trade on World Trade Organisation (WTO) terms – would have only a marginal (if any) impact on exports to the EU, while it would considerably boost the 87% of the economy not related to the EU.”

      But neither of them is well known, while Reform is the opposite – it has a large membership and is well known but does not use that strong position to distribute well-researched information about the EU.

      “Complaining” is one thing, “campaigning” is another, and while the former can certainly be a useful part of the latter it is not sufficient by itself, there needs to be some kind of positive alternative offered.

      This is why we need the various groups to come together and form an umbrella campaign.

      Reply The main groups do talk to each other and seek mutual support for campaigns

      1. Facts4EU
        January 31, 2025

        As ever our figures are correct, based on the total number of business as reported to HMRC. The other article must be looking at larger concerns.

        1. Denis Cooper
          January 31, 2025

          I think so, because he writes “The other big trade group is the Federation of Small Businesses. They claim to have 250,000 members.” while you looked at nearly 6 million businesses:

          https://facts4eu.org/static/media/uk_exporting_businesses_1.jpg

          “Our investigation shows that only a tiny number of the UK’s businesses (39,000 out of a total of 5.9 million) actually sell goods to the EU27. Even stripping out all sole traders from the total number of UK businesses, this still leaves 1,409,950 employers. 39,000 is a very small proportion (2.8%) of these.”

          I note that the Briefings for Britain article only had 1364 views, we need to reach a wider audience.

    2. a-tracy
      January 31, 2025

      Are there enough cross-party MPs who want to ‘keep control’ they seem to want paying for less responsibility.

  4. Sakara Gold
    January 31, 2025

    Soaring U.S. debt, Federal Reserve policy uncertainty, and a shifting global economy are driving renewed interest in gold and silver as safe-haven assets

    The U.S. national debt, now exceeding $36.4 trillion, is sparking concerns about fiscal stability, with gold trading near new record highs just below $3000oz, and silver climbing to $32oz

    As Reeves prints ever more fiat here, sterling is a record high of £2250.25oz gold

    With Trump planning $billions in tax cuts, this is not going to end well.

    Reply US state debt is well below Japanese levels and similar to many EU country levels. The superior growth of the US economy means less worry about them than countries like France and Italy.

    1. Mark B
      January 31, 2025

      As you so often fail to understand, it is not the amount of debt you have, but the ability to services said debt and the trust from others that you can. Plus the USA has the advantage of being the Reserve Currency of the World.

      Japan owns some of the largest Sovereign Wealth Funds in the world plus, most of its debt, is government debt. They too have a manufacturing economy and make things people want to buy.

      As for gold, I suggest you have a word with that ‘One eyed Scottish idiot !’ and ask him what happened to all our gold ?

      1. IanT
        January 31, 2025

        “it is not the amount of debt you have, but the ability to services said debt and the trust from others that you can”

        Exactly so Mark but unfortunately the numbers don’t add up. The US may have more leeway in this respect than the UK but things are changing and I’m not sure it’s so simple any more. Gold is seen as a store of value but it is also an index of global anxiety and clearly people are getting anxious. FIAT currencies are good for just as long as people have faith in them but if that faith crumbles – then they are worth nothing. Gold hasn’t changed in value, you just need more dollars to buy it.

  5. formula57
    January 31, 2025

    Lots of things we can do, certainly, but the treacherous British Establishment works tirelessly to prevent us. I regret very much we never saw establishment of the still much-needed Unbrexit Activities Committee.

    At 2., “…feeble UK negotiating…” is a too generous phrase for quisling antics.

    As for “9. The UK is free to cut the gross burden of EU laws. Time to get on with that” we saw the pace was set by Kemi of course, when BEIS Secretary.

  6. Donna
    January 31, 2025

    Could have, would have, should have. And if we had, we would be in a far better place than we are.

    But the Computer in the pro-EU Establishment said NO and the Westminster Uni-Party REFUSED to LEAVE the EU. So instead we are a semi-attached satellite, with significant policy areas still controlled by the EU, and the current Government is trying to increase those.

    Brexit didn’t fail. The Not-a-Conservative-Party did.

    We still need a Government which is prepared to LEAVE the EU. The Uni-Party won’t.

    1. Denis Cooper
      January 31, 2025

      The failure started when the EU referendum Bill did not say what should happen if we voted to leave the EU, even though it was pointed out that the Act for a referendum on AV did lay down the steps to be taken if we voted for it. Which left the door wide open for the losing side to immediately start legal actions to try to overturn the result. I have read that Gina Miller regrets her involvement because she thinks her cancer may have been partly caused by the abuse she suffered for trying to exploit a loophole (deliberately?) left open by David Cameron. All that he had to do was add the kind of provisions that were later put into a separate Act.

    2. a-tracy
      January 31, 2025

      Donna, you don’t ever hear Nigel saying what has gone right either. He is weak on the gains, its easy just to say it wasn’t done, it was.

  7. Leigh Evans
    January 31, 2025

    On behalf of the teams at Brexit Facts4EU and CIBUK, I would like to put on record our thanks to Sir John for continuing to publish his stalwart positions on seeing that all the benefits and opportunities afforded by our exit from the European Union five years ago be delivered. He stimulates debate on a range of topics, which is healthy, and neatly summarises key and essential facts which are heard far less than they should be in parts of the mainstream media.
    Readers of this diary might wish to see the great man in action in our report this morning, as we celebrate Brexit’s fifth anniversary. (Yes, we know we didn’t fully leave five years ago, but let’s be positive today.) We are re-publishing our movie called ‘The Independence Documentary’ in which Sir John starred in 2023, along with the likes of Sir Jacob, Baroness Hoey, Lord Cruddas, Nigel Farage and many more luminaries : https://facts4eu.org/news/2025_jan_5th_brexit_birthday
    Best rgds, Leigh Evans, Chairman: Facts4EU; Chairman: CIBUK; Chairman: The Global Discussion Forum; and others.

    1. Dave Andrews
      January 31, 2025

      Much appreciation for your good work.

    2. Denis Cooper
      January 31, 2025

      Before we left it was right to say “TAKE BACK CONTROL”, now it is a matter of how to “KEEP CONTROL”.

      I look at this several times a day:

      https://www.newsnow.co.uk/h/UK/Brexit

      and while our opponents are clearly running a concerted campaign we are not and so WE WILL LOSE.

    3. Lynn Atkinson
      January 31, 2025

      +1

  8. Mick
    January 31, 2025

    3. We can control our own borders. Large scale migration from the EU has stopped.
    You should be a script writer for a comedy show Sir John what a laugh control our borders, there’s only one party committed to this and that’s Reform so get your subscription sent to them along with true conservative MPs

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      January 31, 2025

      We can. They current government chooses not to. If we elect a Trump-alike that can be reversed within 24 hours – as it has been in the USA. 25% tariffs on Canada because they refuse to seal their border. They can’t react because their Parliament that’s been prorogued for 3 months. If your country has no operational government your neighbour with one has an advantage.

  9. Bloke
    January 31, 2025

    What an expensive, unpleasant muddle the EU caused for us, and all those other countries that still stand in its sticky mess, tolerating it up to their bottom lip.
    What we most need now is a sensible government to secure our borders and remedy all the other maladies that linger. Reform is well-placed to succeed, gaining increasing power to complete the benefits of our nations’ freedom, fortunes, and essential qualities, in health and happiness.

    1. John Kirkham
      January 31, 2025

      Well said.

    2. Sir Joe Soap
      January 31, 2025

      Yes despite these points stated by our host, everything here has been half baked.

      To pick one random item “VAT off some green products…?” Yet massive extra tax ON green energy, and no VAT off fuel because it would upset the EU if we did that in NI!

      Yes we need fresh faces to finish the job. Old chestnuts like Badenoch, Mel Stride, Jenrick etc all been there and failed.

  10. Narrow Shoulders
    January 31, 2025

    The UK was not suited to membership of the EU due to the trifecta of factors. We had a Civil Service that positively embraced diktats and rules passed down by the EU which disadvantaged UK business, other countries ignored certain rules the UK gold plated them. The UK was then unique among EU member states in that we were not only a large net contributor but unlike other contributors we ran a trade deficit with the rest of the block so there was no benefit in paying to be a member. All other member states of the EU either benefit from large grants greater than their membership fee or run a trade surplus due to the protectionist nature and regulation involved in being part of the block.

    As a free trade area the EEC was a benefit to the UK and provided a market into which to sell our goods with the minimum of fuss. As a political project the EU was toxic for the UK. Not least because Britons never, never, never – shall be slaves.

  11. David Andrews
    January 31, 2025

    The EU is in trouble, politically and economically. It wants UK cash and the UK once again to take on a share of its debts. Getting closer on the terms likely to be offered would be suicidal for the UK. The UK has it’s own problems that the political class in power has failed to resolve. That is why it needs to be booted out of office without ceremony. Reform does not have all the answers but it has the right direction of travel.

  12. Bryan Harris
    January 31, 2025

    Happy anniversary

    to all of us that supported and welcomed Brexit.

    It hasn’t gone as well as it should – with trickery on the side of the EU from the start, we should have left with NO DEAL. Then EU countries that now plunder our fish stocks would have had to come pleading for licences.

    Several times we were promised a bonfire of EU regulations but successive governments failed to deliver. Now with Starmer in charge we are likely to see us adopt even more EU laws.

    There was a lot of talk about getting out of the ECHR but no movement.

    All of these failure were down to a lack of will and leadership by successive governments. You’d have thought that David Cameron, following his humiliation at the hands of EU leaders when he went round begging for crumbs, would have supported a more realistic approach to leaving the EU.

  13. Vivian Evans
    January 31, 2025

    As long as politicians and indeed journalists/columnists in the media do not acknowledge the pernicious role Whitehall ‘mandarins’ have played and address their influence on all policies, be it the EU Referendum, Brexit, the Treasury, Home Office, the DHSC, there won’t be any ‘profit’ from Brexit nor will there be anything done about our crumbling infrastructure, crumbling Armed Forces, crumbling education system, and never mind Net Zero.
    The Norwegian coalition government has just crashed -because of insane EU demands regarding ‘green’ policies – and Norway isn’t even in the EU.
    Today is no occasion for celebrating Brexit – it’s rather a day of mourning for the way we’ve been sold out by unaccountable bureaucrats.

  14. Ian B
    January 31, 2025

    Sir John

    If only! We voted to leave and take care of ourselves, in the real World that meant WTO terms on everything. Everyone that took an interest knew that. Leave has never been attained, our Legislators prefer because it easy to take orders from those with no democratic authority(any where) Parliament has become a home of lazy ‘free-loader’

    The only reason these discussions are still happening is because of the neglect of those we empower and pay still want to be tied to someone else’s apron strings

  15. William Long
    January 31, 2025

    If anyone is allowed to learn History in 100 years time, the failure of the present and last Governments to take any advantage of our freedom from the EU will surely be seen as one of the greatest pieces of misguided incompetence of all time. There is no sign at all that Labour has any intention of taking the necessary and desirable actions, and I cannot see much reason so far to hope for much better from the new Conservative leadership; they have given little sign of their intentions on anything at all. This seems an overriding reason to support Farage and Reform UK.

  16. glen cullen
    January 31, 2025

    ….and yet we retain all their laws & courts

  17. Linda Brown
    January 31, 2025

    Happy Birthday Brexit. Get on with it those in Parliament and take all the opportunities it gave us which have not been put into practice YET.

    1. Blazes
      January 31, 2025

      SJ talks about all of the freedoms we have gained but what good are they if the people have not got enough food and the old people are at home cold in their houses.

  18. Ian B
    January 31, 2025

    From the Media – “Nigel Farage took a brutal swipe at Boris Johnson and Kemi Badenoch on the fifth anniversary of Brexit, accusing them of not truly believing in Britain’s historic decision to leave the EU.”
    The Reform UK leader said the country needs a government that believes in quitting the bloc so its full potential can truly be unleashed.

    that says it all

  19. Mike
    January 31, 2025

    Dress it up any way you like SJ but for my business it has been a disaster. The EU is a club you are either fully in or you are fully out – the increased bureaucracy and loss of JIT finished if for me and now am into early retirement – ten people lost their jobs.

    1. Denis Cooper
      January 31, 2025

      Yes, we are now part of the 94.5% of the world’s population who are treated like that by the EU.

      Does it not strike you that perhaps it is the EU at fault, not us? Take this chap with his oysters:

      https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gw9xegk7go

      “Tom Haward said he had found a new client in Dubai, which was easier to export to than Dublin.

      “It’s really easy: I write out an invoice, box the oysters up, send them to Heathrow and it’s job done.

      “It’s all done the way we used to do it with Europe.

      “It’s easier to get them into the Middle East than across the English Channel, that’s the madness of it.”

      Is that because restaurateurs in Dubai don’t care about their customers as much as they do in Dublin?

      But then setting aside the pro-EU BBC hyping it up, how big a problem was this in reality, in numbers?

      “Before the Brexit vote, Richard Haward’s Oysters was looking to double its EU exports to 20% of sales.”

      So 90% of his existing business was untouched, and so far he has managed to make up for the loss of sales to the protectionist EU with increased sales to what is by far his largest market, which is the UK domestic market.

    2. Lynn Atkinson
      January 31, 2025

      Part out is better than fully in, believe me! Indeed ‘fully in’ is existential – as Germany is discovering’.
      All I can say to Germany is ‘well, we told you ….’.

  20. a-tracy
    January 31, 2025

    I wonder how bad things will get this year to persuade the public to realign with the EU. Reeves started with her anti-job creation tax on employers; it will be interesting to see how many leavers/retirees this year aren’t going to be replaced. How many expansion plans will be halted as people wait for the work before taking a gamble on a new employee? They think their new anti-firing legislation will stop employers from offloading poor performers, so how will that affect morale productivity and profitability?

    1. Lynn Atkinson
      January 31, 2025

      Nothing can be as bad as being in the EU. Ask Germany. Trump has not yet telephoned Ursula, Kallis has brought her job down to her own level – somewhere close to a county councillor.
      The U.K. WILL NEVER VOTE TO REJOIN THE EU.

  21. a-tracy
    January 31, 2025

    I noticed a video from This Morning with Nigel featuring the banner ‘CHINESE NEW YEAR: THE YEAR OF THE SNAKE BEGINS’.

    The snake, which matches up with the years of people born in 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2013 and 2025, is most commonly associated with intelligence, resilience and love, Lee said. And people born in those years are thought to do “whatever it takes to accomplish a goal.”2 days ago NBC

    Forbes says: People born in the year of the snake are said to be resilient and courageous, with strong interpersonal skills and leadership qualities

    Does This Morning really want to associate Nigel with the year of the snake? He was actually born in the year of the Dragon 1964 the same as Boris.

  22. Original Richard
    January 31, 2025

    “We now need a government to use the freedoms we have gained.”

    Correct. But it will not be the blue section of the Uniparty. They are fully signed up to not only EU membership but to the membership of the ECHR and the Net Zero death cult as well as still promoting mass immigration and DEI/ESG/woke.

    Unfortunately the blue section’s Parliamentary seat loss at the last GE was insufficient for them to change their policies or to bring into being a true Opposition. It is excruciating to watch how they are totally incapable of acting as an opposition to the red section’s policies bringing economic and national insecurity with the red section saying “we’re only following the previous administration’s policies!”

  23. Keith from Leeds
    January 31, 2025

    Agree with your eleven points, Sir John. But why have we got a government that is trying to take us back into the EU? Because the previous conservative government did not take us out properly or take advantage of being out.
    I am amused that Boris Johnson has a weekly column in a national paper where he tells us what the government should be doing. Isn’t it sad that he was never our PM when he could have done things properly?
    Oh, I forgot, he was and loved Net Zero, allowed Woke and DEI to spread through our Universities, Government departments, and the more stupid private companies, then kept buckling to the EU by extending deadlines when they were not met, made the stupid decision to close down the economy for Covid, allowed WFH and then did have the bottle to stop it by sacking Civil Servants who refused to come back to working in the office. On top of which, he and his equally stupid Chancellor upped the national debt by £400 billion! So now we have the ridiculous situation where Net Zero trumps democracy, according to a Scottish Judge!

  24. Original Richard
    January 31, 2025

    Next year we re-negotiate fishing with the EU. With the civil servant who with PM May botched Brexit now the Permanent Undersecretary of the FO and with knowledge of our PM’s Chagos deal with Mauritius we can predict the result. A court somewhere will decide we need to give away our fishing rights to the EU and consequently our reverse Midas PM will agree to pay the EU for access to any fishing grounds. Job done. Perhaps, given our EU history, this time we won’t even need the ruling of a foreign court.

  25. Original Richard
    January 31, 2025

    In addition to the task of making Parliament, and hence voting in the UK, irrelevant, there is also a Net Zero element to the PM’s wish to create closer ties with the EU. Ramping up imports will enable further and faster de-industrialisation and get us nearer to our national and, most importantly, our international commitments, to reduce our CO2 emissions by 81% by 2035 and 100% by 2050.

    Perhaps further de-industrialisation will be the offest for the promised 3rd runway at Heathrow by 2050? This will be of course after closing all other airports apart from those in Edinburgh and Belfast.

  26. Lynn Atkinson
    January 31, 2025

    Well I’m fairly miffed that we are not approaching our 9th Anniversary. But the fact that we have an anniversary to wholeheartedly celebrate is thanks to the Spartans, DUP and the wonderful Corbyn who delivered the Remain Labour Party time and time again against the May treachery, and of course a Speaker who should have been ‘given a jersey’.
    Thank you JR for the heroic battle you fought for us – I appreciate that you have fought a few, but that one was a masterclass. How a thinking minority can outwit the unthinking majority (in Parliament).
    The lesson is never give up. Never compromise as Johnson and Rees Mogg, and Philip Davies did.
    Thank God we are out, we have a fighting chance. Without Brexit the history of Britain could have been completed. A story worse by far than the Rise and Fall of Rome.

  27. David Paterson
    February 1, 2025

    This ain’t going to be under the current UK Government

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