I was asked to provide a comment, so I reproduce here for my readers:
I was told  when young I was born into a country famed for her democracy, the home of the Mother of Parliaments, a place where each individualâs voice was respected and each vote mattered. There was nothing the UK could not achieve. We were  self governing , trading with the five continents of the world, an outward looking seafaring island people.
All this changed with our progressive incorporation into the EU project of economic, monetary and political union. For many years the UK governing classes pretended the project was not one of union, or thought we could be swept along by stealth. The public thought otherwise, demanded a referendum and voted to be an independent country.
I never doubted we would win the referendum. I argued that we were being good Europeans by stepping aside from their mighty task to create a United States of Europe. We should wish them well and be friends with them, but the fact that the UK had refused to join the Euro showed where our hearts resided â with the wider world and with national democracy. Today I feel much relief that our country has been open with our friends in Europe and stated clearly we wish to be self governing whilst good trading partners and allies of theirs. I look forward to 2021 as a year of strong economic recovery, where we can start to use the new freedoms and opportunities
December 31, 2020
Your tone suggests the struggle is over – but there are plenty of quislings on the loose who will do whatever they may to drag us back into the orbit of the Evil Empire.
As for “…and be friends with them…” – nice if it proves possible but let us not presume just yet. And let us cease pulling others’ chestnuts out of the fire.
December 31, 2020
The struggle is not over. The danger is the government will now try to ignore Brexit. EU will flex its muscles and the government will just roll over and put up with it.
An assertive, proactive approach is needed and I donât see Boris and co offering that.
They have done just enough – on paper – to claim they have fulfilled their promises. There has been a very effective spin campaign in the media. I donât think Boris will follow post Brexit developments. He doesnât do detail.
January 1, 2021
Under the EUâs napoleonic code, everything is banned, unless it is explicitly permitted. No new products or working practices are allowed unless and until they have been authorised by the regulators. The rules confine not only what you are allowed to do, but also how you must do it.
Now, in the U.K., we restore the principle that everything is permitted, unless it is explicitly banned. The regulators need to scurry to keep up. As the vanguard of global innovation, from Global Britain the clarion call to entrepreneurs and innovators is âYou can make it here!â.
January 2, 2021
+1
January 1, 2021
There are no friends in international politics, just interests. I know our kind host is trying to be nice, but being nice is not what it is about.
January 1, 2021
You are about to learn a hard lesson about reality. Brexit is not over. Brexit only just began 8 hours ago. Now you will discover the truth. Costly obstacles to trade and not enough people to staff our care homes and pick our fruit and veg. Freedom to diverge from EU rules but big tariffs if we do. So we wont. We will still be in the EU orbit but we will have no say anymore. You dont know what you voted for but youre going to find out, and unless you are very rich it is not going to be pretty.
January 1, 2021
Expecting “foreigners” to do the jobs our benefits system makes unattractive is not the way forward I feel.
But you enjoy your cheap labour globalist mindset.
January 1, 2021
Formula57
there is no empire.
I would suggest you look it up in the dictionary, before you use it again
January 1, 2021
It is moving fast that way.
Presidents, Anthems, Flags Ambassadors, Embassies, Ambitions for more member nations unde its power and ambitions for its own armed forces.
Then add
Its own currency and central bank.
Law making powers.
Tax raising powers.
Power to add rules regulations and directives onto member nations.
Soon to be renamed, yet again, as The United States of Europe.
Why are you defensive and touchy when some call the EU an Empire.
January 1, 2021
bill, an Internet dictionary search as you demanded:-
Definition One
A group of nations ruled over by a powerful sovereign or government
Definition Two
A major political unit having a number of territories or peoples living under a single sovereign authority
Also I found:-
What are the 7 characteristics of an empire?
Strong central government.
Bureaucracy.
Militarism.
Global” trade networks
Standardization
Infrastructure
Unification strategy
Not complete yet, perhaps, but its all in the plans.
January 1, 2021
âA single group of states or countries ruled by … an oligarchy ..â
So the EU is an Empire. Look it up yourself Bull.
December 31, 2020
But they don’t want to be ”good trading partners” with you.
They want to tariff you if you don’t do what they want.. and they want your fish too!
”The deal” was a stitch up. One minute you left the EU, and then you signed up again to do a whole range of things the EU way.
I don’t think you need a feeble Boris Johnson, but instead a ”Wellington” or a ”Churchill” like Lady Thatcher!
Polly
December 31, 2020
All the world is coming together to fight a common enemy . Does this virus lead the way in showing us how we can work together against human destruction . Are these latest moves really about democracy and anti European dictatorship or is there simply a general unease stemming from a feeling that we can do better, have done better and can achieve more when we are not forced to tow the line by the lower standards of others.
December 31, 2020
No more snide comments about the EU comes 2021 ?
Your new year resolutions ?
December 31, 2020
Off the leash.
January 1, 2021
And what about you?
January 1, 2021
Why so touchy?
December 31, 2020
Happy New Year Sir John (and all readers).
I have two overriding feelings about leaving the EU. Ecstasy tinged with fear that the agreement is a dud.
December 31, 2020
The dud can be turned around if there’s a will.
EU members don’t obey the rules, 3% GDP deficit anyone?
Time will make some of this look stupid and ignorable too.
December 31, 2020
I hope being allies is not to be tested, because I doubt Brits will volunteer for any conflict support in future. EU credit on that is exhausted.
December 31, 2020
I am ashamed that this Government has not given a knighthood to Nigel Farage. Truly ashamed. This man has fought for our freedom for over 25 years. Why have you not stood up for this man Sir John? I may have missed it, reading your diary regularly, but I donât remember seeing any words of praise for this man.
December 31, 2020
A Westminster political order will permit internal dissent & a wide range of political discourse within its chambers, but it is unforgiving of any politician that challenges its power paradigm, unless he succeeds in breaking it & reforging a new one. Farage (an inadvertent challenger) failed in this regard & he will get no titles from it, as Enoch Powell didn’t.
January 1, 2021
Or the former Speaker of the House.
January 1, 2021
AJAX +1
January 1, 2021
There absolutely no need for YOU (or me) to feel ashamed. It is as clear as day that Sir Nigel deserved both a Peerage and a Knighthood, however the office-holders have chosen to deny him that recognition, preferring to scatter their devalued baubles elsewhere. I wave two derisory fingers in their general direction, in the confidence that the rest of my fellow citizens will do the same.
January 1, 2021
+1
January 1, 2021
The UK Establishment despise Nigel Farage. He upset their status quo.
January 1, 2021
Hear, hear.
January 1, 2021
It cheapens such honours to give them to extremely easily-proven liars.
Perhaps that is why?
January 1, 2021
You are being a bit harsh on Bercow Martin
January 2, 2021
Because of your permanent chagrin at losing the argument your cheap & false claim & denigration of an English hero is understandable but says more about you. He spent 25 years fighting not only the Brussel panjandrum technocrats, the British political class, establishment & the fourth estate led by the EU funded BBC.
And when the departing & treacherous May rewards the civil servant Xxxxxxxxx Olly Robbins he’s well out of that den of charlatans.
January 1, 2021
I hope he has been offered one and turned it down. He is more use as an outsider.
January 1, 2021
+1
January 1, 2021
M W +1 !!
December 31, 2020
Indeed a new start from the EU and a new dawn on the horizon from an Oxford produced vaccine.
We need to emulate the vaccine development in many areas.
Celebrate the intellectually gifted and grifters.
You make your own luck, right time, right place, right environment.
No need for over arching regulation, just prove the point.
Focus on the achievers, not the losers.
December 31, 2020
Dalliance with the EU has not been the only failing of the governing classes. Before that we had the dalliance with Bolshevism which manifested itself as state control as a preferred model for industry (after all politicians are clever people not solely motivated by profit so are bound to better at running things). Then we had corporatism in which the state did not necessarily need to control industry but merely to endlessly reorganise it into failing conglomerates.
Now we have the war on white (ie English people) and the war on carbon both of which are actively promoted by this government. Both these wars are likely to be far more damaging than membership of the EU because they will lead to us becoming a third world country with no access to reliable or economical power.
December 31, 2020
Promoting the equality and the decent treatment of people whose families did not originate in this country is NOT a “war” on white English people.
And you know it.
However, if you pretend that it is, then that is some sort of moral excuse for a reprehensible attitude and intent towards those engaged in that honourable pursuit.
That is why you and others do it, I think.
December 31, 2020
Waving your virtue flag as usual Martin.
Just call everyone who voted to leave the EU a racist.
Go on.
You know you want to really.
January 1, 2021
Edward 2
Totally unncessary remark and even you should know and do better.
SHAME
January 1, 2021
It is what Martin really meant to say bill.
Read it again.
January 1, 2021
But that is what they called Leavers Bull, totally unnecessary I agree, but nevertheless we have suffered disgraceful abuse at the hands of the not-very-bright for years. We are fed up with it actually.
January 1, 2021
Well said Lynn
Their abuse has been endless.
December 31, 2020
Equality does not equal minority preference which is being practiced much to the detriment of our country as a whole, nor does it equal giving priority access to our resources for those who have their own countries somewhere in the third world.
December 31, 2020
MiC
There is nothing equal about giving preferential treatment to people just because their culture and / or origins are different.
But then we all know left wing ideology exploits the vulnerability of minorities to cause division. You lack the guts to have a crack at us directly, so instead you fill someone else’s heads with crap and run from the responsibility when there’s trouble.
January 1, 2021
We also have a war on disease. And my money is on the microbes.
December 31, 2020
Thankyou for being there for us, how I wish there were more MP’s like you.
Happy New Year !
January 1, 2021
+1
December 31, 2020
We need to resolve a huge number of nasty issues – Boris cake. The control of our waters must be asserted by legislating to ban pulse fishing and drag netting, maybe other things too.
Melanie Philips suggests a solution for the humiliation of being stripped of our own flesh and blood in Northern Ireland. The Republic must leave the EU to rid the Irish Sea of its border.
There are more ways of skinning a cat than choking it on cream, and we need to come up with more of these strategies. For instance if the Elgin Marbles must be âreturnedâ (as I believe they must under this agreement) perhaps all Greeks should go with them. Cultural appropriation must reach its zenith when we appropriate their people!
One of my familyâs churches in South Africa (Redemption) have just distributed their 750,000th meal. It canât go on! Healthy people must be allowed to live and work.
Who would have believed this New Year would be more hopeless than the last!
Happy New Year
December 31, 2020
Not in a million years would the ROI people think about leaving the EU and that is so out of touch Melanie and the rest of you are. Jeez what a bunch of loosers- one hour to go
December 31, 2020
“Not in a million years would the ROI people think…. ”
==========
Hmm, true I suppose.
January 1, 2021
+1 LOL !
Like Scotland, reason can be easily bypassed in pursuit of envious antipathy. That card is still a Joker.
December 31, 2020
Your comment will look daft in 5 years time.
Don’t underestimate how sensible the Irish are at looking after the Irish.
January 1, 2021
They pay into the EU now, no longer receivers of cash goodwill. So I agree with you that the Irish will look after the Irish – in these circumstances it means they have to leave the EU.
Unless the British just give them all anyway, as we did before. âHave a Republic and retain all the benefits of British citizenship.â Why would they reject that?
January 1, 2021
They have to stop this Lynn or the Scottish will think they can have both and the EU have already insisted on borders. These borders mean they can no longer have both.
January 1, 2021
By the way, are we all allowed to be Irish if the Southern Irish are all still British too?
December 31, 2020
Ha ha, wait until they have to divvy up their increased share of the EU budget and the EU clamp down on their corporation tax racket. And then they are assigned their quota of Merkel’s migrants.
January 1, 2021
The last of those is already happening. Like here, it just isn’t news.
January 1, 2021
Well, they only joined because we did, perhaps they might follow us again. Oh wait, they owe the EU lots of money. Maybe that is why they were so active in undermining our campaign to leave?
January 1, 2021
They voted against the EU and were made to vote again. That was when they ceased to be a country. Their political and media class love being in the Protection Racket because it gives them a bigger stage to strut about on, but eventually they will be beaten, as ours were.
January 1, 2021
WRT Elgin marbles, make a copy or several copies and gift the originals to the Greek people.
The Pantheon Marbles, and many other artifacts, have already been digitized by the British Museum and the models are freely available. Anyone can download them – you, me, the Greek government – 3D print them and hang them on your living room wall.
January 1, 2021
The point about Elgin buying and safeguarding the marbles is an interesting one. The Greeks stored ammunition and explosives in the perfect Parthenon during the last war. The Germans detonated it. Instantaneous Greek ruins. The Elgin marbles would have been dust and grit had he not brought them to England.
January 2, 2021
I agree that Elgin’s actions then preserved the artifact, he did the right thing
Independent of any EU/Greek government politiking but bearing in mind the shitty way the Greek people have been treated by the two I do wonder if we should gift them back, they are capable of maintaining their preservation now. We are also able to duplicate such things very accurately now so the BM exhibit could remain.
January 1, 2021
I agree our government must become uncharacteristically proactive and assertive in defence of our sovereign interests.
Not sure that RoI leaving the EU would automatically remove any borders in the Irish Sea though.
January 1, 2021
Yay! Pulse fishing banned in our waters! Congratulations Sir John!
December 31, 2020
I think you are right, Sir John, to write thus. In my own professional life I always took the view that I had no power except that which was vested in me. I also made it a rule to treat rogues as gentlemen, which I found the most disarming and effective strategy in engendering a lasting respect, without letting them get away with anything! There’s no point in being a sovereign nation if we do not stand for truth and integrity, and treat our neighbours fairly. (Oh well, I guess I was a lad during Foyles War! đ
Wishing you a Happy New Year!
December 31, 2020
+1
December 31, 2020
There continue to be deep divisions in our society over the subject: for instance the young (Remain) versus the old (Leave); graduates (Remain) versus non-graduates (Leave); prosperous areas (Remain) versus declining areas (Leave); Scotland & Northern Ireland (Remanin) versus England (Leave); and so forth.
December 31, 2020
I am very proud of this Country, and it is shameful that so many have attempted to undermine the majority, and I agree, the referendum was never in doubt. I also agree that we have amazing opportunities, and we can turn our technical skill to create new dynamic companies, but how do we protect the embryos being swallowed up by the vultures. Our SMEsâ have all but disappeared, and in the past, have been significant employers. As a reminder, the EU had three of the top universities in the world, and now we have left, it is NONE.
December 31, 2020
All Conservative MPs, especially those who were prominent in backing Brexit, need to feel a massive pressure to make this great change a resounding success.
No time to waste with futile gesture politics. All efforts must be focused on making the UK the most attractive economy, at least in Europe, for investment, innovation and entrepreneurship.
January 1, 2021
Richard 1
Oh indeed.
We need to nail them to their words. Aggressively hold them accountable on every single thing they say and do. They’ve tried to palm us off with BRINO……we need to make sure it pans out as the BREXIT we voted for.
January 1, 2021
Richard 1 – oh absolutely agree. No more flailing around, they need to get on and make changes for the better quickly.
December 31, 2020
Norman
“no point in being a sovereign nation if we do not stand for truth and integrity, and treat our neighbours fairly”
Some don’t deserve to be treated fairly, considering the way they treat us after what we have done for them.
In response to your reflections : I was brought up not to turn a blind eye to someone down on their luck, and not to turn the other cheek but hit back twice as hard.
I do not have the right to expect anyone else to turn the other cheek either.
January 1, 2021
Happy New Year Sir John. Thank you for your integrity and your level-headed comments: there have been times when these have been mood-lifting saviours.
January 1, 2021
A new year and a new beginning.
I am puzzled why a personal insult passes moderation but the satirical reply is deleted.
So much for free speach or the right of reply.
January 1, 2021
I think that one thing we have to do is to take Yes for an answer. Since the signing of the FTA, there has been an amazing amount of online paranoia, insisting that plain words don’t mean what they say, and that BRINO is the rule of the day, not to mention the Elgin Marbles – sigh. Stupid stuff.
The truth is that we have left and that from now on our relationship is one of trade, not constitution. Sensible people will recognize that one of the best aspects of this is that now we will be able to focus on UK issues as UK issues.
Now we have to recognize that Socialism is a bigger threat to prosperity than the EU ever was, that the secondary education system is a mess, that many people in the UK trudge through life with few or no skills, that there is a serious North-South divide, that there are areas that look permanently deprived, that the national diet is a disaster, that logical thinking is a minority pursuit, that only a small number of citizens understand even basic economics, that the intellectual level of the BBC has plunged, and so on.
So let’s exercise the freedom to forget the EU and get on with solving our own problems.
January 1, 2021
Seconded.
January 1, 2021
Sadly this is NOT an FTA but a constitution constraining âagreementâ. We have surrendered territory, control over much of our trade, our sea. We have agreed to the return of cultural artefacts, thereâs a lot more quite aside from the legal tangle. You should read it.
January 1, 2021
Good morning.
Sir John, they are not ‘new freedoms’ they are old. We just surrendered them because we trusted those who governed for and on our behalf to act in our interests. Today, I still do not believe that those tasked with such an honour, have quite done so and have pulled pretty much the same trick as before. Time will tell of course.
January 1, 2021
I have mentioned this before and now do so again:
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashed Al Makhtoum, Ruler of Dubai, once said, when addressing the people of his City State ( and a wider audience),
” We don’t wait for the future – WE BUILD IT”. He and they did and continue doing so. WE need to regain that enthusiasm, determination, motivation and entreprenueralism that we, as a Nation, once had. If it means filling in a couple of more Customs forms, getting visas/ residencia etc like we used to have to do – GET OVER YOURSELVES AND DO IT! Those of you in business – Get out there and do it OTHERWISE get out of the way and let those that can -do!
January 1, 2021
Great post. I’m fed up with the negativity all around me. Get up and go message is for governments too. Stop talking and start doing.
January 1, 2021
I donât call Borisâs Association deal leaving, I fear itâs just parked us back into the entrance lobby when the door should have been firmly shut.
Many remainers are now regrouping to campaign to rejoin the CU and SM – wait until Starmer et al gets into power then weâll see.
However a happy new year to you Sir John.
January 1, 2021
I would have preferred a clean break and no “deal”. We would have met tariffs with counter-tariffs and would have seen a net gain.
Yes it would have been temporarily disruptive but we could have then bargained (if we needed to) from a position of greater strength then we have now.
Having said that, it is time to celebrate because we are in a far better position now than for many decades.
Happy new year!
January 1, 2021
You left the EU eleven months ago- time to give it a miss-
Instead better to redirect your energies into funding to recreate a merchant navy with suitable ships and structure for world wide trade- we are still an island nation and won’t be truly free and independent or sovereign until we have our own ships to rely on- in short we have to recreate a trading situation as it was in the 1960’s. We cannot rely on EU owned shipping companies anymore
January 1, 2021
why did you vote against the government ?
January 1, 2021
Sir John, We owe you a tremendous debt of gratitude. When you and your fellow ministers and MPs rebelled against the Treaty of Maastricht – rammed through by the PM of the day with a casual, assurance to the European Commission that ‘we did not have referendums in this country, we just let Parliament and the government make such decisions’, and with the equally casual pretence to the country that no constitutional change was involved – back then many of us were only beginning to glimpse how the ‘project’ would now take shape: with a far more centralised governance, the domination by voting numbers of a post-reunification Germany hungry for strategic influence, and a French state that seemed to regard economics as a zero-sum game. Those of us who came later to the realization of just how ominous the implications of Maastricht were (and of Nice, Amsterdam and finally Lisbon) and who subsequently campaigned with vigour for the Leave referendum we should have had in in 1991/92, must all be supremely grateful to you and your ‘happy few’ colleagues for your patient spadework in Parliament, in season and out of season, helping the country – as we managed by a hairsbreadth it now seems – to salvage our independence.
Thank you most sincerely, and a Happy New Year to you.
January 1, 2021
But we cannot afford to wish the EU well. We do not want a Federal European SuperState on our doorstep, particularly one as undemocratic as the EU.
In the EU as it stands, the power lies with the unelected European Commission, to a limited extent controlled by the Council of Ministers and not at all by the European Parliament. Some Member States are more equal than others. The raft of laws and directives issued by the EC since Maastricht was incorporated into English law in 1993 has favoured German technology, French style bureaucracy, big business and incumbent businesses.
We need to do quite a lot reasonably quickly:
– Henceforth we will negotiate only with individual Member States
– Encourage Hungary et al to resist a common EU immigration policy
– Support the Member States that resist a Federal European army and defence policy
– Support the idea of fiscal transfers within the EU
– Separate church and State within the UK and campaign for the EU to do likewise
– Offer support to Member States that wish to leave the EuroZone