My views on Brexit

This whole Brexit deal has me shaking my head in bewilderment with it still not sinking in that Britain wants to leave the European Union.

I moved to Spain from the United States eight years ago, thanks to the fact that I have a British passport and that entitled me to live anywhere in the European Union and enjoy the same rights except voting in national elections that the citizens in my adopted country had.

Thinking back to before the referendum I was convinced that people in the UK would see the greater picture of remaining in the EU and how freedom of movement between countries was a good thing and not bad. I remember back in the 1990’s while working in Slovakia that it could sometimes take two hours just to cross the border into Austria and then the same on the return journey. Now with both countries in the EU, you just drive across the border as if it never existed.

I also thought people would realize that for more than 72 years there has not been a war in any of the member states, unlike the two conflicts that last century cost millions of lives.

I also had no illusions thinking that Britain was the colonial power it once was and that all the talk of it being a trading nation would automatically bring back the good old days when Britannia ruled the waves.

Looking back on the referendum I can now assume that David Cameron and his government felt the same way, as they certainly did not push the case for remaining in the European Union hard enough. Nor did they quash the xenophobic notion portrayed by the leavers that all foreigners were coming to the UK to take advantage of state benefits or to undermine British workers by accepting less pay.

Donald Trump even used Nigel Farage as an advisor to hoodwink the American people with his talk of a wall and that he was going to bring jobs back to industries that were no longer viable in the modern age.

Truth be told I think the leavers were fed a pack of lies and that if Britain had joined Schengen and accepted the euro as the nation’s currency the Brexit vote would have never happened.

Anyway, it is what it is and we will just have to make the best of it, which in my case will be getting a Spanish passport if I need it to remain living in Spain.

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