Happy Birthday, Brexit! – 5th Anniversary Gala Celebration!
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January 31, 2025
TLDR: Special guest Anand Menon discusses the effects of Brexit on Britain, assessing its impact on the UK, Tory party, Labour, and European Union over the past five years.

Introduction
This podcast episode, hosted by Ros Taylor and featuring contributors like Hannah Fearn, Marie le Conte, and special guest Anand Menon from UK In A Changing Europe, reflects on the fifth anniversary of Brexit. It delves into the transformative effects Brexit has had on the UK, discussing both its immediate outcomes and long-term implications.
Key Themes and Insights
The Impact of Brexit
- Transformational Changes: Discussion centered on how Brexit has irrevocably changed Britain, from political landscapes to economic ties with Europe.
- Shift in Dynamics: Anand Menon points out that the UK now has to navigate a more protectionist and unified EU, influencing Britain’s international dealings.
- Unexpected Developments: The speakers reflected on how unforeseen consequences, such as changes in EU power dynamics, became evident post-Brexit.
Political Ramifications
- Disruption of Traditional Parties: The episode explored how Brexit's aftermath has affected parties like the Conservatives and Labour. Menon suggested the Tory party has been significantly weakened due to its handling of Brexit, compounded by the failures of leaders like Liz Truss and Boris Johnson.
- Labour’s Reluctance to Address Brexit: The panel discussed Labour's avoidance of stringent commentary on Brexit and the reasons behind it, indicating a complex political strategy to win back voters.
Lessons from the Brexit Experience
- Misjudgments During the Referendum: Anand Menon highlighted that many remainers underestimated the depth of dissatisfaction among the electorate regarding EU membership at the time of the vote.
- Communication Failures: The maintainers of the remain campaign failed to effectively communicate the benefits of EU membership, leaving a gap that the leave campaign exploited.
- Voter Dynamics: The changing electorate plays a crucial role in today’s political landscape, with many who voted remain having since shifted to a more nationalist outlook.
Economic Consequences
- Trade Relationships: The significant drop in small businesses engaging in EU trade due to bureaucratic barriers was noted, indicating an ongoing economic struggle.
- Investment Stagnation: Menon detailed stalled investment rates since 2016, contributing to a broader narrative of economic stagnation tied to Brexit.
Looking Ahead
- Evolving EU Relationship: There’s indication that, while the UK cannot rejoin the EU or alter its position on key policies, both the UK and EU are seeing changes in their approaches to manage relationships more favorably.
- Youth Mobility and Cultural Exchange: Discussion arose around potential deals on youth mobility as a path to healing relations, though mixed with concerns over government policies on immigration.
Conclusion
The panel concluded that while Brexit has been a divisive and transformative experience for the UK, it has also opened a necessary dialogue on broader political and economic issues. The lack of consensus and the shifting Overton window concerning populism and national identity poses challenges that will require careful navigation in the coming years.
Key Takeaways
- Brexit Changed Everything: It altered party dynamics, economic conditions, and the nature of UK-EU relationships.
- Future Considerations: The need for strategic political communication and public engagement remains critical as the UK seeks to redefine its international stance without the EU.
- Political Awakening: The Brexit experience has shed light on the importance of recognizing the needs and sentiments of diverse voter groups, emphasizing a need for political reflection and responsibility.
In summary, the discussion encapsulates a pivotal moment in British history, challenging assumptions and prompting reevaluation of national identity and policy direction.
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Welcome to Oh God What Now, the five years of Brexit Grand Gala celebration edition!
I'm Ros Taylor. On today's show, on the 5th anniversary of Britain leaving the EU, some listeners may have concluded that on balance Brexit was a mistake. But now seems a good time to reflect on how it's changed Britain. What happened that we didn't predict? Are we any closer to understanding why we did it? And in the second half, a look to the future. Where's our relationship with the EU heading and what will the reset really mean?
director of the UK in a Changing Europe, Anand Menel, joins the podcast to talk us through it all. And in the Extra Bit for supporters, AI has gone from being an idea to a daily presence in our lives. How are we using it and how much can we trust it? Let's meet today's panel. First, it's Hannah Fern, who's a journalist specializing in social affairs. Hi, Hannah. Hello. Rachel Reeves has delivered her big, pro-growth speech we persuaded.
A bit more than before, I think. I felt like she'd shaken off a bit of that slight anxious head girl vibe that she's had in the beginning. And so there was a certain confidence in her projection. And I think it was lucky for her not inevitable that the CBI back speech afterwards. So that's kind of a big tick for all those, you know, writing newspapers, what they're going to report on it. So they can't get away from that.
I think it was pretty comprehensive as well. Obviously Heathrow dominates, and that's what everyone's been talking about, but there were other really big projects in there such as the Oxford Cambridge Growth Hubs and the Great Zen Crossing, which obviously was something we've been talking about for 30 years or more, and it now looks to be more realistic. I thought it was better than I was expecting, as well I'd say. What's this plan for old Trafford?
So it's leveling up really, but with a new name. So infrastructure isn't just going to be in the southeast, that there is an opportunity to build everywhere. So they threw in the man United plan. Much to United has been spending the last sort of five years wondering what to do about its capacity issue. They're due to make a decision by the end of this football season about whether to develop, redevelop their existing stadium or build a whole new one with 100,000 capacity. And basically that scheme will end up using public money to move a bunch of
rail freight terminals are in the way. So this has basically got the government's backing now. So if they go ahead and do that, they're free. Do a huge project, which will include things like 5,000 homes and what they're calling, Andy Burns calling a football campus, whatever that means. One imagines just a few new public services in the area, but still it's a big project. Can I just say, and I know you haven't introduced me yet, but if there's a god, it'll end up a tenth full as a championship ground and serve them right.
I'm just wondering whether it's a little bit of compensation for not getting HS2. Possibly, although this issue wouldn't have gone away. So I think it's just the government piggybacking on a football team that people like and the whole world's heard of, apart from Alan. Not everybody likes. Next up, it's columnist and author Marilla Kant. Hello, Marie. Hello.
You've been thinking about Kemi Badenock and the way she keeps returning to the importance of integration, because she was born in London, but only came here at the age of 16. And less than 30 years later, she became leader of the Conservative Party, which is, you know, what could you call pretty much integrating? And what does the word integration mean to her?
It's something I've been frustrated by ever since she's become leader, because I think that as someone who is a first and second generation immigrant, I really like the idea of someone in a very senior politician being someone who really has so much of another culture in her, in her heritage and background, etc. But he's also, obviously, undeniably British. But instead, what we're getting is someone who is quite sort of fanatically, I think, anti-immigration.
But yeah, it always seems, you know, we had that most recently with the Southport Killer where I think she managed to somehow shoehorn integration into her kind of, you know, media interviews around the topic. When, as far as we can tell, it's really not, you know, the murders, as horrible as they were, had nothing to do with the family. You know, they were not badly integrated. It was not a really cultural thing, et cetera. And I'd like to see her talk about it more, I guess. And it's clearly shaped her as a person, I think, to have grown up in Lagos to be Nigerian.
Yeah, I think I'd like to hear more about that. Then also I think it'd make her a more interesting character, even just cynically for her. And finally, I guess this week is the director of the UK in a changing Europe. Hi, Anand. Hiya, how are you? I'm good. You've just published the Brexit Files. It's a big report looking back on everything, or pretty much everything that's happened over the past decade. I enjoyed the swanky launch last night. It's very nice. It's been a decade since we both joined the Brexit beat. Has it changed you?
God yeah, I mean, I stopped being an academic, ran UK and changed Europe. I must have been utterly transformed, I suppose, in that sense, I'm a bit of a war profiteer because I've really enjoyed it.
Are you worried about, you know, it ever going away or is it going to keep on giving for you as far as you're concerned? It'll never go away. It'll never go away in the way that, you know, Canadians will never stop worrying about the United States or Asian countries will never stop worrying about China. If you're on the doorstep of a continental sized economy, it will dominate your waking hours. However much you like to think otherwise. And actually the irony, I suppose, is if there was one way not to stop us banging on about Europe, it was to leave.
It was far easier to not bang on about you when we were in, but now we've got our deal to update. We've got all sorts of bilateral tensions. There are court cases going on. The EU keeps doing stuff that has impacts on us, whether it's carbon border stuff and things like that. We will have to keep a really careful eye on what they're doing and what they do will impinge on us always.
And as the title of your organisation says, Europe does keep changing in ways that are pretty unexpected. Well, yeah, I mean, it's interesting, isn't it? Just how much the European Union has changed since we left? It's done a number of things that would have been inconceivable with us around the table. I think the COVID recovery fund would have looked different. There's no way there would be a defence commissioner if Britain had a veto. About six months ago, I gave a talk to a bunch of senior Dutch civil servants. And as a joke,
I said, Bloody hell, we turn our backs for a few years and you let the French take over. And rather than laughing, they all just sat there and nodded in a rather sad way that, yeah, the whole place has become a lot more French, it's a lot more protectionist, it's a lot more into subsidising industries. And part of that is because they don't have our voice around the table anymore.
Let's begin. And as when the referendum result came through in 2016, there was very little certainty about what Brexit would mean. I remember even reading some interviews with leave voters at the time who thought that we'd just announced we were out and that would be it job done. What shape did you expect Brexit to take back then?
I think back then, naively, I expected it to be far softer. In retrospect, I was being an idiot because if you have a campaign that's run on the basis of control, then actually the one thing you can't do is be anywhere near the single market where borders, money, and laws aren't fully in your control. So I think I was slightly naive then.
And, you know, I like everyone else, including her own cabinet. I think we're utterly taken aback when Theresa May took to the stage in October at the Conservative Party conference and laid down those red lines. Was that because, you know, Joyce Johnson had more or less said that we would stay in the single market, so you thought that was how we play out?
To an extent, yes, I remember we had stuff on our website, then being a little bit kind of, it's not quite that easy because A, you've got to negotiate it and B, which I still believe when you hear this debate about the single market, that includes some really nasty trade-offs. I mean, whether an economy is big and as complicated as ours, i.e., not the Norwegian economy, could put itself in that position. Could you imagine
EU regulations on financial services over which we have no vote regulating the city of London. We thought it would have been problematic. I didn't have a clear shape in my head. We knew there would be issues around single market, but I think I naively thought we would come up with some sort of arrangement whereby trade wouldn't be as badly affected as it has been.
When remainers were speculating and warning about Brexit before the vote, what did we fail to realize? And what did we just get wrong in retrospect?
Well, that's a big we, and I think... Well, when I say we, I mean me, because I was on the remaining acts, so I don't mean you. I mean, I mean, remainers, personally. I mean, this isn't meant as a slight, but I don't blame you as much as I blame David Cameron. Good. Right. That's a leaf, I think, but... That's also a relief, because if you were a mortar blame...
You wouldn't even give you roles, like, you know, I think of that. I do wonder about my role in it all of this sometimes, but, you know, yeah, I nonetheless, yeah, God. But I think they got wrong. I mean, there's a list of what they got wrong from the hubristic attitude of saying, once we've won this, we'll put the party back together again, which meant you couldn't attack other Tories. I mean, I remember during the campaign when, do you remember that poster of Ed Miliband in Nicholas Sturgeon's pocket that the Tories used in the 2015? They had one of those with Boris Johnson and Michael Gove in Nigel Farage's pocket.
that David Cameron vetoed the use of because it was blue on blue and was seen to, you know, it's a little bit rude to other conservatives. So they fought with one hand tied behind their back, which was a massive mistake. David Cameron, having spent five years doing ridiculous stuff by every time before there was a European council saying, I'd rather be anywhere than going to Brussels. Coming out as pro-EU and saying, our security depends on this organization was less than convincing. I mean, there's a long, long list.
of what the Conservatives did wrong at the head of the Remain campaign. The other thing I would say is one of the most bizarre spectacles during the referendum were Tory ministers essentially campaigning against austerity as part of the
referendum campaign. That red bus for me wasn't just a leave bus, it was an anti-austerity bus, it was about, we're going to plow money back into public services, sort of oce because we have screwed them over the last six years. And I think that whole austerity debate played into the Brexit thing quite fundamentally.
Yeah. But I mean, returning again to remainers, and I mean, we clearly made- You were never self-obsessed, at least. We clearly made huge mistakes. We failed to persuade. We didn't stop a very hard Brexit, not the hardest that could possibly have been, but a hard Brexit. But how would we get it wrong in a way? Why did we fail to persuade? At which part? We're still talking referendum more subsequently.
subsequently after the referendum, when it was all up for, well, not all up for grabs, but when there was very much uncertainty about what form breaks it would take. Towards the end, I think there were two things. I think one, the slightly scorched earth policy that was essentially shared between the ERG and the second referendum brigade, which basically meant our job is to basically sack off every other alternative apart from the extremes. I think that essentially killed the soft ground in between those two extremes. And the other thing, a lot of people say,
Brexit blurred party lines. It really didn't, because ultimately, even though Theresa May's Brexit deal ticked every single one of the Corbinite boxes for Brexit, what Jeremy Corbyn demanded from Brexit, Theresa May had delivered, and it's worth noting.
that she negotiated a far better deal with the European Union than I think anyone familiar with the European Union thought they'd be willing to give. But ultimately, why did Labour vote against it? Not because of what it said, but because it was a Tory deal, because she negotiated it. So party politics reasserted itself right at the end, I think, which was absolutely fundamental to the story. And looking at it now, five years on, we can really get a sense of what Brexit has done to the economy. What has Brexit done to the economy? How has it changed it?
Well, I mean, it's a work in progress. Okay, so it's only four years since we actually left the end of the transition period. It's had an impact on goods trade. That much is very clear now. It's particularly had an impact on the number of trading relationships between us and the European Union. The evidence is an awful lot of small firms have pulled out of that market now just because of the paperwork and the cost. There was a remarkable thing a couple of weeks ago. And if you heard it where the head of MNS said, we've rented warehouses to store the paperwork.
So, the surprising thing, I suppose, is that services trade has held up. Now, I would have thought services trade would have held up and been a bit better still, were it not for Brexit, but the numbers on services trade belie the expectations. And the final area where there has been an impact, I think, has been in terms of investment. Investments stalled after 2016 and has never really recovered. And, you know, in a week when we're talking about Rachael Reeves and growth, that lack of investment is absolutely fundamental to our appalling productivity story.
And you mentioned earlier on that maybe the COVID recovery fund, the COVID recovery fund wouldn't have gone through if we had still been a member. What else has Brexit damaged? Is the EU weaker because we left?
Absolutely. They're smaller. They have less in the way of foreign defence policy resources. There's no way round the fact that the European Union is weaker without us. It's different ideologically without us, but actually is able to do some things, some integrative things now that wouldn't have been possible if we'd been there.
And is there an overriding explanation to leave vote? Because I remember reading so many different explanations for why people voted leave. Do we finally have an idea of whether there was one big one or was it always an assortment of desires and grievances that were all in some way pinned to the leave vote?
I mean, there were always more people in this country dissatisfied with membership than was the case in other member states, but you'll layer that onto an incredibly unpopular government, an economy that had essentially flatlined since 2008, or even before, I mean, even before 2008, Gordon Brown was sort of having summits in number 11 about how to have productivity growth.
And on top of that, the real unpopularity of the political class, I mean, one of the really fascinating things about our politics is the last election, 2024, was a throwback to 2015. And in 2015, we had then the lowest ever share of the vote gained by the two big parties. It was surpassed this last year.
and that real sense of disillusionment with mainstream politics, and I think that fed into it. That was the starting gun, if you like, of the period of the last 10 years in the Western world as a whole of anti-encompancy, anti-politics feeling, fueling populism, and other sort of anti-system forces. Marie, have you in any way made your peace with Brexit?
It's actually been a slightly weird journey because I think I made my piece for it a long time ago and I've now maybe unmade my piece. Because obviously, I was covering Brexit like I started working in Westminster in 2015, so it's very much there. All the votes I watched several of the trees are made. But I think in that context, because professionally I had to talk to everyone all the time.
it felt easier to just kind of set my own feelings aside and also i think it became quite clear to me quite quickly that there was obviously never going to be a second referendum you know we're obviously going to leave anyway so i think i definitely had a lot of frustrations along the way about you know again sort of people who again either the very sorry because i guess that was remaining acts with a very the people who very much like second referendum or nothing i was very frustrated with the kind of you know very hard Brexit or nothing people
But you know i did have some sympathy for the kind of soft levers and again thought the media was pretty good and i'm slightly biased because i do know civil servant who worked on it so i feel like you know. I was forced to learn about it to be a good friend and yes i think i spend quite a while going okay well fine this is just something that's going to have to happen and it's annoying but it's fine.
But no, I can't remember exactly when I think it might have been. So a few about two years ago, I think my little brother, his girlfriend and their group of their friends are all French living in Paris, came to London for a weekend. So I took them out for brunch and there's about seven, eight of them in their mid 20s.
All spoke reasonably good English university educated interesting sort of young people and yet none of them had ever considered moving to London and none of them had any interest you know i had any sort of interest in moving even though they liked it as a whole the destination and i was like and yeah and i had this really shocking moment i thought oh but if you compare that to my cohort of you know my friends.
Obviously, I live home, I've stayed here, but also so many of my friends moved here for a few years, so went to university in Britain and then actually went back to France or stayed in work for a few years and moved elsewhere. So many of my friends spent at least a few years in Britain, you know, in their late teenagers and in their 20s. And yeah, and I had such a big like,
Jesus fucking Christ. This is what we had, you know, and I had such a deep, tangible sense of like we've actually lost something that was really special. And I know that's, you know, obviously very personal, you know, quite small level, I guess, but I was like, oh, but I feel like Britain is presumably a lot less rich kind of culturally, you know, because of that.
all these kids, you know, are going to have slightly less interesting lives because I feel like London was just so obviously the place you'd go to. And yeah, and yeah, from that point onwards, I think that's when I allowed myself to kind of emotionally process Brexit. And I was like, it is a fucking waste. And I think I do resent as well. So I feel like I'm on a rant now. And I also really resented.
And for quite a long time, the idea that if you said in any way that maybe Brexit wasn't going terribly well, then you were some kind of like national trader, remainder, bollocks, whatever, it's fine. It's an opinion that's fine to have. You can just say there was a referendum, we left fine, but also that sucks. And in fact, we can say that about any other political decision. So I think eventually I reached boiling point where I was like, well, why can't we say that about Brexit, though, and still be taken seriously?
Yeah, and I guess I'm thinking of something that I think was John Curtis said last night at your launch event. And when he was pointing out that the immigration had gone up a lot since Brexit, and that wasn't what people had expected to be voting for. And I suppose I'm wondering if when we think about the effect it's had, whether
in a way, as John Curtis himself quite provocatively suggested to, I think, the remainers there, we should welcome this opportunity that it opened up for many more, a much wider group of people, ethnically, to come to Britain and to have their time here in a way that you were able to do. I mean, I personally find it hard to imagine how you could describe a situation where you've replaced the French with the Indians as anything other than a triumph.
I think the saddest thing about Marie's anecdote though is that the long tail of those small personal decisions that people from Europe were making in their late teens early 20s about studying and so on. You see it echoed in the ending of the Erasmus scheme is that our relationship with, our soft relationship with the entire European population is destroyed because we don't have this kind of kind feeling, this sort of warm feeling.
that harks people back to like some months they spent in London or Bristol when they were 23. These things actually do really matter because when those people are 45 and decision makers in businesses, they actually affect economic decision making. And so we lie to ourselves, we think the only decisions people make in business are hard financial ones. They make emotional decisions too, and that relationship's been lost.
And a lot of the abiding business about Brexit and many of our listeners will still feel it, is that it was a result obtained through lies and evasion. And yet the main parties have all made their peace with it. What would you say to the many people who still find it hard to accept that we pursued one of the hardest possible versions of something that has damaged us?
I'm not sure, to be honest. I mean, it's interesting, isn't it? I mean, this was, it was a fluke of political geography as much as anything else, wasn't it? Because I think I'm right in saying that in 2017 and in 2019, more people voted for remain backing parties than voted for leave-backing parties. It was just very inefficiently done. So, in a sense, once the referendum had happened and once Theresa May had read out her red lines, it was very, very difficult to do anything about it because we were then in the hands of a parliament.
that changed its composition in 2017, that was dominated by the intransigence of the sort of hard Brexit law. I mean, I do think one of the problems with the sort of, if you could call it the liberal or the soft side of the Brexit debate is they were just too damp a light. You know, your David Ludington's David Cook just wouldn't play dirty. They wouldn't threaten to bring the house down. And that played into the hands of the ERG, but it was very hard from outside parliament to affect that, I think, at all.
I do think a problem with this as well, kind of looking at internal Tory politics, but I think we're still seeing play out now, and we saw in the leadership contest, et cetera, is that, and it took me a while to kind of contour onto it, but I think, centuries stories, that what we think of as century stories, will never quite seek.
to move the Everton window themselves that always try to be and be like, okay, well, wherever the Tory party is now, we'll probably be on the left without the centre of that, but they never try to change it, whereas I think the right shift the window, the centre and the left of the Conservative parliamentary party is like, oh, so Rwanda, for example, a lot of them, instead of going, no, we just, you know, that's a mental idea. They were like, oh, well, we'll be softly against.
Because I think that's a lot of what happened to Brexit as well. They never sought to define the parameters of the debate. They always thought to be like, oh, well, we'll be on the kind of nicer side. And I think that's why the party keeps being dragged to the right again and again. I mean, it's worth saying that, of course, you have the unique circumstance of Jeremy Corbyn. And I think for a lot of those people, whatever happened with Brexit, it could not be as bad as opening the door of number 10 to Jeremy Corbyn. So I think that that conspired to make those choices a little bit harder for them.
Are there any upsides to Brexit? I think one of the things...
that came out of Brexit that could be a positive is how our politics has changed. Our political debate has changed. We noticed inequality on the 24th of June 2016. We should have noticed it a long time before, but we didn't. The rewriting of the political geography of the UK has been really interesting. The fact that we have virtually no safe seats left I think has to be a good thing. The fact that politicians can't take voters for granted anymore is a good thing. I mean, obviously all of this rests on the assumption that at a certain point in time our politicians will act on the basis of this. But I think
Quite a lot of the shifts we've seen in politics are potentially beneficial, though the jury is very much still out as to what actually happens. But also politics is a lot nastier, isn't it, and a lot coarser? Or am I just remembering things pre-2015? I first started getting interested in politics during the minor strike and I grew up in West Yorkshire and God, politics was pretty bloody nasty then.
No, that's fair. But I suppose, as Marie was saying, the Overton window on many things has just changed, and partly as a result of Brexit and the constant push towards more extreme version of it. That doesn't seem like a good development in politics. No, but I'd also say that the fact that it's happening in every other Western democracy points to the fact that it probably wasn't just Brexit that did that and it might have happened anyway.
You mentioned that poverty has been noticed and it was a clearly a factor in the decision. But then what's happened with that knowledge is not very much. So in the 10 years, we mentioned growth has been at its lowest and that this is awful.
plummet in British growth, but that isn't necessarily just to do with lack of investment because of Brexit, it's also because of the decisions of the Conservative Party over that period. So it's interesting that they took this knowledge from it, and then we've done nothing with it as a political system. No, that's absolutely true. I mean, what I would say is we have a Conservative Party now where Theresa May talks about the Just About Manageings, where Boris Johnson talks about levelling up, where actually the issue of inequality got on the radar of the Conservative Party, which it wasn't before then, okay?
No, I'm not for a moment. I'm going to sit here and argue and they acted to reduce it. They did nothing whatsoever and you could sort of give them a bit of a get out of jail free card by saying they spent three years arguing about Brexit, then another two years trapped with Covid. So we were distracted by a load of other things and no one has acted on it yet and actually talk about Rachel Reeve's growth agenda. I'd have liked a little bit more on the regional stuff because it came which is all well and good.
But it is there now, I think. And I think, in that sense, you know, Marie, we'll talk about the Overton window. That Overton window has shifted. Regional inequality is part of the national debate. Now, it's up to politicians to run with that. But I think there is an opportunity to say, we are going to do something about this because God knows our politics tells us that it really matters now in a way that there wasn't before. Now, you might say I'm sort of clutching straws here, but I do think that is important. And I do think it's refocused political attention a little bit. I'll tell you one story. The Center for European Reform edits
birthday party reception thing, and I can't remember, I think it must be when Starmer spoke to them actually, but I was introduced to the new Japanese ambassador, so this was in 2022.
whose first words to me were, I'm absolutely fascinated by what's gonna happen in Wakefield. Because the by-election was gonna happen, I grew up in Wakefield. Now, never in my wildest dreams I had ever heard anyone from outside Wakefield express the slightest bit of interest in Wakefield, or even know where it was. And it did strike me then that actually, you know, these previously safe labor seats where people have put up with shit since the 80s were suddenly the center of political attention, and I thought that has to be a good thing. I mean, politics has yet to deliver on that, but, you know,
It was a nice first step I thought. Yeah. Hannah, has Brexit changed us as a country rather than just as a trading partner with Europe? Have we realised anything about ourselves that we didn't know before?
I think we sort of already knew that we were fractured as a population that we had different sort of sects within us. But it gave us a language to talk about that, brings it, which I think has actually been quite damaging. It's what's directly led to the rise of forage reform, where we are now. The conversations that we hear, the way Trumpism is becoming very popular among young people,
And that has all been given a language through Brexit, which worries me. And yeah, it has become sort of the ultimate market of social division. And I think from externally as a country, that makes us look a bit muddled outside. I think it's hard, people find it hard to know what Britain is, who British people are now, because we are still locked in this kind of internal war about what side we're on and what we really think of ourselves in the world.
But it's only one thing I think that also it's taught us that we are better than politicians admitting our mistakes because if you look at data on whether or not, you know, it was the right thing to leave that for much of the last 10 years, we're kind of tracking the politics on that. You know, there are politicians who believe it's right to leave. There are politicians who believe it's wrong. And as there are in the population, but right now in 2024, which is when they last polled, we as a population, the majority now think it was wrong to leave looking at the reality that we're in.
But politicians are not there. They haven't grappled with that, even though the people can see the truth. But I mean, can I just say one thing about that? I mean, it is certainly true that some people have changed their minds, but most of the shift in the opinion polling is down to what demographers politely call churn.
which is, you know, it is a very different electorate now to the electorate in 2016 because of exits and entries into the electorate, if I can put it that way. But just coming back to your point about what we've learned about ourselves, I think one of the really interesting things is we kind of figured out that the way we thought about the economy was wrong.
thinking simply about GDP was, during the referendum campaign, George Osborne made a couple of speeches, one in which he said, if we leave the European Union, the city of London will be damaged, and another in which he said, if we leave the European Union, house prices will come down, and a mate of mine from home from Wakefield rang me up and said, has he changed sides?
Because they sound like really good outcomes to men. And the way it sort of toppled our assumptions about how people feel the economy, which is something that was very current during the US election. You think about it? Absolutely. And I think we were slightly ahead of the curve there. We realized that actually the way economists talk about the economy is not necessarily the way people think about it. And it was impacting on people in all sorts of
Although interestingly enough, I'm no Corbinite as people who, you know, have ever read anything I've written or know, but that Corbin was got that right too. So that explains him. Absolutely. It's no coincidence that far out of the other weeks said there are similarities between myself and Jeremy Corbin. Exactly. Absolutely.
And many of the Tories desperately wanted Brexit. And now their party is diminished. It's out of power. It's being rapidly eclipsed by reform in many ways. There's kind of something of the Greek tragedy about this, which I find quite fascinating. Is it Brexit alone that almost killed the Tory party? Or would they just have burnt themselves out anyway, like a, you know, battery that's overheated? No, I don't think it was Brexit. I think, you know, have a combination of their handling of Covid, including party gay.
I mean, it was party gate and list. If you look at the polling, it's quite clear. Party gate and list trust with the two turning points in terms of the popularity of the conservative party. In a sense, that had nothing to do with Brexit. My hunch.
was always that Boris Johnson would win a second term before people started to see the contradictions inherent in what he was saying and the fact that it was very hard to deliver. But the skill of Boris Johnson as a politician was he could go up to Yorkshire in the morning and promise investments and growth and come back to a sort of rubber chicken thing in Surrey in the evening and promise low taxes and no one would call him out on it. He could do that. I mean, and that's a real political skill. I thought that would come back to him eventually, but I thought he'd have had one more win in him.
But would Boris Johnson even have ever been Prime Minister without the push exactly that Brexit gave him? So without Brexit, no Boris Johnson, so no Liz Truss. I'm not convinced that 52-48 the other way in 2016 would have led to a stable political outcome. No, I think you're probably right.
Is there an argument here that actually it's not Brexit that broke the Conservative party for Boris Johnson? If you look at it the other way, you're like, I don't think if Boris doesn't come out for Brexit, or would David Cameron have been called the referendum in that way, et cetera? So I think it's Boris Johnson that killed 14 years of whatever that was. Totally agree. Right, let's wrap up that section with blaming Boris Johnson. Something we may have done in the past.
Now, the new look but your emails. We're going to be doing more of your questions and it's not just for patrons anymore. If you want to ask a question to the panel, follow the link in the show notes. As it's Brexit week, we have three questions on our favourite topic. One is from Hugh Matheson.
He says, why aren't labour seizing back the Brexit betrayal narrative? They're doing a good job of hammering home the message that Tories did a bad job and shouldn't be listened to, but they're missing a trick by not doing the same with the Brexiteers and highlighting all the promises made by the Brexiteers that were broken. What do we see? Is that the way forward for labour communications?
I think the reason that they're not really leaping on this is partly because all those promises that the Brexit made were lies because Brexit was a giant lie. It was just a great, you know, brilliant comms job and nothing more. And so they can't.
spring that and say, you know, you broke these promises because they know they can't deliver on similar promises either. So this, you need to have something to step in. You can't just attack and then not say, and here's what we're going to do. And so while they have got the whole growth agenda, which we've been hearing all about today and housing development, we've got all of these projects.
Some of those promises related to Brexit, they can't say this promise was broken and now we're going to fulfill it, where you were let down before, because they know they can't. So I think it's just too dangerous an avenue for them to start to walk down. So I wonder if they've been slightly sort of victims of their own success in that. I think so many of the very prominent Brexit is
especially on the Tory benches, have either left Parliament by choice because they could see they were going to get wiped out or got wiped out. So I think it's a lot harder. If the shadow cabinet is not full of those people, it would be weird for you to kind of bring it up. So I think if we still had your kind of boruses and goves, et cetera, on the Tory from bench, that would be quite a useful political attack. But if not, you know, like GEMI generate, et cetera,
were either sort of very low level break their supports over the time, some of them were remainers, some of them were not even in parliament at the time. So it kind of feels a bit, I think, like fighting ghosts.
I think it's more to do with voters. Labour are obsessed with winning back working-class voters that they didn't get back in 2024 actually. They might have won Red Wall seats, but they didn't get the votes of working-class people back in the numbers they had before. And I think the danger with calling out some of the things the Brexitists said.
is you are in danger of coming very close to calling the voters idiots, which is to say, it's very hard to do that without saying, I can't believe anyone would have been taken in by this nonsense. And that, I think, is the danger. They are desperate to appear respectful to those voters, hence the red lines, hence the line on immigration. I mean, you might throw up your hands and say, for Christ's sake, this just sounds like a continuation of what we had before, but I think it is because of a fear of offending those voters.
Yeah, respect. It's sort of an under-discussed element of the Starmer agenda, I think, and the whole idea of respect. Slightly light-hearted question from Liz Allen. If the EU said that we could rejoin, but in doing so, another country had to leave the EU, which I can't see happening, but let's pretend it will. Which country would you throw out and why? Hannah.
What do you get, Vijay? So that's a lighthearted question that I now realise I've put a not very lighthearted answer for, which is Malta, because of its human rights abuse. So, delayed or responding to or ignoring refugees at risk at sea entirely. Abortion is still illegal for the majority of women in Malta. They're treatment of journalists. So, yeah, Malta can go. Bye-bye, Malta. Marie, who would you get rid of?
So I've got a serious and slightly serious and slightly serious one. Slightly serious is, on a re-selfish note, I really want to kick out Hungary because I am so fucking sick of Warban. I mean, every single time you try to read about EU News, it's just Warban being a dick. And I think there's an argument saying that I think that you can only really truly support Ukraine in the war if you just kick hungry out. And I feel bad that, you know,
I mean, you don't have to get rid of Slovakia quite as soon the way it's going and, you know, before long, the Eastern European enlargement would be gone. But all bands have been a twat for so long, and it's just, I can't, yeah. But the funny one, I think it'd be really, really funny if France was doing European. It'd just be great.
That's it. I have no other keys to make. I just think it'd be really funny. Anna, do you want to make any enemies here? I agree with Marie. I mean, for the laws it's got to be friends. I mean, just imagine what that would be. We could maybe veto their application to join later down the line as well, just for all time's sake. And I think it has to be Hungary. If you were doing it for the benefit of the EU, Hungary is the biggest spoiler there at the moment.
Right, let's go on to something slightly more serious again. Wily pike POT, that said, asks, we all know that Britain would have to make compromises to get back into the EU. What are the deal-breakers as far as the panel is concerned? Losing sterling, driving on the wrong side of the road? I don't think we would have to change that. But anyway, what might the EU want us to do that we could not possibly do as far as the panel are concerned?
I think the EU would want cross-party consensus on the need to rejoin, which would be the deal breaker in the foreseeable future. Are we getting to that? I mean, they'd never ask for it, but some kind of dismantling of the BBC would be my red line.
I mean, it's just not something they'd request, but then they wouldn't request that we drive on the other side of the road either. So, in the spirit of the question, would we be okay with having the Euro? Everyone call with that? It would make my life so much easier. But they might ask for it, it is. They might ask for it. I mean, the Swedes are committed to join the Euro. They haven't got an opt-out, but they're just sort of quietly. The Swedes incidentally were incandescent with us when we left, because they used to, you know, we used to be the spokespeople for the Euro out, and without us, they lost quite an influential voice for that group.
I think as someone who gets, for some reason, after 15 years in Britain, who still gets cashed in Euro for Christmas every single year, I'm just saying it'd be very convenient for me personally. And I have no emotional relationship with the pound. I would have no problem with that, but I know that for so many people it is. It's an interest rate thing though, isn't it, really? It's being able to set you up. It's not having the ECB telling you what to do.
Right, let's move on. We're talking about the future now. We've Brexited. For a while, that felt like the most important thing in the world, but as the past five years have shown us, the world changes in ways that you don't necessarily expect. And in hindsight, Brexit looks like the first herald of a new kind of populism. The isolationism we're seeing from the US are willingness to put new restrictions on trade, to satisfy national priorities, and of course, a new skepticism about immigration.
And yet, here we are, bucking the trend with a centre-left and fairly progressive government. Don't all write into object, because I know the caveats. What does the future hold for us? Marie, what do you worry about most in the next few years?
I mean, none of this is going to be especially original, but I worry about the Overtan window shifting and shifting again, because I think it's been, you know, it's been happening even since the, you know, government has been elected. I think that the conservatives have gone matter in matter. Obviously reform is becoming more and more popular. You know, external forces are definitely having an effect on political discourse. So I think that getting worse is a big worry, but you know, what goes hand in hand with that is, I think, also the center and center left.
still having not found a way to deal with that, to deal with populism. And again, I think that's the case in Britain, is the case in France, in the US quite famously that everywhere I think, I can't think of a single country that's managed to kind of do that. And again, maybe you know that that is an unfair comparison, because you know, very different, obviously, like candidates, countries, etc. But
Obviously, you could think about Kear Starmer as that, you know, and he won. He's the one who showed that actually you can take on the forces of right-wing populism and win, or you could see him as, you know, Joe Biden going, and now for a little break before things get even worse and at the moment, fines-wise, that is how I sort of see him. And again, it may be unfair and it may just be a pessimist, but yeah, that would be my worry. What would you like to see Britain do? Well, how would you like to see us behaving on the world stage?
So this is going to be slightly left-field, but I think I would really like the Tories to become more competent again, because I think the only way in which we can get more normal, healthier political culture is by having a reasonably normal and respectful left-wing party and right-wing party. And I think that Labour can quite do its job properly if the Tories have gone insane.
And I don't know on the world stage, it's hard not to speak in platitudes as Nick, so I would say, not be afraid to say the things that need to be said and really taking a stand on the issues that matter. But more broadly, I think just trying to get our house in order first would be ideal.
And the government says it wants to reset its relations with the EU, and you point out in the big report that there's been a lack of urgency around this. We know what it won't do. It won't rejoin the single market or the customs union or allow freedom of movement. We have got much better vibes already, especially with Germany.
But will we move closer to the EU in tangible ways? Is there a deal to be done on youth mobility, for example, which the Commission is so very keen on? We are closer to the EU in tangible ways, because we think back to Boris Johnson, it was seen as politically beneficial to be at daggers drawn with the European Union. Now it's seen as politically beneficial to be
have on good terms with the European Union. So things have changed. I think that matters. I think there is a deal to be done on youth mobility. The government is making it much harder for itself than it needs to, partly because of the attitude of the home office, partly because of the language. I don't understand why a government that must realise there has to be a concession here.
keeps equating it with freedom of movement. Because when they come to agree a deal, then if I were Kevin Badnock, I'd go, you yourself said this was freedom of movement. I think the whole youth mobility thing's weird. How it's become a test of good faith is weird. There's an FT story today saying, security deal might be held up whilst we haggle over fish and youth mobility. And I thought, God, this is the wrong way round in the world we live in now. But it's happened. So there will be a concession, I suspect. It might be calling it.
Work experience or something that doesn't say mobility on the economics. I don't think much will change partly because I don't think the EU wants much change in here. I think I was very struck. We were over in Berlin about three months ago. I'm talking to someone in the foreign office who said there's a parting shot after our conversation. Bear in mind, we don't want you to make Brexit work.
Now, that's not punishment, that's sort of rail polity, which is you have, across Europe, populist parties saying, not we should leave, but the EU shouldn't bosses around so much, you should be looser, the commission shouldn't have so much authority. And if you have offshore a Britain that is flourishing economically,
it will be grist to their mill. You see, we could do this differently. It doesn't have to be quite so dogmatic from Brussels. And I think they're all aware of that. And so they're not going to do as any favours when it comes to the economic relationship. They will do things that are in their interests, but won't simply say, oh, that Kia Star was a nice guy. So let's give them a bit of something that will get him growth. But there are some things that are in their interests as well as ours. Things like electricity, energy, doesn't get much attention. And we like to be able to do a deal on that.
Yes, I would have thought so, except, and it's no coincidence. I think it was a French, actually, who insisted on this. The deadline for renegotiating the energy corporation deal is the same as the deadline for renegotiating the fisheries deal.
And the closer you get to a French presidential election, the more politically sensitive the issue of fisheries becomes. The more fish we nick. Yeah, the more fish you need. So yes, I think it should be possible. You'd like to think our politicians could manage that, but there is that little rub about the coincidence with the fisheries.
And now Trump is back in the White House. It feels like a closer relationship with EU is a no brainer for many people. And especially when it comes to defence, but is it? Is it going to be that simple? God, no. I think if you're the British political or military or intelligence establishment, you will do anything to maintain that special relationship with the United States. And I think, you know, if we enter a world where Trump confronts us with trade-offs,
We'll keep working closely with you, but when it comes to your dealings with the European Union, then I think it's not a no-brainer what we'll do. I mean, Kistama famously said at Manchin House, I don't have to make choices between Europe and the United States, but you can easily see a world in which Trump forces us to make choices. If we get a sweetheart deal on tariffs and the EU doesn't,
It's not exactly going to endure us to Brussels and make them keen to negotiate close to economic ties with us. We will see, I think back to the 60s and the goal, when he called us America's Trojan horse in Europe. And I think there's a real danger now that that kind of thing might reappear.
Hannah, the EU is changing. As we all know, there are more right-wing populists trying to shape it to their interests. And the next French president might be from the populist right, Italy is already close to Trump. Will there come a time when, for legacy remainers, the EU doesn't even feel like a warm and friendly place to be anymore?
I think how it feels is a little bit less important than what it actually represents and is, because what's the alternative? The alternative is actual Trump, not just Trump lights. For those who are very motivated by EU membership,
The diversity of the block is part of the point the fact that it's a group of nations coming together with differences finding their similarities finding ways to be more successful together the fact that the group moderate itself.
that the checks and balances within Europe are part of the point. They're part of the bulwark against populism. I mean, that was its founding purpose, after all. And these are all the benefits. So I don't think attitudes are going to change, even if certain individuals start to feel a bit uncomfortable. I mean, Orban, obviously, as we've mentioned, is one of those. But overall, the EU is more than those individuals. So now I don't think that there will be a kind of a changing of mind.
We're in a situation now where a small majority of Britons do want to rejoin the EU, and most Labour, Green and Lib Dems, MEPs would be very happy to do that, but it remains absolutely out of the question. Is that healthy? Is it necessary?
I think it's inevitable. Those are smaller parties. They don't represent the majority. Those still committed to rejoining, you know, I personally think I'll write to stick with that, but I just don't think it's a reality at the moment. And I think holding on to that
hope is a bit naive, frankly. I think it could happen eventually. I think in my lifetime, we probably will rejoin, but in the short term, that's not going to happen. It reminds me a little bit of, do you remember, if anyone remembers in the 90s, Eddie Azar did a sketch where they talked about
how we were kind of not even in the European car. We were scraping the windows, washing windows. Now we're not even washing the windows. We're standing on the pavement, looking at the car, waving as it goes past. We need to get back to washing the windows before we start thinking about sitting in the driver's seat again. I mean, it was so far away from that.
I mean, I just kind of said a couple of things on that. Firstly, there's the issue of salience. I mean, one of the things about that debate is yes, the polls have moved, but it's like 6% of people think the relations with the UK is the most important issue facing us now. And I think a lot of those people who said, if we had a referendum, I'd vote to rejoin. If you asked the second question, which is, would you like to go through all that again? They'd hide under the duvet. And so actually, no, thank you. So that's the first one. But the second thing is,
And I don't know whether this will turn out to be significant or not, but it feels like it might, is that the Liberal Democrats have taken a decision after the US election to be far more forceful in their language about Europe. So, you know, Davies come out now and said we've got to rejoin the campaign. You know, you're remembering the election campaign. The Lib Dems had a secret policy on Europe that they didn't want to talk about because they were trying to drive leave voters. They've ditched that now. They're coming out strongly as pro-European to put pressure on Labour. Now,
It might not matter, there are precious few libdem labor marginals, but it does strike me that having what is now the third biggest party in parliament being loudly pro-EU could have consequences down the line and might
Might persuade labor thinkers, and I think this is the crucial thing. Labor at the moment are obsessed with reform. In fact, I think labor planners think reform is more of a threat than it really is, to be honest. And they're not paying sufficient attention to their left flank, where you've got the Greensy independence. And depending on which day of the week it is, the Lib Dems, because the Lib Dems spend the other half of the week on labor's right. But if they're made to think about something else, apart from reform, that might change things, but it'll be a very slow process, I think.
at that point that that's what makes the Lib Dems so dangerous to them. They've taken a whole bunch of like Oxfordshire and so on and sat on that and they're not getting that back anytime soon with the nature of the current Tory party. So if they do start to be more successful on the left as well, I think that's really interesting. Yeah.
But if you're in the late party, so you can't take on the mantle of the Lib Dems or the Greens, and you are pro-Europe, say you're stellar creasy, for example. What is the best way to make your case now? With rejoining, you know, I think we know nobody in this studio thinks that's going to happen in the next five years and probably not in the next 10. So what should you be doing now if you wanted to happen eventually?
I think there's probably a lesson that Romania can learn from Brexit is, but it's in the proper old school, you know, kind of like Brexit is. Because what they did was just bang on about it day and day out for a very, very long time. But I think the writers better at that, because you could argue that the free market is exactly the same thing, and that's how they took over the Conservative party eventually under Thatcher.
But no, I think the idea is probably being like, you know what, we will be sending press releases, we'll be responding to stuff, we'll be making that case whenever we can, however often we can, but also with no real expectation that anything will meaningfully change anytime soon. Because I think again, that's how they got there eventually, because that's how you win people over very slowly, you get people on side, you know, very slowly. And also it means anything that's quite an important thing, which the left
I feel like should know, definitely used to know, but you create networks that way as well, I think. And, you know, so being the same way that, you know, when the Brexit campaign, the Brexit referendum started, I feel like so many groups popped up seeming out of nowhere and you end up having these mental spider charts of like who the various campaigns were, who the campaign is. And that's because these, you know, these were people who spent decades working on that. And I think having this human networks is really important.
But ultimately, they need to persuade the Labour Party than it's in its interests politically to change its position. It took Nigel Farage to get the Conservative Party to think it was in its interest to be not just Euroskeptic, but pro Brexit, because of the electoral threat to the Conservative Party. You need to find a way of persuading the Liege below a party that actually, in their political and electoral interests, they have to shift their position on Europe.
So one lesson of Brexit, I guess you were saying, Marie, is that pro-Europeans need to just keep banging on about the virtues of rejoining the EU. What are all the other lessons of Brexit that we should bear in mind as we deal with everything that's probably going to come at us over the next few years?
I had so many thoughts on that. I think you have to. I remember really clearly in the, like a few weeks after the referendum talking to a Labour MP, he would obviously come to remain, etc. And he was like, you know, and it was quite interesting how clear right he was already because he was like, oh, that's kind of on us. I feel like we didn't really, you know, we never really talked about Europe, but of course we were kind of assumed.
That, you know, everyone knew that we thought that the EU was good, but we never bothered making that point in a meaningful way at any point. And, you know, and then shock horror surprise outside didn't win, because, you know, when we saw that sprung up into action, fucking like six months before referendum. So I think making the case for things you believe are good or necessary I think is really important, and it's not something the left I think has learnt at all, or the centre. I think immigration being the big one.
You know, you can't keep complaining that the oven window keeps shifting when you're never making the positive case at all ever. And it's like, well, yeah, of course, if the other lot are making the negative case constantly, of course, they're managing to shift the debate. So I think just make the, if there's something you think is, again, good for the country or necessary for the country, or even just a necessary evil, make that case because, you know, the other lot will. And also,
never assume something's inevitable, because the assumption was that the obvious answer was yes, of course, we want to stay in, because the evidence demonstrates it's the right thing to do, but that is not enough. It's never enough in politics. I mean, to go back to Maurice's point, which is so utterly true, that the progressives struggle with this. I mean, for a lot of time, progressives hide behind the law and say, well, we have certain defined rights, and obviously they're not for debate because they're enshrined.
When the argument, otherwise people are going to start pushing back, one of the frightening things about how EU policy is being pursued now is because we have no European scrutiny committee in the House of Commons, and because Labour have passed a piece of legislation allowing them to align with the EU using statutory instruments. And that's right.
But what that basically means is there will be no debate. And if you want to ultimately move us closer to the European Union, you can't do it by stealth. One of the problems with our membership of the European Union was the benefits of membership were never sold. I remember Tony Blair on two or three occasions saying, we're going to have a European roadshow to sell the benefits of EU membership to
The British public never quite got round to it, but you have to win the argument. You have to have the argument and you have to win it. Doing things surreptitiously is not the way to get long-term success.
Before we go, we're switching up slightly on the usual Wednesday show, and instead of under the radar, we're bringing in escape routes. So what's been taking our panels' minds off the Brexit anniversary and the general doom and gloom of politics this week?
Marie? Very Eastern European themed for me this week. So the brutalist I went to see it is very good. It's definitely not a flawless movie, but I think it is a proper cinematic experience and it was actually so nice to sit in a cinema for nearly four hours and watch a thing that's quite epic in scale and really beautiful and stuff. So I think I'd really recommend, yeah, if you want to not look at your phone for four hours, the brutalist, that's great.
And then in terms of books, I finished, well, I'm cheating about 10 days ago, but I finished Imperium by Richard Kappuccinski, who's a Polish writer, because he traveled across the USSR repeatedly over the decades. And the book is kind of foreign reporting, but it's, it's hard. I think it's, he called it literally foreign reporting. It's a slightly whimsical, but it, but a mix of whimsical and obviously just harrowing because it was, you know, the USSR. But absolutely remarkable book. I feel like the best thing I've read on the Soviet Union by far,
And I've read that and it's absolutely brilliant. It's so good. It's so bad. I've read it all about it. I've read it about 15 years ago. It's absolutely brilliant. I said, weirdie. Yeah. I talk about it. That's so good. It's so good. It's very good. No, I must try it. Anand, how about you?
Well, I mean, the two things I used to escape from work, I suppose, are football, but I won't bore you about that. But actually, I have been having an absolute strop of that Manchester United getting public money today. And grandchildren. But in terms of books, there's a book called The Wager, which is the sort of book I never ever read because it's actually a history book about a British Navy ship in the 18th century.
And it is the most stonking story. In fact, it turns out that Marty Scorsese bought the rights to this book, and there's going to be a film about it. But it is just a jaw-dropping story of mutiny, disease, pestilence, war. It's unbelievable. And I really strongly recommend it.
Fantastic. Hannah, you've got a novel as well. Yeah, so I'm reading Headshot by Readable Winkle. It was a novel that was shortlisted for the book prize. It's basically about young American women competing in a girl's boxing tournament. They're kind of in their late teens. And the book is really interesting in it the way it's divided up. It's split into the four matches that the eight characters fight.
But it's just a narrative feast really. It's fantastic. It's both set in the present and the past and the future. You learn about these women's entire lives through the medium of just this one fight and it's very sparse and I highly recommend it.
Well, since it's Brexit week, I've got something French on Netflix to recommend, which is a drama that's called Standing Up. I don't know what it's called in French, Marie might know. No idea. It's a drama about some stand-up comedians living in Paris and the ups and downs of their lives. And it's great fun. It's nice. I recommend that. And that's the show. Thanks to Hannah. Thank you. Marie. Thank you. And I'll guess this week, Anna and Menel. Thanks ever so much.
Hang around for the extra bit after Demon is a Monster by Corner Shop and a grateful salute to the supporters whose generosity keeps the podcast going. You can join them for as little as three pounds a month and get the podcast early and without ads plus lots more. Search Oh God what now, Patreon. We'll see you next time.
Happy Brexit Day and many thanks for your contributions in devalued pound sterling to Julian Hill, Hannah Jones and David Baker. A massive virtual high five from me to Stephen Hall, John Kitchen and David Griffin. And for me, welcome aboard to brand new supporter Mike Gibbs and welcome back to returning prodigal Patreons, Steve Edwards and Paul Helis.
Oh God, What Now was written and presented by Rose Taylor with Marie Lecont, Hannah Fern and guest Ann Ann Millen. It was produced by Chris Jones with audio production by Robin Leeburn and art by Jim Parrot. The managing editors Jacob Jarvis, group editor Andrew Harrison and Oh God, What Now is a pop master's production.
Hello, and welcome to the Extra Bit, exclusive to Patreon backers. For a long time, it seemed as though artificial intelligence was a threat or a promise, but not something that affected our lives much. But with chat GPT, that's changed. People are using it to save time in their jobs, kids use it to help with their work, and every time you apply for a job, there's a warning in case you thought AI could write a better application than you.
Spoiler, it probably can, but that doesn't make it right. Now, a Chinese AI app has come along that was much cheaper to develop than chat GPT, and it spooked the tech markets. But have the panel started using AI yet? Is it a boon? And if it is, are we all together happy about that? And you know more about Brexit than possibly anyone else alive. Do you ever consult chat GPT about it?
No. I'm quite proud of myself for figuring out what AI stands for. But the interesting AI story I have is when this story broke about the Chinese AI.
I was absolutely horrified by the fact that a bit of me thought, good, those Americans need taking down a peg or two, and it's a nice example of what Trump has done to my view of the world. That was a teaser for the bonus bit of this week's podcast. If you'd like to hear the whole thing every week, plus get every episode without ads on a day early, then sign up to back us on Patreon for as little as £3 a month.
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Hello, it's Andrew Harrison here. We live in a complex world and sometimes it feels like the problem surrounding us are insurmountable. But they aren't, as you will find out, in how to fix a brand new podcast that we've made with the University of Leeds to celebrate incredible innovations that can solve society's biggest challenges.
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Why aren't men on the pill? Why are we drawn to people who are evil? Why do so many seemingly stable people join cults? Why do some people cry much more often than others? Find out with me, Emma Kennedy, on why the new science and psychology podcast from the team behind Oh God What Now and The Bunker. It's out now in your favorite podcast app. Why not have a listen after this?
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Okay, I want to tell you about a podcast. It's a great, great podcast. Everybody's saying it, they're saying it's the best one you're going to listen to this year. It's called American Friction. Out every Friday, it tells you everything you need to know about the golden age of the United States of American terms, even kiss, starboard can understand. He's a very simple man, very simple man.
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