Brexit Has Made me Angry - My Family History Might Explain it - We are Certainly Not Elites Either !

Brexit has really made me angry.

"Brexit - not in my name" !!

My Family History (as I see it !) might go some way to explain it.

And the misinformation from the Leave campaign might also ! The 350m figure was never factually correct and the money was never going to the NHS you can forget that ! These people believe in Private Healthcare so they are destroying our NHS as fast as they can so we cry out for private !!
And .. now it seems we never lost our sovereignty - the "CALL" of another 1/3 of the Brexiteers - "We want our Sovereignty Back " even though they cant spell it and neither can I probably ! (This excerpt from the Brexit White Paper this week)

Now to get on to my family history.
Firstly many of the Brexit main players appear to not be entirely British themselves - now this is interesting - many have backgrounds from elsewhere yet they appear to have become more British than the British themselves !!
No doubt some British people are purely from way back "stock" - some may well have farmed in an area and never interbred - maybe they are indeed pure Pict or pure Scot or pure Anglo Saxon or Breton. But I think you'd be hard pushed to be such pure stock nowadays !
Most must have mixed with incoming Romans, incoming Norsemen and women (if Vikings TV prog to be believed!) and it carried on from there with the Norman invasion which led to many terms in English being French terms as they seemed to become the ruling class. My history is very poor - this is how I see it !
My own family history includes Hugeonots from France who fled persecution there and settled in Lanarkshire as Lace Makers - so we do have refugees in our history. There are also a few Irish who presumably fled the potato famine or its aftermath - and settled in Glagow. I am proud to say there are a few inter-marriages in my family history - catholic/protestant - which in those days were really not a "done thing".
And we have a few branches who emigrated to Canada over the years so we are indeed world citizens in our small ordinary Scottish family !

But in fact we have quite a few heroes - or reluctant heroes in our family. Again I hate to say it but some of the politicians now spouting about WW2 or WW1 surprisingly either didn't live in the country then or seemed to avoid fighting ! Funny that.
What I do know is that the people who did fight etc then they never ever spoke about it. So in fact we never heard anything about it. We have pieced the stories together from old documents in family boxes or from stories from Uncle's who wrote some of it down. So here is a list of what my family and husband's family got up to in the war ... and I guess how the war sort of ruined what our family might have become ...

My grandfather fought in WW1 - including I know of Gallipoli - Mons - he rode a horse through the deserted and ruined streets of Amiens in Northern France etc - no doubt he fought in many of the battles - he had a gun carriage - and became a Captain having signed up along with all his brothers some of whom were under-age. I think they all survived so we have that to be thankful for. But he got the Military Cross and I know he did realise the horrors - you just have to read this - but I also know he went about designing an improved tank and submitted that to the military. He had a business selling car accessories which passed down our family tree to my cousin. But he never spoke about it - and my uncle who had a VW campervan had to park it round the corner as you can imagine so he wouldn't see it !

Anyway moving on, a Great Uncle got a Military Cross twice and also the Croix de Guerre from Buzancy, where the Scots had fought alongside the French and the French erected a memorial to them.

Before the war this Great Uncle had joined the army - which was unusual as the family had Irish history - but for whatever reasons he joined the British Army and became a great horseman - he joined the Hussars and the story goes he jumped a horse over the officer's table without knocking over a wine glass ! I think it was maybe a thing they do as I have a photo of the Hussars doing this. He was due to jump at the White City when war broke out. But here he is forming part of the Escort for the Kaiser of Germany who was on a visit to I think Kent as he was Commander in Chief or something of the Hussars. His horse is marked with a star - its in the middle in first two rows but we cant quite work out for sure which one it is !

This is my Great Uncle Jack Kelly ...

Moving on ... another Great Uncle reluctantly fought - not sure which war - but he was a pacifist but fought so his mother would not be ashamed.

Other grandfather failed the health check but took children away to the Highlands.

A Great Aunt was stationed in the Highlands to check soldier's mail - even checking the mail from a soldier she had met on the train who had written to his mother to say he had met a nice girl on the train - how sad is that to think of ... I got the feeling she had not met him again ... but lets hope she did. Poor guy.  But she also had in her circle of friends a woman who was arrested as a Germany spy - she had been entertaining the offices and trying to get stories out of them ! Apparently a very flamboyant woman .. I think blonde ...

Those are the exciting stories - another great uncle was an ambulance driver during the Clydebank Blitz and my Uncle who had inherited the Car Accessories shop took leather gloves to help rescuers at the Blitz.

An Aunt worked at Bletchley Park having passed the crossword test you see in the Alan Turing film ! But they were told to never speak about it. It was the "goose which laid the golden egg but never cackled". Her family really only fully discovered the story after she had died. They had to say nothing for 50 years.

And my grandfather was a Prisoner of War camp commander (well we were told commander ..) inWW2, presumably as he was too old to fight by then but was trusted having made Captain in WW1 and receiving military cross. We recently realised he had been at the Trent Park secret Listening Camp where the senior Nazis were held. Maybe he was the mysterious Lord Abernethy who has never been identified ! ... but my mother assures me he would never have passed as a Lord !!

He also ran the camps on Isle of Man.

This is my Grandfather !

(A boat made by one of the prisoners - "Grandad's boat")

Another Uncle had suffered mustard gas poisoning in WW2. My husband's Uncle had come through the war after flying goodness knows how many flights as a gunner in Lancaster Bombers.

But again if I can point out - none of this was EVER spoken about. It should have been.

So ... when various minor MPs and Boris Johnston and such like use Nazi or WW2 symbolism then they have no right. This week we had an allusion to Dunkirk - as though Brexit was "our Dunkirk moment". How ignorant is that... OMG ... I just searched for Dunkirk - there is a 2017 film coming out about it - oh dear - it was a heroic and awful time - but the film will just stir up all those Brexiteer passions again!

Here is the History of Dunkirk - heartbreaking - but for European Unity please read the sections "Retreat to Dunkirk" and "Evacuations" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Dunkirk.

So ... on from that ... in fact this post was originally to be a listing of how many Europeans I know who are now integrated in my life - and how many UK people I know who live abroad.

I must not forget also my Aunt who worked as a doctor in Kenya for a good few years - in Nairobi.

In my family my father worked at a famous engineering company who built gas turbines into power stations all over the world. But in the end Thatcher's Government was the end. The pound was too high due to oil money so British exports were expensive. Norway took the best option at this time and save their oil money so it didn't influence their currency ... (my summation of economics !) ... But our exports were expensive to the rest of the world by then ... it was not the fault of the British companies it was the fault of the level of the pound over valuing ... and other countries gave financial support to the competitors - it was maybe breaking the rules in some way but they managed it. So the Scottish company failed to get a deal in Kenya as the Kenyans could get the power station for free from the US.  But I remember my father visiting Colombia, Argentina, Norway, US, India. He no doubt visited elsewhere too but his main job was engineering design back in the UK. 

So from that ordinary background one brother became an Engineer and studied as part of his degree via Erasmus in France then worked in France for a number of years, becoming fluent in French. Another brother being a true citizen of the world and a computer expert who used the internet in its very very early days, made a good friend with a guy from America and also his wider friends too. They have become family friends. But when he first came to visit it was with trepidation that we waited as I don't think you even got to see photographs of people in early internet days ! 

Anyway so here is a listing of people I know - in my not terribly large circle of friends this is how global people are.

School friends 

C ...still in UK !

J ... lives in the US

K ... back in UK but lived in Bahamas for a long time

F ... still here but has visited US, Pakistan

D ... lives in Peru

University

A ... lives in Sweden with her family - all UK citizens but have now taken out Swedish passports this year after Brexit !

H ... lives in Geneva

C .... still in UK

A ... lives in UK but lived in US for a long time
L ... lives in UK
S ... lives in UK but lived in New Zealand a while with her partner
A ... lives in UK but travelled world for a bit
S ... lives in UK but also in New Zealand and Hong Kong
J ... lives in Australia
Work life Dundee
L ... Grew up in East Germany but must have come to UK minute the wall came down and is I think still here !
M .. same as above
L ... from Greece but probably back in Greece
there was guys from Spain, Iraq, Libya, Iran also in that department - some stayed and some went back but these were people who were either working full time in NHS or studying...
Granted there was also a terrorist who was found to have come from Dundee at the time but there was also a home grown one too from there ... but people are all so different - you cant judge one person by how another is. The rest were trying to cure diseases or learn how to improve scanning techniques !
S ... a friend from Argentina who I hope is now in America - I haven't heard from her now for a few years. But she introduced us all to films of what a beautiful country Argentina is.
And I guess for balance there were probably 50 other ordinary Dundonians or UK people in the department but it was always a colourful mix of different nationalities from what I remember. And I remember the lovely Tapas meal the guy from Spain or Tenerife made for us all when he left !
Recent family life
One family have a husband who had to take a job in Sweden for a couple of years - in IT - he is back here now - the family probably didn't see much of him in those years- the occassional weekend - not easy.
Two other families I  know have had long parts of their careers as engineers in Germany or Holland
I have a friend who is from Belgium and lives here - fluent in 5 languages yet could not get a job easily at all and is working in a shop and loving it !
Another friend lived here for a while - they were a French family and I am still in touch with them.
I have a friend now who is married to someone French and they live here. I hope they are able to stay - they have been here a while.
It goes on and on ...
A relative lives in Germany with his Spanish wife !
A friend also had a grandfather who fled Germany in war - this has led to four out of five of their family managing to obtain German passports this year and by this means - EU citizenship too..
There was a Netherlands family at our Toddler group ..they are in Wales now I think.
My neighbour's grand-daugher is working and living in Paris - not sure as what but she has just picked up jobs while travelling and is now settled in Paris. Nice !
A friend's son is working as an engineer in the south of France - at an Aerospace place I think - but he is a UK citizen - so what happens there !
Many friends have houses in France and I speak French with groups of people like this - through French classes and meetup groups.
One of these friend's daughters now works in Marseille.
Another friend's sister is married to a French guy and they live in south of France near Perpignan.
An acquaintance I know is about to marry a Spanish guy - sounds fabulous.
A friend's son is working as a ski instructor in France.

I could go on ... and on ...
We are European ... and we are Global too .... and young people are even more Global ...

Where I live we are just so used to people being a mix of nationalities from EU - its great. And it benefits us as we have access to jobs across the EU.

I will never ever agree with Brexit - and I will never ever agree with the way some of our politicians are dealing with it and talking about it.
Signed Jennifer Wilson

A Brexit for All or NONE At all !

This article is interesting re: WTO rules (see below). We must not go down the line of a sectoral deal for any sector. I have a suspicion that the London based government, of the party who first mooted the election, are tempted to try for a sectoral deal for Financial services. However, if they do this, then to me it is the most major insult and snub and ruination for manufacturing in the United Kingdom. It would be massively unfair. And it would really finally separate London from the rest of us !  Now we say London, but lets remember also that many of those who work week in week out n London are workers from the rest of the UK. Every week people leave Glasgow, Liverpool and other cities and head down to London to work for the week. Lets not forget this when London gets so uppity.

Changing Light over the London Skyline from New Zealand House

                                    (Photograph © Copyright Christine Matthews and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.)

And as well as manufacturing there are other sectors that should be considered - services, fishing, farming etc. As well as consideration to UK workers abroad. So we must either have:

A Brexit For All or NONE At All !

However lets also remember that Financial Services and Banking caused the Financial Crisis of 2008. These money speculators are happy to gamble with other people's money. For them its not even a gamble as there is no personal risk attached. If they win they take the money. If they lose, someone else pays ! They gamble with our money. They invest with our money - but they make sure that the first returns are paid to them and any that is left night come to us if we are lucky !

Lets remember though that its manufacturing and exports that are the key to sorting out the negative balance of trade in the UK. We need to sort this and its the only way of increasing the wealth of our country. The balance of trade has been negative for far too long. It needs to be reversed.

And personally I do not think Brexit is the way to do that. But if we are doing Brexit then let's really aim to stand on our own two feet. Lets ban takeovers by foreign buyers while the pound is low. And let's get started on building up the UK ! "Make Britain Great Again" (to paraphrase Trump !! (I wonder why Theresa May has not used that one ! Apart from the fact we are the UK as opposed to Britain !)

Anyway have a read about trading and WTO Rules here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38658025

Very Good From the New York Times

And I thought that American's didn't do Irony .... !

Very good ! Sums up this nonsense of Brexit entirely. Certainly this reflects many of the people I know who work globally now or at least across Europe. This is the way many people work now.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/opinion/theresa-mays-global-britain-is-baloney.html

The Will of the People ? Not ! This is not Democracy as it should be !

If I hear the term "The Will of the People" again I will seriously scream !

The Will of the People.... A Heroic term but a term that to me reflects something rather like a character from Charlie and the Chocolate factory ... "I Will have that Chocolate ... NOW !!!" ... Give me !  We Will Rise Up ! (from more heroic battles)  ... I Will I Will I Will (stamps feet)

Well The Will of this person is that I Wish that people had properly educated themselves before this Referendum Vote. I wish we had kept in touch more with the goings on of the European Parliament. I wish our MEPs had been more pro-active and kept us informed. For example one of our local MEPs is I think the longest standing one in Parliament.  I was in the audience at a radio show on which he was a panellist and he did seem very good. But I have not seen a single article from him in public or in the local paper etc since. Nothing. Why was he not more pro-active in trying to get the public more informed about the benefits of Europe ?

Now there are many benefits. I personally did in fact work for a brief while for the European Union. I gave talks and demonstrated how to use a particular database which daily has Tenders available - Tenders Electronic Daily - TED.  I gave talks to Small and Medium Enterprises to show them how to search the database and find relevant Tenders to bid for. Again these are the hidden opportunities in the EU - contracts that were won that the general public probably never heard about, but it is just another of the positive benefits.

So... the Will of the People or at least of the 37% who voted ... or the 25% of people - not sure if that even includes EU citizens in the UK who didn't have the vote or many UK people who live and work abroad who didn't get the vote ... anyway the Will of the People .... apparently is to leave the EU.

Now many of these people were attracted by tabloid headlines. Tabloids that are all owned by rich billionaires who do not live in the UK. They tuned in to anti immigrant sentimentality. They tuned into desperate people who have experienced the overstretched NHS and who appreciate our NHS and believed the carefully worded "Brexit Bus", that the money would go to the NHS. Now firstly the maths was wrong - it was never 350m (see my Page about this ....) it was much less. Now secondly this money does bring us many untold benefits which we will now lose - for example access to a single market, cross EUropean science research etc .... but ... assuming we do come out and the figures of 130million is saved a week. No way is it all going to go to the NHS - and you will see that the bus does not exactly say that - people just believed what those "clever manipulators" wanted them to believe - jargon - slogans.... and they fell into the slick trap set by those clever millionaires, most of whom have dual nationality .... funny that !

And getting on to Democracy ... thats another of their refrains - "ITS THE DEMOCRATIC WILL OF THE PEOPLE" ... this is the more than monosyllabic "educated" version of the refrain ... this will definitely win the argument - who could argue with democracy ?
it literally does mean People Power ! Power to the People !
But ... and here's the but ... in Greece, although people did finally get a vote - or at least some did ! they elected a representative to the forum... they elected a person like our parliamentarian. And the leadership of this group changed too so it was not too much time for one person in power. ie the European Parliament has this model.
But ... the UK is not really following democracy as :

• Firstly Our Government is not elected by PR - so is unrepresentative - we have a government that was elected by only 36.9% of the electorate. Yet got over 50% of the seats - see  -http://greatideasworld.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/libdems-middle-needs-voice-or-we-will.html
• Secondly even those voting Conservative voted for a party that was led by David Cameron - but he resigned after the EU vote and now we have Theresa May - who appears to be only slightly less extreme than Angela Leadsom might have been ! But certainly was not the leader at the General Election.
• Thirdly we are now following by the word the result of a Referendum - an advisory referendum. And a referendum with too narrow a winning margin and with no required minimum turnout.
• But in my opinion this referendum was based on lies and untruths and also characterised by people not looking properly into issues.
• Fourthly and disappointingly it also seemed to become about immigration and I have yet to hear the government condemn any personal attacks strongly etc. We are currently still in the EU and EU citizens are fully legitimately able to live here. And should not be harassed. As an aside I will say that some other European countries appear to insist you should be able to support yourself in order to live there - I do wonder why the UK didn't do this ...Theresa May's old department?!? 

Which also then brings me on to the final rallying call ...

WE ARE EU CITIZENS - WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO LIVE AND WORK ACROSS THE EU - THEY SURELY DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE AWAY OUR RIGHTS. MANY ARE CURRENTLY WORKING IN EUROPE WITH THESE RIGHTS AND OUR YOUNG FOLK NOW ASSUME THAT WORKING IN EUROPE IS A NATURAL PART OF THEIR CAREERS AND MAY EVEN BE WHERE THEY WILL SETTLE DOWN.

THAT IS THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE - ITS POSSIBLY THE WILL OF 63% OF VOTERS - THOSE WHO DID NOT VOTE FOR BREXIT !

How some of "Thatchers Children" - Expats and UK Workers Abroad have been excluded from the Debate on the EU !

I am just an ordinary person but among the people I know there are a few groups who should probably have had votes in the EU Referendum.  And I could almost frame them as "Thatcher's Children" !  My generation left school in the 80s. There were no jobs where I lived - well jobs were hard to come by. Industries were closing. My father worked in an esteemed company designing gas turbines which were installed in power stations worldwide. I can remember him visiting Delhi (as it was called then), Argentina, Colombia, the US, Norway, he nearly had to go to Iraq, Europe and no doubt other places I forget.  Those are the ones I remember. But that company was hit by the level of the pound in the 80s and the intransigence of Heseltine to consider investment in a new technology they had invented to use coal more efficiently. They also use the environmentally friendly Combined Heat and Power technology where a town can re-use heat produced in one part eg if freezing an ice rink then heat is produced and you can use that to heat houses. That sort of idea !  Anyway to explain, this esteemed company that was trading worldwide in high tech turbines largely did not survive the 80s. There was a lot of people who lost their jobs. And my generation were just leaving school at that time.

Now this is the reason that most people I left school with moved to England or moved abroad. Certainly most graduates did so. People I was at University with left to work in Europe or elsewhere. But many still have their ultimate home and certainly their citizenship is in the UK ! My friend's brother has worked worldwide as a civil engineer. All with have worked over 15 years away from the UK and did not get a vote in the EU Referendum. Even though the EU will definitely have had an impact either positively or negatively on their own and their family's lifes. As it is the only citizenship many of them had, they should have had a vote. In fact two of them who I know about have decided to apply for Swedish and Germany nationality, so I suspect realistically we have now lost them finally to the UK. But those ones were fairly settled in their countries. The other ones I know are more mobile and work in different countries.

Other people I know literally live in the UK and work abroad staying in hotels or rented apartments. If there were enough jobs in their sector here then they would have taken them. But there weren't.
These are the people who have been largely overlooked in the debate. In that I have two close friends who are working/commuting in this way and two others who did this fairly recently then I would imagine the numbers involved must be higher than the official estimates.

And then there are the UK expats who have retired to live in the sun ! (this does not tend to be my generation as we are not quite at the retirement stage yet - unless you are lucky such as Fred the Shred !! - but I don't really consider that he has retired on his own money ... )
Most of the retired expats we hear about are based in Spain but many are in France, Germany or other countries. Now a very common story we have heard from this group is their ballot papers arrived suspiciously late. I have spoken personally to some and they relate other stories indirectly. One I spoke to had received his paper late and the postmark was for the day of the referendum, so there is no way it could have arrived on time !  Now this was a group who I think would probably have voted Remain ... well possibly not. But someone somewhere might well have thought that ... or was it just incompetence ? But electoral returns officers in those regions should be held to account for this mismanagement - it is disgraceful.

So taking into account these groups - the people over 15 years away and the expats with late ballots - I wonder how many extra votes for Remain there might have been ?

The Country Models Document

Just found this - this was a requirement of the EU Referendum Act - to present the various country model options - eg the Norway Model, the Switzerland model and the Canada Model.
Not great reading - none of the options sound too good for eg financial services or exports: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/504604/Alternatives_to_membership_-_possible_models_for_the_UK_outside_the_EU.pdf

What Theresa May Should have Said

I was driving home this evening and mulled over what Theresa May could have said instead of the infamous "Brexit means Brexit" ....
here is what I came up with .... (now remember I am a Remain supporter - but if she had wanted to try and get me on side here is what might have helped !)
my first draft !

"I would like to thank the citizens of the United Kingdom for their considered votes and for the result of this Referendum. A majority of voters have indicated they wish to Leave the European Union. These people have considered a variety of reasons and we hope that with time we will be able to lead the United Kingdom in a direction that is a good way forward. However we must also thank those who voted in large numbers to Remain in the European Union. These people also made a considered and difficult decision. It has not been an easy decision. Many were happy with the status quo and we must ensure that the future establishment of the United Kingdom will help them to also to have a good future.
We would like to thank the citizens of the European Union and their elected representatives. The UK has benefited greatly from being part of a stable, united Europe. We have moved forward together into the 21st Century. However, now we have taken the decision to Leave the EU. We are not leaving the Continent of Europe. We are still proud to call you our neighbours and friends. We hope to continue to work with you, learn with you and trade with you. But we have taken the decision that the United Kingdom would now like to take control of the decision making and law making processes. We hope that this can be carried out smoothly and over a period of time, as we wish no disruption to the European system and we wish to make no sudden changes. We will make a considered exit to suit us all."

(If she really does not feel she can offer all our current EU citizens who live in UK a permanent home then maybe she could have said at this point: "We currently have a great number of valued EU citizens living in Britain. We hope that everyone can stay, but if this proves to be impossible, please be assured that there will be no sudden changes. We will keep you informed of how this situation progresses. It is certainly our hope that no-one should have to leave who is already here from an EU country and who wishes to remain as a contributer to our society.")

But I would prefer she said here :
"We currently have a great number of valued EU citizens living in Britain. We ask that everyone stays and continues to contribute to our society.  We will keep you informed of how the situation progresses and if and when Brexit has been concluded we would hope to offer UK citizenship to those who request it. It is certainly our hope that no-one should have to leave who is already here from an EU country and who wishes to remain as a contributer to our society. We would also hope that in return that EU countries will protect and welcome those UK citizens who are living and working in Europe. We do not wish to play with people's lifes - citizens will not be part of our negotiations.

In the mantime, after a period of reflection my ministers will present a portfolio to the European ministers to review and we will then aim to begin talks at a time suitable for all involved. I thank you for listening......etc "

Why was her speech not more like this ? Was it that "winning mentality" which has probably got her far through life. But did she ever notice the losers en route ? Or maybe its that grammar school education where you are told "you are a winner" ... you don't need to worry about the losers ! But when 48% of those who voted are Losers and many of those are intelligent people with a lot to lose then it might have been a good idea to try to get them on board for this "new project".