If you measured the amount of ink spilled and the amount of paper dispensed on Brexit, it would be enough to create a lake of the former and a mountain of the latter.
Given we are now at the five-year anniversary of the UK’s departure from the EU, this seems as good a moment as any to add to that topography.
When something has gone badly or a choice has not worked out, it is hard to find anybody who will readily divulge they chose the failed path. Admitting error is one of the things that humans are hardwired to avoid.
However, in an attempt to upend that, I want to start with two admissions; firstly, I voted for Brexit. If that hasn’t stopped you in your tracks and given you heartburn, here’s the second; I have changed my mind.
Rewind to 2016 when then UK prime minister David Cameron called the referendum.
Not a typical 'Brexiteer'
At that point I was genuinely undecided. I was far from your supposedly ‘typical’ Brexit voter; I am a degree-educated professional, my parents lived in France and I had been to university in Ireland.
Legal consultant Richard Gibbs feels that Brexit has failedRichard Gibbs
I was not some swivel-eyed Little Englander aiming to turn the Channel into a fortified moat. I speak French, I have read Camus, Sartre and Tolstoy, I am culturally European.
To me, Europe as a place has always been different from the EU as a political construct. This is just as true today, and in my local Breton bar you can easily find French people who agree.
When the referendum was called, what swayed me from undecided to Leave was the negativity of the Remain campaign.
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Modelled on the Scottish independence referendum of 2014, this was ‘project fear’ writ large.
Every argument, it seemed, came from the perspective of the negative; we would be marooned, there would be economic Armageddon, we would not be able to import or export anything and the sky would fall in.
It was not that I was won over by the Leave campaign either. I was certainly not fooled by Boris Johnson pledging £350million to the NHS on the side of a bus!
I just hated the hectoring of Remain, including a patronising Barack Obama warning that if we left the EU we would be “at the back of the queue”.
In short, I felt the Remain campaign failed the fundamental test of any sales effort; it did not sell the benefits, and that is what I wanted to hear.
Pre-Brexit French retirement
So, wind the clock forward by five years and what has changed?
More time spent in France, for one. I now divide my time between here and the UK. I work in the UK, but often remotely from France.
However, I have been coming back and forth for about 15 years as my parents have lived here for some time.
We all learn so much from our parents and, though sadly my dad died just over a year ago, he and my mum moved to France to enjoy a very good retirement pre-Brexit and stayed afterwards.
Their quality of life, the enrichment which comes through immersion in another culture added to their retirement hugely. If others like them tried to do the same now, it would be so much harder and I find that deeply saddening. Unwittingly, Brexit has limited the aspirations of our retired population as much as our students.
Artists and performers now find it harder to move between the EU and UK than even in mediaeval times. Back then, the seas were seen as communication channels between Britain and Europe. No more; now they are a barrier, complete with 90-day limits, visas and restrictions.
Try setting up a business, a bank account or buying a car or property now and you will find it harder than before Brexit. I am not just thinking of the Brits though; what about the 155,000 French now living in England, to say nothing of those from other EU states?
They too face hurdles they did not have to navigate before, meaning Britain is now no easier to move to than any other anglophone country.
The result? Those who would have travelled to London to work or study can go to the US, Canada or Australia – and they do.
Blighty might be only 20-odd miles away from the continent at its closest point, but in terms of red tape, it may well be no easier to access than far-flung Ontario or Brisbane now.
Essentially, I have come to see Brexit as the closing of a door rather than the opening of another.
This appears to be true in terms of trade, culture, work and education, and I struggle to see what benefits have accrued to balance those deficits. Perhaps that is because there simply are none.
Those who failed to sell the benefits of remaining are balanced by those who failed to create benefits by leaving.
The obvious conclusion? Brexit has failed, it was a mistake of historic proportions.
Did you support Brexit? Have you changed your mind on it since voting? Let us know at letters@connexionfrance.com
