Many of those still vehemently backing the idea of the UK leaving the EU like to pretend that those supporting Remaining within it unfairly characterise Leavers as being stupid. This, the Leave backers claim, shows a lack of respect and has no basis in fact. Well, after the latest Leave protest, they may have to think that one over.
That is because earlier this week, a small group of protesters blocked the access road to a distribution depot in the Wirral town of Neston, which is used by discount supermarket chain Aldi. They did this because - wait for it - Aldi is a German company. Nothing gets past some people. The Liverpool Echo had the story.
“The group of around five supporters came in cars and camper vans and blocked Chester High Road, in Neston, last night … In a video taken by a passer-by members of the group can be seen brandishing placards and wearing British flags around themselves … Meanwhile a man with a microphone shouts 'this is Brexit at its best' as another woman, with a flag wrapped around her head, shouts 'we are here’”.
Ridicule followed close behind. “The protest was quickly mocked online as some pointed out that one of the camper vans was German-made … Others noticed that the demonstrators were wearing clothing from other countries … Maff Michaels responded to the Liverpool Echo's Facebook story: ‘None of the vehicles, clothes, flags that they have are British.’” So what was the point of this supreme act of idiocy?
According to the Echo, “because they want Brexit to happen now”. And they believe that interrupting supplies of food and drink to their fellow citizens will make this happen, and gain them support? Yeah, right. Let’s put these Gammon Gonads straight.
Aldi is a good employer. It pays its staff well and treats them decently.
The supermarket consistently scores well in customer satisfaction surveys. It consistently scores well on lowest price and value for money surveys.
It is not the only chain that is foreign-owned (Asda is owned by US giant Wal-Mart).
Boycotting German brands would mean not going near Rolls-Royce, BMW, Mini, Volkswagen, and Bentley cars. It would mean avoiding Arriva buses and trains. It would mean avoiding many other train operators (Like West Midlands Trains, Thameslink Great Northern, TransPennine Express, ScotRail and South West Railway) because they run German built trains. A German owned firm moves much of the country’s rail freight.
Avoiding anything foreign would mean not having a car at all in most cases. It would restrict your choice of banks. You’d have to avoid most airlines (BA is Spanish registered, EasyJet has part of its fleet registered under the Austrian flag, Ryanair is Irish, and TUI’s ultimate head office is in Hamburg - yes, in Germany).
And after all of that, you’d end up paying more for your shopping. That’ why the Aldi protest is the Peak Stupid of Brexit direct action. Some Leavers really are that stupid.
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8 comments:
Well as Brexit may well disrupt food and drink supplies, they have a point.
There is a website being circulated within the quiter echo chamber where they can sign up and promise to buy only British.
Then people publish on twitter how, they have stopped shopping at Lidl and Aldi, and check the labels to make sure they only buy food that is from the UK, or a non EU 27 country.
Aldi and Lidl where possible have a British first policy for food, so they are hurting UK farmers. (How very patriotic that they wont support their fellow leave brethren as per usual farming stereotypes)
Or that most of that non EU27 food they are buying probably came in on a 0% tariff because of an EU deal.
Yeah. Close Aldi in the UK and put over 32,000 employed directly by the company out of work.
I do wonder if these rather simple folk would think they could purchase British chocolate for example...without realising Britain does not grow cocoa beans! Or perhaps British tea, coffee, oranges, bananas, pineapples, kiwi fruits, mangos, coconuts, rice, etc.
Presume these muppets are content to boycott countries where the workforce is treated well, in favour of supporting somewhere like China where he workforce is treated in quite different ways.
You do wonder about the thought process that ends up with the result "Lets picket an Aldi warehouse - that'll show em".
They're right though - it really is brexit at its best.
Neston - the third most in-bred town in the UK, I believe. (After a group of islands in the N. Sea and a four-lettered town in Norfolk)
The residents think anyone from south of Chester is a cockney; there are signs on the edges of town (leaving) reading 'Danger! 'Ere be monsters' and a lot of the residents have eyes on the same side of their heads, like flatfish.
I believe they also have a 'ladies day parade' and at that time it's not unusual for a (male) visitor to the town to mysteriously disappear...Probably to dilute the gene pool, rather than be burned alive in a wicker statue.
Unconfirmed reports also say that 'The League of Gentleman' characters Edward and Tubbs Tattsyrup were created after the cast had passed through Neston (V. quickly, one would imagine) once upon a time.
How do I know these things? I had the misfortune of once working with a load of the utter weirdlings.
One wonders where they get their ideas from?
The internet? On a cell phone? Newspapers? Other media?
Mostly made/run by foreign or offshore owned companies.
Turn off the lights? Possibly running on energy provided by a foreign company?
Should any type of this action be successful there could be retaliatory action taken, cf Trump and his trade wars, leading to downturn in market activity. Couldn't be their aim could it?
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