The voters of Grimsby did not dismiss Mr Thirsty as just another of those Here Today And Gone Tomorrow politicians; they voted Brexit in their droves, driving a 70% Leave verdict. They had been told that the EU was behind the decline in their town’s fortunes, and that, at least by implication, things would be better outside the Union. Sadly, Farage was once agin lying.
This has been highlighted in an article by Sabah Meddings at Bloomberg, who noted that one veteran fish smoker responded to the idea that Brexit would help the industry with “Nonsense … The fishing industry in the UK is smaller than the lawnmower industry … Nobody gives a toss, really”. They voted for Brexit: it made EU workers more difficult to hire. That’s a third of the workforce. Much of the fish auctioned is imported, often from Norway.
The UK produces lots of shellfish, lobster, crab and langoustines. But Brits would rather eat haddock or cod, most of which is now imported, and so is not landed by UK boats. Exporting that home caught produce to the EU - the UK’s largest export market - was made more difficult by Brexit.
It’s not as if the industry didn’t know it was being screwed over. As Ms Meddings observes, “At the time of the deal, Barrie Deas, then chief executive officer of the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organizations, said then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson had ’sacrificed’ the industry … The UK, which established an empire based on its maritime power, now has a seafood trade deficit. Last year it totaled £1.7 billion”.
She puts it directly: “Fishing still plays a vital role in town. Almost 6,000 people work at 50 processing factories, where imports from Iceland, Norway and the Faroe Islands are packaged for UK supermarkets. But, since last November, one has closed, and two have indicated they could soon follow”.
The fish market’s CEO, who voted for Brexit, told her “I’m not sad about it, I’ve thought the European model has been flawed for a long time”. However, “If it was only about fish, I’d have voted to stay in”. And what are the Tories doing about this state of affairs? Any Prime Ministerial, or indeed any ministerial, visits in the offing? None. Because they don’t care.
There was, it is true, the false hope offered by Dan, Dan The Oratory Man, telling back in 2020 “Fishing is currently a tiny fraction of our economy. But there is vast growth potential in using fish in cosmetic and health supplements. Bones, scales, guts, heads, enzymes - almost all can be monetised. Hull and Grimsby could be reborn as pharma hubs”.
Sadly, as the Bloomberg article shows all too clearly, this was total crap. As for Farage, he’s said nothing so far about the article, but has been demonising refugees, demonising the expansion of London’s ULEZ zone (giving a nod and wink to those damaging the cameras involved), and suggesting that there is a campaign to “kill cash”, which there is not.
But, as with the fishing industry, when the damage is done by his campaigning, Farage will be nowhere to be seen. The people of Grimsby followed the propaganda of a false prophet, and now, like all those other parts of the UK that voted so enthusiastically to leave the EU, they have been discarded and forgotten by most of the media class.
Small wonder no other EU member state wants to leave. We. Were. Conned.
The fish market’s CEO, who voted for Brexit, told her “I’m not sad about it, I’ve thought the European model has been flawed for a long time”. However, “If it was only about fish, I’d have voted to stay in”. And what are the Tories doing about this state of affairs? Any Prime Ministerial, or indeed any ministerial, visits in the offing? None. Because they don’t care.
There was, it is true, the false hope offered by Dan, Dan The Oratory Man, telling back in 2020 “Fishing is currently a tiny fraction of our economy. But there is vast growth potential in using fish in cosmetic and health supplements. Bones, scales, guts, heads, enzymes - almost all can be monetised. Hull and Grimsby could be reborn as pharma hubs”.
Sadly, as the Bloomberg article shows all too clearly, this was total crap. As for Farage, he’s said nothing so far about the article, but has been demonising refugees, demonising the expansion of London’s ULEZ zone (giving a nod and wink to those damaging the cameras involved), and suggesting that there is a campaign to “kill cash”, which there is not.
But, as with the fishing industry, when the damage is done by his campaigning, Farage will be nowhere to be seen. The people of Grimsby followed the propaganda of a false prophet, and now, like all those other parts of the UK that voted so enthusiastically to leave the EU, they have been discarded and forgotten by most of the media class.
Small wonder no other EU member state wants to leave. We. Were. Conned.
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6 comments:
The UK fishing industry was in decline well before either the CFP or even the UK's entry into the then Common Market. Ask any Icelander.
Once in the Common Market, and when the CFP kicked in, the issue of Quota's reared its head or, more precisely, the privatisation (that doom laden Thatcherite word again) of quota share. According to a Greenpeace report in 2018, 80% of England's fishing quota was held by foreign fishers and it's worth pointing out that it was ever so patriotic Conservative governments that allowed our quota's to become a saleable commodity, most other European countries did not.
So, contrary to what Fartrage was telling his gullible audience, it was Mrs Thatch and her barrow boys of doom who sold out the industry, the EU had very little to do with it.
Since Britain couldn't even win "the Cod War" with Mighty Iceland...what did Grimsby expect? Largesse from a far right mob of tory gangsters and thieves who cut an evil swathe across two thirds of the so-called "United" Kingdom? Did Grimsby REALLY believe it could be an isolated exception in a wicked assault on that two thirds?
@ Anonymous - Fun fact, it was the good old US of A who happily clarified the UK's position in the world (again) during the third and final Cod war when they basically told blighty to stand down and let Iceland win, for fear the Icelanders would be go over to the the Soviet Union, there was already a fair bit of anti-NATO sentiment in the country at the time.
To 15:06.
Yes. Indeed the confrontation goes back many decades, if not centuries.
Wikipedia has a good piece on it, reasonably accurate for once. But the best source is the official papers in the National Archives.
It affected all fishing ports of course, not just Grimsby. All of them lost one way or another. Classic wilful ignorance by a distant central government that couldn't care less about long term socioeconomic consequences.
I wonder how often Farage visits Grimsby and other fishing ports these days? When the toxic little bigot had Jacob Rees-Mogg on his GBN show for a cosy chat some time ago, he advised his ghoulish pal not to visit a fishing town 90 mins from his constituency for the very problems Brexit is causing.
Fishermen and fish processors, as with farmers will find it difficult to muster much sympathy. Not just because they voted for Brexit. But because they should have known their industries far better than they clearly did.
To 23:51.
It's hard to blame the victim when that's the kind of socioeconomic "culture" created over the last four decades. Some people (but not all) will do almost anything in a desperate situation. The most extreme example is the Depression that produced the mass insanity of fascist variants 1920-45.
The current version is a mutant virus of it, the homicidal military element concentrated against the East (as so accurately forecast by Orwell), with Africa probably the next helpless proxy target. But it inevitably turns inward as its certain failures get traction. The disease knows no other way. The best domestic example of that is the betrayal of the 1980s Lynx-led Nottinghamshire miners....as soon as their splitting usefulness was over they too ended up on the dole, Lynx "protesting" with a pathetic solo underground "sit in".
Which is why this organised paranoid evil will continue to worsen until enough people say Enough Is Enough. Unchanged, it really isn't that difficult to forecast where this will go. Grimsby isn't the first victim and it won't be the last.
Brexit showed there is a plentiful supply of flag-waving willing feudal mugs in Britain 2023.
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