Can the UK come to terms with its post-Brexit trauma?

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Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

The UK has officially left the European Union (EU). Brexit has been done, time to heal the rift and move on. Aren’t sound bites wonderful, easy on the ear, then melting away to nothing. And then reality hits.

The two biggest stumbling blocks will be setting up trade deals with the rest of the world and realigning legislation to better suit the workings of the UK.

Trade deals.

The UK already does a substantial amount of trade with the EU and there seems to be no real reason for that to stop. It already satisfies the regulatory requirements of the EU and if they still wish to trade with them, then these requirements must stay. Indeed, the EU itself has advised that should the UK wish to remain a trading partner, it must stay within its regulatory guidelines. The EU is currently the UK’s largest trading partner and it would be a foolish government to empty the apple cart and try to refill it from scratch.

However, other potential trading partners may not fit the same specifications. The case of the USA has been well commented on. The notorious, chlorinated chicken, the GM crops and hormone-treated beef. These three items, the EU would not normally have allowed and the general UK public is distinctly uneasy with these three…