Goodbye to all that

 

Who would have thought that Prime Minister of the (presently) United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland would turn out to be such a fire-brand radical.  Those of us who thought of her as merely the malicious bitch of the “zero tolerance” policy which continues to poison the workings of the Home Office, could not have imagined that her mindless destructiveness in support of the continuance of the hopelessly divided and self-regarding Conservative Party would espouse the most left-wing anti-imperialist views about the destruction of empire! 

But today, after her capitulation to fellow minority politician leader, Prime Minister Sanchez of Spain, she has signed away the concept of nationality as it relates to an overseas possession.  Gibraltar, whatever the mendacious May says about it, has now lost its British character as it becomes in future subject to a foreign country deciding aspects of its existence.

Let us not forget, too, the fact that Northern Ireland and Scotland also voted for Remain and the Brexit self-harm is making these countries’ futures inside the laughably “united” Kingdom more precarious.  Whatever happens now, the divisions inside the country are not lines of demarcation but gigantic fissures that no amount of mealy mouthed platitudes from a letter to the British people by a desperate and increasingly irrelevant “Prime” Minister of nowhere will be able to bridge.

It is supremely ironic that the party of Empire and National Unity, a party in whose title is the concept of conserving what is excellent in the past, has turned out to be the modern wreckers of the institutions that they formerly maintained they existed to serve.  They have placed party politics above national interest and, including the most fanatical of doctrinaire Brexiteers, they know and have admitted that the country is going to be worse off with Brexit, a price they say is worth paying for the freedom and liberty for our country to advance into the unicorn filled grassy uplands of future long-term prosperity. 

 

As someone rightly said, in the long-term we are all dead, and in the medium to short term most of us do not have the millions safely stashed away in European funds, like the ever-odious Rees-Mogg, to make the difficult times ahead just a little more manageable.

Realizing that Brexit is a disaster is not rocket science and there are politicians on all sides who know this.  I do not paint the whole of the Conservative Party in one colour, there are people in the party who must be desperately worried that their party is going to be accused of national destruction in the future, and they know that the present policy is not one that will benefit the people of Great Britain – to say nothing of Northern Ireland.  I also know that there are Brexiteers in the Labour party, some, like fox-hunting Kate Hoey (who to me seems to have no place in the party) and others who, with some justification, are deeply suspicious about the workings of the EU.  But, as with democracy (a questionable quality in many aspects of EU governance) so with the EU, it is not ideal, but it is better than the alternatives. 

 

And remember, my father and grandfather fought in World Wars, both started in Europe, and I am of the generation that has not had to suffer that obscenity.  Unity in Europe has been tenuous enough and has not eliminated wars on the continent, but the situation is not going to be made better by a major country in Europe withdrawing to its insular boarders.

Today the minsters of the EU will sign the “agreement” and then May will have to go, metaphorical begging bowl in hand, to try and get support for a document that does not seem to settle any of the major questions that make leaving the EU so problematical.  It has been suggested that May has already been stooping to dangling knighthoods in front of those MPs who might be tempted to change sides and support this insupportable agreement.  The next few weeks are going to be catastrophically unedifying - and those are two words that I have never had occasion to put together before.

I am fed up with being a citizen of a country that is now regarded with bemused contempt by those who have bothered to look at our mare’s nest of a national situation.  I am fed up with having to try and explain why my country is doing things that are absurdly out of kilter with rational thought.  And I am fed up with my situation as a British Citizen living in an EU country being used by MY government as a negotiating chip in a no-win game at MY expense.

It is at times like these that I wish I could use the “Delete all and insert” approach of General Body meetings in my University, where one motion could be amended to its opposite by the “Delete all and insert” gambit.  The trouble is for that to work today for the absurdity of Brexit, there would need to be an addition to those four words – the word “forget” between “all” and “and”, so that the revised amendment would be “Delete all, forget, and insert”.

In real life, unfortunately, amendments like that don’t work.  However absurd and dangerous Brexit actually is, we seem to be stumbling, blindly towards our doom.  And even if, by some miracle, we were able to reverse the absurdity, there would still be the corrosive memory of what has been said and done during these two years of governmental paralysis.

Whatever happens, Britain has changed and there is no going back.  My only hope in the chaos that I foresee in the near future, is that something positive will be salvaged by politicians who finally realize that their responsibility is to the country and not to their parties.  Hoping for politicians to “do the right thing” is, clearly, desperation! 

 

But, I am an eternal, if cynical, optimist and the historical precedent of the Conservative Party of Peel and the Repeal of the Corn Laws shows the way!

Do your duty!

Reality will bite!

The twenty-somethingth of this month is going to be significant for me.  On that date I will have to take an examination in Spanish for which I am supremely unprepared.

It was not really my choice to ‘go on’ to the next level in the language at the start of the year, but my (vicious?) teacher encouraged me to progress with comforting words of specious consolation.  I had not, to be fair, ‘nailed’ the last examination – though I got a pass and a certificate that (I think) is the minimum basic level of Spanish competence that will get me nationality – as long as I pass the accompanying examinations on my knowledge of Spanish culture, politics, administration, Real Madrid and the King.

That examination I am not too worried about.  The knowledge needed is factual (though partial) and I know that I can cram for that with no problems.  The problems come with the reality of what Spanish nationality can mean.  As far as I can see, Britain and Spain do not recognize dual nationality.  Indeed, at the moment, what is the point of dual nationality when we are both part of the same EU?  But, thanks to the “lower than vermin” Conservatives and the idiot Brexit voters, that is all about to change.

In a few years time I will be effectively disenfranchised.  After 15 years residence in a foreign country I will no longer be allowed to vote in British elections.  As I am not a Spanish citizen I cannot vote in national elections in this country and, when we leave the EU, I will not be allowed to vote in local elections.  I will then be in the situation where I am taxed in both countries and allowed to exercise my democratic rights in neither.  My freedom of movement will be curtailed and, although it appears that I will have the right to stay on in Spain, I may have to apply for residence and I will certainly lose my present rights to move to and settle in any country in the EU.

After the well documented economic effects of the Brexit self-harm become a reality, it is highly likely that my pension will be further reduced.  The value of the pound has fallen since the announcement of Brexit and I expect it to fall further when Brexit becomes real.  My pension is paid in pounds sterling and is taxed at source and then transferred to my Spanish bank where the total has bought fewer and fewer euros as the disastrous chasm draws nearer.

The present state of my health necessitates regular visits to hospital for check-ups and controls.  I see my doctor regularly and I have a scheduled series of tests stretching into the summer.  I take daily medication for which I pay a token amount.  All of this could change.  At present, although I do not pay it, the real cost of my medical treatment is printed on the information that I am sent.  The treatment of EU national resident in Britain has been scandalously heartless.  The reputation of The Home Office has been comprehensively shredded as more and more examples of callous administrative indifference or active antagonism come to light.  Why shouldn’t EU countries reciprocate? 

Our Prime Minister is the shameless architect of the “hostile environment” and she is presiding over a country where voiced xenophobia is becoming mainstream.  She, and her riven, minority government are disgraceful and in no way reflect my attitudes and ethos, but she and her squabbling rabble are the public faces that the EU sees and I, and people like me, are likely to be the collateral damage from an ideology-driven Brexit that serves (some of) the Conservative Party and ignores those likely to be worst affected by it.

Which brings me back to the solution to my Brexit problems (well, at least some of them) – becoming a Spanish citizen.  As I have no intention of returning to the UK except as a visitor, it makes sense to link myself more closely to my chosen country.  We will leave to one side the question of Catalan independence, and concentrate on what is, at present, on offer.

I have zero intention of giving up my British citizenship.  Though I may be thoroughly depressed at what I observe of the present Daily Mail encouraged right wing exclusivity in the country, I take some comfort from the “This Too Will Pass” school of philosophical tranquillity and fondly believe that sense will eventually prevail and all manner of things will be well.  However, the immediate future demands action and Spanish citizenship seems one realistic way of combating some of the fall-out from the Brexit collapse.

No matter how much rumination I indulge in, there is no alternative but to cough up the readies and buy in some legal advice.  We are now in the tax return season and I do have someone who has done my tax returns and in my next meeting I will start making serious enquiries about the practicalities of citizenship and will-making and all the other little bits and pieces that make for a quiet life in a foreign country!

The necessity for speed has been emphasised by the breathlessness that I experienced on returning from a shopping visit to Aldi to get the necessary stuff for Toni’s birthday meal.  I was glad that I wasn’t alone and that the fetching and carrying was shared, but I still felt exhausted on our return.  This is not good, and such exhaustion concentrates the mind wonderfully. 

Whether that leads to action, well, that’s another question entirely!