'Who the hell thinks Brexit is going well?' | James O'Brien on LBC 

Greetings from germany. I recently had a conversation with a coworker (also german) who said that "it's great for britain that they left the EU!". When I asked him why he would say such a thing he listed all his gripes with the EU. I proceeded to educate him on how brexit has been going for you guys and asked him why all the other members have expressed no wishes to follow your example. He did not know anything about brexit and had no answer to my question. I have said before that history will remember brexit as the stunning application of the dunning-kruger-effect to an immense number of people and I stand by that statement.

As someone who voted brexit, I admit it's been an unmitigated disaster.

My compassion for the conned evaporated away when they started acting petulantly with slogans like "You lost, get over it". Revenge is said to be best served cold and I've been joyfully savouring the line "You won, get over it"

Those of us who witnessed Britain going down the toilet in the '60s and early '70s, to be saved only by joining the EEC, never had any doubt that Brexit would be a disaster.

I would just like to relate a case study of the damage of Brexit. My wife and I run a fine jewellery company, employing 7 makers in the UK. We have retail sales globally and have wholesale stockists in the UK, Asia, Singapore, Australia and our major market in the USA. Since Brexit we have been dropped by all of our European wholesale stockists due to the Brexit imposed import tariffs and costly bureaucracy and red tape they have to deal with to import our work. Since Brexit we now have zero retail trade in the EU from our website, due to the taxes our often longstanding private clients now have to pay when our jewellery is delivered to their doorstep. Brexit has directly damaged British business. We are a small international company- our once nearest and most profitable market is now lost to us, and Brexit is why. We may now have to lay off employees in the UK due to loss of trade due to Brexit. The damage of Brexit to UK business is real, and cuts across all sectors. Brexit is economic suicide.

I'm on my pink unicorn riding into the sunny uplands, mainly to get away from the stench of sewage filled rivers, streams, lakes and seas. From my hilltop I can see queues at the ports where lorries are waiting to clear their documents. In a layby I can see a red bus with faded words written on the side, "We send the EU £350 million a week, let’s fund our NHS instead”. The tyres have been slashed, the windows are smashed and bonnet is raised with smoke rising from where an engine used to be. I passed fields with unpicked fruit. So of course it's going well. 😄

I'm a fan and promoter of underground rock and metal and we hardly ever see our European counterparts since Brexit thanks to the costs and red-tape involved. A major European agency just stopped offering us all these incredible and eager bands overnight.... I'm absolutely gutted. It's just another moment that tells me that the world is just getting further down the toilet thanks to bunch of selfish, bootlicking killjoys

My mother in Denmark sent my daughter a gift. It cost me £28 to get it.take that as a metaphor for all of the economy. The friction is tremendous.

It is very upsetting how, within a generation, all of the great things our grandparents achieved were willingly thrown away by their spoiled children. The young will now have to clean up that generations messes. Not how a society should function.

Many of the 33 million people who voted in the referendum googled...What is the European Union?... Makes me feel ashamed to be British...

Don’t know what you’re talking about James, leaving the EU and having even less regulation around tax loopholes and business accounts is going fantastically well for a very small obvious group of people

I always found it hilarious that after 200 years Napoleon finally got the blockade he wanted :P .

"compassioned for the conned" ... You're a much better man than I am James. I'm still frikkin livid.

So more people in the UK believe the earth is flat than those who believe Brexit is going great ! 😂

"Compassion for the conned" has to evaporate at those who were conned because they are so dedicated to hating their fellow humans.

And that is why she is a president and farage is in the aussie jungle. Case closed ✌

Vladimir thinks it's going well. He thinks half of the EU will soon be re-joining a different federation.

Who thinks Brexit is going well? Bankers who have just had their bonus cap removed?

The best comedy show I have seen for years. 🍿🍿🍿 From Poland with love.

I always bought items from UK and after brexit I don't buy from the UK and I am sure I am not alone. So, tell me how well brexit is going, very sad the people of the UK have been sold a lemon, it will go from great Britain to poor Britain.

I watch James and Sangita all the time. I was overseas when the results of the Brexit referendum were announced. I was sitting in a bar, A French lady asked me what I thought. I lowered and shook my head, covering my eyes for a moment. I told her something like I thought it was the stupidest British political decision in my whole lifetime. I knew even then that the UK would not benefit in any way....quite the reverse! Well, for all the "Brexiteers", you reap what you sow....the only problem is, you "effed" it up for the rest of us!

It's been almost 4 years now, guys. 4 years and people are still saying it'll be great like it didn't happen and make a failing country even worse.

I have friends who voted Brexit now denying they voted for Brexit for the they don't want to be seen as morons.

I voted remain with a passion. The smugness I feel draws little comfort.

Don’t ever underestimate someone’s ability for self delusion. That’s a mistake I have made one too many times!

"Is there a single sector in this country that's over subscribed?" Politicians.

Let's face it, the Tories should be awarded the Nobel Prize for Ineptitude. Alas, this is in common with Tory governance which also doesn't exist.

As a Brit living in Europe I can assure everybody that it is just way too much hassle to buy British - unless you are dealing with a British firm that has opened a warehouse in the EU or is based in Northern Ireland.

And the man who created all this mess is now Foreign Secretary - a role fundamentally tasked with ensuring strong relations between the UK and the international community, which naturally includes the EU. I sometimes wonder if we are actually living in reality 🤦‍♂️

I am _constantly_ enraged about BRexit as it shafted my ability to take short/medium term contracts around the EU (in which I engaged for more than 20 years) - along with 100s of thousands of other Brits. But this never seems to be mentioned in _any_ of the media in the UK. We hear of farmers and fishermen and cheese exporters but _nothing_ of the Brits employed in a peripatetic fashion around the EU.

Napoleon tried and failed to damage Britain by stopping its trade with Europe. But with a little unlawful proroguing, it Can be done.

My friend is in Grimsby. He voted Remain as he worked, until last week, at a fish processing plant. It was built and improved with EU funding.

I'd have compassion for the conned if there hadn't been any experts telling them exactly what would happen, or 'project fear' as it was branded!!! 🤷🤦

as a remainer, i could not see the consequences, but it was glaringly obvious that brexit would be a total catastrophe, given the benefits the uk had accrued since joining the eu.

What a pleasure to listen to James O'Brien. We are starved for this kind of intelligent, informed and clever commentary in Australia.

Yes, Smoggy in effect was saying we would be better off to have little to no food security in the event of severe climate change or supply chain issues.

2% of the population can easily dictate 'the will of the people' if they happen to own the vast proportion of the media. People believe what the media tell them they believe; in this Democracy with freedom of speech they have no choice and dare'nt say otherwise.

The Brexit we got wasn't the Brexit I voted for, say Brexiters who all seem to have wanted a different Brexit from each other. Which just goes to show that Brexiters didn't know what they were voting for.

I think we need another referendum on Brexit. It should never of happened. And as for Cameron’s return to government , well how dare he show his face when he left with his tail between his legs after last referendum.

"We goofed it up" is beyond diplomatic. That's how you'd graciously excuse an emerging democracy, mid-apprenticeship.

I love how the UK thinks rejoining is up to them. Rejoining isn't the UK's choice, it is the the EU's. For sure the UK has the choice to decide to TRY and rejoin but in the end it is totally in the EU's hands to accept the UK back in. I'm not so sure the EU would actually back bring the UK back in. They seem to be doing better, politically things seem to be smoother, and they would have to worry that UK will just decide to change their mind and leave again as soon as they start feeling exceptional again.

Still cannot see what they expected to happen , net immigration is up , and that was the one topic brexiters overwhelmingly wanted to reduce

I do love how people who say remoaners 'need to get over it and accepted it' yet nigel farage said before the vote even if we lose we'll keep fighting......

Rejoining will not easily erase the fact that the majority of the British are okay with bigotry & xenophobia. 😢

Any reasonable person knows it’s going very very badly

We should rejoin as soon as possible

Brexit appears to be a tremendous success for the UK's International ........ competition.

As a disabled person, I'm looking forward to working from home as our new Prime Minister 😂

I keep hearing about how young people, especially those who were to young to vote in the 2016 referendum, are somehow going to ensure that the UK rejoins the EU. Much as I would wish that to be the case, and much as most young people I know moan all the time about Brexit, I see no evidence of their dissatisfaction being turned into political action. Given that Labour aren't going to try to take us back in (apparently), is anyone forming an explicitly pro-EU party (the opposite of UKIP)? No. Have I seen demonstrations with thousands of under-30s marching to Whitehall? No. I've been on three anti-Brexit marches, and the average age on each of them was about 60. It's very depressing.

I always have sympathy for our Brexit voters. The same way I have sympathy for those who fall for Amazon and Banking scams. again the scammers mostly target the elderly. The only thing with the Brexit scam is with these silly people, we all have to pay!

The other day, I (in Berlin) ordered a spare part for my espresso machine from a British retailer for some 45 pounds, about 50 euros. Two weeks after delivery I received an invoice for additional 17.44 euros in import fees. I feel bad for how people struggle with the fallout of Brexit, no matter how they voted on the matter - but it is certain that I will not order from the U.K. again.

Given the absolute state of the country I'm sure we'll rejoin sooner rather than later.

James, you are missing a key element. It is not a UK decision to join the EU. The UK can only decide that it wants to apply, the individual EU member countries will make the actual decision. VDL is correct, in my opinion, but is playing a long game. Eventually the UK will join, it will take a decade (I think) before the debate and political parties in the UK are mature enough to apply and then a minimum of 5 to 10 more years to meet the criteria and agree/accept the terms that will be available. The UK will have to be grown up enough to fully commit to the euro, for a start, no special opt out etc. The lesson for the EU from Brexit is that, they can not allow any half in, half out members like the UK was, again

anything recommended by fararge is 100% going to be a disaster . . .

But on gbnews this morning a man named Andrew Piece thinks it is. When asked on GMB a while ago he couldn't name one single thing.

Oven ready was a bad phrasing, but unintentionally accurate considering Brexit was always slow motion National suicide.

Who is it that conducts these polls, where do they do these polls, and how come I have never been invited to take the poll?

"I hold in my hand, a nugget of pure green" Blackadder

Ahh yes James, but you see it's not Brexit that has failed, it's this particular Brexit, which is completely different to the Brexit people voted for. You see, there lies just beyond our grasp a perfect Brexit that will certainly work. Bloke called Nige down the pub told me all about it...

So the so-called 'project fear' has become project reality!?

"There were 335,447 work visas granted to main applicants in the year ending September 2023, 35% higher than in the year ending September 2022, and two and half times more (+150%) than prior to the pandemic in the year ending September 2019." - 2.5 times more immigration than in 2019. Brexit working well.

Sadly our PM reveals that he is a small and inconsequential man almost every time he opens his mouth. He is physically small which probably doesn't help but he appears mentally inconsequential as well. He talks complete nonsense when confronted with issue such as Brexit, trade deals and immigration. He appears to have little original thought and behaves petulantly. Tea with the Greek PM being cancelled due to the latter mentioning the Parthenon Marbles being a perfect example of his pettiness.

Four years after Brexit, the British are still waiting for the benefits.......

Ms von de Leyden's comments and tone are probably the best thing to come from Brussels since 2016. As a Europhile Brit (and 20 year military veteran so poke your "you're not a patriot" BS) I've always felt that the EU didn't really try very hard to keep us as European citizens and ignored remainers choosing to see a stereotype football hooligan/Brits Abroad image as representative of the 48 million people who didn't vote for Brexit. The recognition and the very reconciliatory tone in her comments are most welcome even if I feel they are a bit overdue.

Sunak does not speak for me or the majority. Sickening.

It's going great mate. Blue passport, fish are happy, less regulations, lower immigration, world beating economy, 350million a week extra for the NHS.... They need us more than we need them!!! Over to you moggy!!!!

As an ex-pat living in New Zealand for the last 20 years all I can say is “Ha ha”

Leaving the EU should never have been an option given to the British public.

Would you accept the Euro if it became the condition of rejoining?

Thank you for your voice of reason. In the Netherlands we have fallen for the same type of lies. This Wilders guy will be the same disaster as Boris.

Straight after those simple, kind words, Tory MP Lee Anderson, told her to 'shut up'. There is the difference between the two sides.

There is no "rejoin." There is only "re-apply" and possibly be re-admitted, but that's a long shot.

" ... there had even been demonstrations to thank Big Brother for raising the chocolate ration to twenty grammes a week ... " - 1984 - George Orwell

Just think how much more expensive everything from the eu will be when the new uk charges start for each product being imported. I think if you have two differenft fruits on one lorry ,there is a charge for each different fruit,so ridiculous increase in everything on top of greedflation and the cost of tory corruption crisis. The 12% who are cheering brexit,are bankers and rich people

The lesson for the EU from Brexit is that, they can not allow a member like the UK, ever again. You won, deal with it!

I appreciate the tone of this. Thank you.

It's going well for the EU.... does that count? 😂

I’m genuinely interested in hearing about the successes from the people who think it has been a success.

Compulsory fingerprinting is infringing of personal freedom?

Fancy wanting independence and fighting a war for it. My ancestors must have been mad. If only they had appreciated economics

Fantastic James keep it up

The benefits of CCTPP has now been downgraded from 0.08% to 0.04%.

It’s with sadness I listen to the witty English sarcasm and remember that, I as a person who visited London frequently before Brexit. Have not visited since the Brexit vote. My children also, do not talk about visiting as we (in my generation did), but instead are going to Paris, Berlin and Warsaw (places I rarely thought about visiting because Britain was always the obvious choice).

Bring back Boris immediately

I'm pretty sure that staff shortages will soon be filled via the India trade deal that Cameron was bought into Sunnaks government for. (and well rewarded with a Lordship £££ for life)

“Make Brexit work”: an example of an oxymoronic policy

On the other side of the channel we are prepared for any nonsense coming from UK. It's obvious UK is not ready for its own nonsense

I agree with U.von der Leyen: there is no bitterness ("Rancoeur") in our EU ranks BUT one thing is sure, the EU behaved quite politely and amicably UNLIKE the UK representatives so we (EU) are not ashamed in the least with our past attitude. Where do we go from there? Not far I am afraid: - no other solution outside to remain OUT or to join the EU. In the EU, we are totally neutral on this (i.e.: we don't really care) - no waiver of any kind to be expected if the UK fancy to join - nothing will be considered UNLESS both key UK parties support unequivocally joining. - there is no real solution with "make Brexit work", de facto convergence, joining SM, CU, etc. These are gimmicks for lost politicians - the EU will not change its rules, its SM, etc for the UK's pretty eyes These conditions are not exorbitant but still too much for the UK or I'll be surprised

Some lessons needs to be learned hard way, to be remembered longer. Britain needed this lesson badly

I saw Robert Peston on tv this morning, and he says we should give Brexit until 2036 to see if it works. If we leave it 2036 the UK will not have the money to rejoin the EU.

Curious to know how we were ‘dragged’ out??

As a Hungarian who moved to the UK weeks before Brexit referendum and moved back a month before settled status would've been required, the UK leaving the EU was the one thing that broke something in me. My mind has always been and always will be the Blairite, Europeer, British one. When I kept warning about the (recruitment) panic in IT while the UK was about to leave everyone ignored, now the UK can learn in all sectors in existence what lack of labour means.

If it EVER becomes a ballot initiative to rejoin(IF), maybe the EU should put it to a multicountry, BINDING, citizens vote about whether or not to ALLOW Britain back in...? Not to come off as vitriolic, but, show of hands, if you think they'd vote to let them back in...

The problem isn’t that another referendum would pass to rejoin. The problem is 5-10 later or whenever the Tories take power they will just vote another referendum to leave the EU. Another problem is that other countries will veto the addition of the UK to the EU unless they are offered something.

Compared to the same shop brands our shelves are empty or have less variety than in the EU .Also goods are more expensive here .

There’s always hope that we will rejoin, unfortunately I think it’s many years in the future. The whole thing is unbelievably sad for our country.

She HAS to speak for all of us in the EU, I DO NOT WANT the UK back in the EU, I WOULD HASSLE my member of the national assembly EVERY DAY !! to vote against you rejoining.................I WILL NEVER FORGET THE WAY EU CITIZENS WHERE TREATED IN THE UK EVER!! the EU is NOT just about you !! James do you have any compassion for my friend assaulted in front ot her children for speaking Portugues to her husband ??? she and I are now back in Portugal !!

Only 67% think Brexit was a mistake?😅 That's amazing in its own way. That will need to be 90% plus, for years, before rejoining is possible.

Brexit’s been going brilliantly for me recently…since I got Italian citizenship.

Well young people will do it, ok I don’t have a timeframe but it will happen. brexit is going as well as it was supposed to go. I just want Scotland to make its own decisions and not the voters in a neigbouring counntry.