Compared to recent years it's a bit of volte face for a Chancellor to say something like this, I'm not really thinking about the pre-Boris purge era where of co

Compared to recent years it's a bit of volte face for a Chancellor to say something like this, I'm not really thinking about the pre-Boris purge era where of course, things were different. Anyway, I don't want to get stuck on this point. It was a throwaway observation and hearing Hunt say this in his current role stood out, and I felt it was moderately significant politically. The weather is changing. Give it 5 years and I think you'll hear murmurings about rejoining the single market. I really do. Public opinion will get there, although it's way too soon politically for that right now. I don't lay the entire blame for our decline at Brexit's door, I too think it has been decades in the making. For me though, Brexit was a singular moment of lunacy, and many of the morbid symptoms our politics have displayed in recent years, the terrible quality of leaders, the hard right wing creep in some sections of the govt, the sheer reality-ignoring stupidity, does seem to have a Brexit link. But no, I don't think everything was great pre-Brexit. The lunatics took over the asylum is probably more how I see it. Now we have 'grownups' in charge, I'll concede that much, but I find this new project a grim re-run of the Cameron era. Another ideologically motivated choice to slash the state to address a mythical fiscal hole. I dread to think where we will end up after this latest round of austerity. It's truly grim.