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Comment by longdudefromnl | Hacker News Reader

Quote: Again this regulation comes from the EU so NL can't just change it

This is -I think- (one of) the main reasons people voted PVV. We (the Dutch people) can't even make their own decisions! And when things fall apart (and they are: housing, inflation, too much environmentalism, declining healthcare, etc) this is exactly what we need: make decisions to fix this. But we 'can't' because of EU. This is extremely angering and fueled the rise of PVV. And don't get me wrong: I'm one of them. And no, I'm not 'far right'. I just want to fix things. If you can't take care of yourself, you can't help others.

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I find it a large leap to go from "broken housing, inflation, too much environmentalism, and declining healthcare" to "the EU is the problem". All these "problems", as far as they exist, exist in the whole EU as well as in the US. The cause is therefore unlikely to be the EU.

A more likely cause of some problems is the lack of people in the working age, that is, a demographic problem. The US has solved (historically) and is solving this via immigration, which is exactly the thing that Wilders wants to stop. Put differently, who is gonna build the houses? Many Dutch youths have completed a bachelor or master degree, so are not interested in that line of work.

The main reason is that people don't feel like being responsible for their own solutions, just expect it from a savior - failing EU then a local one. They keep blaming whoever else while forgetting THEY are part of the EU and THEY vote for every single point on the EU action list and legislation, yes including environmentalism. And continuing to not feel responsible, they vote for the guy who takes them out of that EU responsibilities, while promising he will deliver locally on exactly the same points he failed previously to deliver on the EU level. And the voters believed him, of course, ignoring there are green and left-wing parties on local level just as well. Well, this eternal naivety some iron hand will save us, same since the dawn of history...

I would hope people would look at Brexit as a model of how well that line of thought works. Especially as we're seeing how ugly the downstream effects are years afterwards.

What are the British population's attitude towards this post-Brexit reality now? Has anyone reflected on it?

Probably a 48%/52% split between "this is exactly what we said would happen" and "we've been hamstrung by leaders not negotiating a good deal"

Generally speaking, bad. Polls indicate that favorability for Brexit is probably around 35% or lower. It's been getting worse because a lot of the current crisis's the UK faces are the direct result of Brexit. Because a lot of things they took for granted in regards to stuff like the food chain or energy negotiations is something that directly impacts an individual's day to day life.

> food chain or energy negotiations

The UK along with Norway export gas to EU during summer which is stored for use in winter. UK does not have expensive gas/electricity because of Brexit, it is because of Ukraine war. The rest of EU is just as bad or worse when it comes to energy prices. The economy in Germany is worse than UK this year. The latest data regarding budget deficit from France is just as bad as UK.

Not sure what food chain issues, the UK needs cheap labour to work the fields, UK people won't accept that work, so cheap labour is brought over from Asia for seasonal work. The new young generation Polish/Eastern Europe people are no longer are interested in such work either.

No, I remember energy prices going up way before Ukraine war. Starting in the summer of 2021 we had multiple energy providers going bankrupt.

And don't forget the usefulness of the UK for USA is now hovering just above nil. From an Establishment point of view David Cameron has got to be the Biggest Donkey in years! And what do the Tories do, they reward him.

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