Do you agree with our readers? Have your say on these MetroTalk topics and more in the comments.
Is it time to rethink Brexit?
It’s clear Trump doesn’t want to have the ‘special relationship’ previous US presidents had with our country.
This only highlights the mistake we made by leaving the EU. There is strength in being united and, like it or not, we are part of Europe, so perhaps now is the time to call another referendum on the issue.
I’m positive the outcome would be different as hopefully we have learned from our mistake of 2016. Barry Stanton, Folkestone
Brexit bad for the UK? Maybe not…
Joe and Charles (MetroTalk, Tue) scorn my observation that by leaving the EU, we have avoided the 20 per cent tariff that Trump has imposed on EU goods, calling our independence ‘self-harm’.
According to Briefings For Britain, leaving the EU has had remarkably little impact on our economy. Among the major advanced economies, the UK has had one of the faster rates of growth of total GDP since the referendum and sits comfortably in mid-table on growth in GDP per head. UK exports to the EU have recovered to long-term trend levels and the City of London has been only mildly impacted.
Since June 2016 and up until the end of the second quarter of 2022, OECD data shows the cumulative growth rate of real GDP in Italy was four per cent, in Germany it was 5.5, the UK 6.8 and in France 7.6.
Claims that UK investment has been very weak since 2016, based on extrapolating from 2009-2016, are misleading as this period featured a strong rebound in investment from the global financial crisis.
In fact, it is still close to its long-run trend and some of the gap is due to the collapse of investment in North Sea oil and gas. Foreign direct investment into the UK has held up well since 2016 in contrast to predictions that it would slump post-Brexit. Will Podmore, London
Penguins feeling the pinch
It looks as if the tariffs have already had an impact that Donald Trump placed on the Heard and McDonald islands, which are uninhabited save for penguins. I bought a pack and they appear to have shrunk by about 20 per cent… Doug, Witham
America the disruptor, then and now
As Christopher Columbus found five centuries ago, there’s nothing quite like America at getting in the way and disrupting trade between Europe and Asia… John, Manchester
Universal Studios in the wrong postcode
Wonderful that a Universal theme park will deliver an estimated £50billion of investment to the UK (Metro, Thu). But why build it in Bedfordshire and not in the North, bringing prosperity to an area that needs ‘levelling up’? Molly, Sheffield
Where have all the moderates gone?
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch abandons her party’s commitment to net zero, whitewashes America’s nightmare agriculture system and chlorinated chicken, and backs Israel’s decision to deny two Labour MPs entry to the country. Moderates are no longer welcome in the Conservative party. Christopher, Chester
I don’t mind the gap
On the Tube, we’re forever being told to ‘mind the gap’. I actually don’t mind it at all. I mean, there has to be one, doesn’t there? Simon J Page, Ealing
MORE: 10 unmissable Time Out deals – including £20 dinner at London’s best steakhouse
MORE: As football alienates fans and locals alike, the women’s game offers a welcome to all
MORE: Apple flew 1,500,000 iPhones to the USA to beat Donald Trump’s tariffs