Typo Amen to that Brexit is just the start for the UK.

Wishing and hoping, let alone saying prayers, are no substitute for hard headed, informed, forecasts. Is it really necessary for the UK to have to go through a long period of unnecessary suffering to then go to the EU with our tail between our legs and ask to reapply. Any terms we got then would doubtless be worse than that we have now? Is it really necessary to break up the UK just to prove that you can? I am hoping that Johnson has an unexpected revelation and concludes he was wrong all along. Should I start to pray?

Harmonising sounds so reasonable and non threatening but the EU want to ensure we do not compete with them. I am all for not reinventing the wheel so if EU regulations for washing machines are good fine we should harmonise with them.

But yet again this is a matter for our Parliament something I would have thought you should approve of. Post Brexit we have a choice to go with EU rules or diverge.

You assume they will allow us to just adopt their standards and freely use them for marketing purposes, but why should they? Especially if we adopt lower standards in other areas. They will rightly demand a level playing field and that's why it will take a long time (well beyond the end of this year) to finalise them.

As for immigration you may well be right that the EU tries to shove their problem onto to us however that it up to our government to stand firm and push back. If Johnson won't do that then no doubt the voters will let him know where it matters.

It's not within the power of Johnson's, or any government, to control this as you want. If there was a magic solution it would already have been found, either here or elsewhere. Building walls won't work and do you really want a wall around the UK anyway? I quite like the unspoiled Cornish coastline! If people are determined to get in then eventually they will. The problem has to be tackled at source, collectively by all interested parties. We have to make people not want, or need, to come. I suppose turning England into a third world country itself might achieve that but it's not a solution I want to see.

Third world? Before long that will be an aspiration for large parts of east London.

Yes I have.
In the last decade have you spent any more time in east London than it takes a train to pass through?
Many of the people who live there have moved out. I was one of them.

You always dismiss forecasts this way, as though they are of no more value than spinning a coin or some other random guesswork.

They aren't! Forecasts are made after the careful analysis of information. They can, of course, be wrong but the point of having them is to be able to weigh up the probabilities. If all the forecasts point in one direction then there must be a very good chance that that direction is the most likely one to be taken.

Hoping they are wrong is beyond just being optimistic. It is downright irresponsible.

As a kid the weather forecasts were just speculation and quite often wrong. These days they are almost always very accurate. Why? Because we have got better at them. The data is better and powerful computer models can look at all the variables and determine what will happen. Economic forecasting is little different.

I never hope they are wrong.
I just know that there is the same probability both ways.

That has to be the leading contender for daftest claim of the year. Now I know it's only Jan 10th but it will take a lot of beating.

What you havemt taken on board is any changes the EU will/would have made going forwards.

We don't have to accept any material changes we don't like. That's why we have a veto.

It probably would not remain the status quo.