- Joined
- Sep 20, 2018
- Messages
- 23,759
- SLU Posts
- 18459
It's partly that fishing, while only a small part of the economy, used to be until comparatively recently a very major part of particular local economies, so the decline of local fishing fleets has very badly affected these areas. Furthermore, there's no obvious reason why other industries or businesses would want to relocate there because, by definition, unless there's also a major commercial port nearby (e.g. Hull), a fishing port is a place at the end of a road somewhere rather than part of an active communications network.
As my late partner, who was from Hull, used to say, "You meet lots of people who were born in Hull and have left, but you very rarely meet anyone who's relocating there," and Hull still has an active port. Grimsby, just the other side of the Humber estuary from Hull, which also used to have a major fishing fleet, has suffered very badly.
So fishing ports, or what remains of them, are very much what would be called in the US "left behind areas" and tend to blame their misfortunes on distant bureaucrats in both London and Brussels, so the "take back control" message tended to resonate there.
One of the attractions of Brexit was that many parts of the UK outside London and the south east, and outside the major provincial cities, have suffered major economic difficulties as a result of the liberalisation of the world economy over the last 40 years, and successive governments have promised them help that's never really materialised. I'm from a major city in one of those areas and I've seen how, while the city's large and diverse economy has protected it, nearby towns and villages have really suffered since the 1980s and continue so to do (the local industry was coal, but it's the same problem as fishing).
Brexit purported to offer a way to turn back the clock to more prosperous times, as does Nigel Farage's Reform party now.
ETA: This post (which I think is free to read) is relevant:
As it happens, I'm in the middle of reading Hurrah For The Blackshirts!: Fascists and Fascism in Britain Between the Wars by Martin Pugh, and am struck by how Mosely and the Blackshirts were also very concerned about British farming and the British fishing fleet, partly because they were opposed to free trade and international trade agreements, favouring instead economic autarky, and partly because they saw farming and fishing as particularly authentic, pre-industrial, British economic activities.
Last edited:
