Post-Brexit Food Supplies: Why You Should Stop Worrying

I hate the silly season these days, I really do. The dog days when Parliament is in recess so hacks do not get easily digested stories to regurgitate and have to invent stuff used to be fun, but now it has become tiresome. The main reason for this tiresomeness is the nonsense that the EU will blockade the UK and try to starve us into submission. If you think about it, this is not just tiresome, it is wank of the highest order.

A blockade of Britain such as the Federasts fantasise over is one step away from a declaration of war. For that reason alone, the EU is highly unlikely to even consider such a move. Wars have begun over less as one side tries to pressure the other and the end result is a lot of dead people. The USA tried to pressure Japan into withdrawing from Manchuria in 1941 by cutting off Japan's supplies of iron and oil. The Americans wanted Japan to back down but what they got instead was Pearl Harbour. No, the EU may be many things, but it is is not as stupid as to do that.

Another reason why a blockade is pretty much out of the question is that it would hurt an awful lot of peasant-type farmers in places like Spain who would see their major market suddenly drying up. They may very well be peasants but even peasants have votes these days so do you really believe that all those voters would just shrug their shoulders at the thought of seeing their own families go hungry and their farms declared bankrupt, just to please the EU hierarchy? 

So, exports to Britain from the EU will continue, but the problem is that the EU is quite likely to make life difficult for British exports to them. In theory, we could end up with chaos at out ports because exporters' trucks are jamming up the facilities and imports cannot get through. That is not the fault of the EU if it happens, and the blame can be placed on our government.

Given such a crisis, exporters will have to be prohibited from approaching the port unless all their paperwork is in order before they leave home. If that is done then, as the blogger Richard North pointed out, the posts should remain open for imports and supplies will get through speedily. Given that this is the same Richard North whose alarmist posts on the possibility of imports not arriving probably helped encourage the press to start their fearmongering campaign, it is good to read common sense like this from him.

Leading from all this, British farmers who export to the EU will probably dump their produce on the home market, especially if the government pays them a subsidy to encourage them, so many food items can be expected to fall in price and that is even before we start receiving supplies from the wider world. 

The only problem we have is do we trust this government not to cock-it all up? Can they be trusted to ensure that exporters do not panic and block the ports, for instance?

The question was rhetorical because of course, we can't. This government is a shower and there could be a short period when supplies do get disrupted because the shower has reverted to type and failed in its duties. For that reason, as I recomended in A Sensible Prepping Guide, it is the responsibility of all sensible people to keep a small stock of non-perishable food in the pantry to tide a family over if there are short-term disruptions to supplies for any reason.

What that means is do not wait until March next year and then panic-buy. Start now and add a few extra items to your weekly shop and you will have your supplies ready and waiting for whatever problems do occur. If nothing happens, which I still feel is the likeliest outcome, then you can rotate them though as part of your normal family meals, but do continue to keep your larder well stocked.

You never know when we might have another vile winter when you will need that pantry, and weather concerns me more than fearmongering from the press over Brexit.