About a year ago now, Brexit happened. The outcome sent shockwaves through the world economy. Nobody would have predicted in a million years that the U.K., a country that prided itself on rationality and poise when enacting legislation had made what was quite possibly one of the least “well thought through” referendums ever. While Brexit might not have had an immediate affect on Australia, should a “hard Brexit” be enacted we may feel the aftershocks in Australia for many years to come.

Before David Cameron came to power, it became widely acknowledged that there were some “hardliners” within the U.K. Tory Party. The hardliners were usually the members of parliament who were seen to be pushing issues that were outside of the party line. These hardliners didn’t care anyway if they were heard or not, because the conservatives were not in power at the time.

The hardliner shouts were faint at first, being barely an anomaly on the conservative policy agenda, but grew louder as there came to be a chance that the Conservative party could win an election. During the reign of Gordon Brown, when an election was held resulting in a hung parliament, the hardliners hitched a ride on the conservative re-election. As David Cameron was sworn into power, the shouts became louder still.

Following the election of Donald Trump, the appeals for Britain exiting the European Union became one of the most pressing issues from the hardliners within the party. As a “middle-of-the-road” conservative, David Cameron found ways to largely ignore the appeals for Brexit, often citing more pressing issues for the U.K. parliament to work through. Eventually he grew tired of ignoring the appeals, so a referendum was held for Brexit, and the sheer buffoonery grew to deafening levels.

A friend of mine whose father voted no put it best. When asking her father as to why he voted no, he simply exclaimed “things used to be better before we joined the European Union!”. When she asked what specifically was better, he simply stated “they just were”. Nostalgia is a powerful political weapon.

Nobody likes uncertainty. It doesn’t sit well in financial markets, and in the greater context of Nobody had even worked out how to enact a Brexit, let alone why!

There is so much uncertainty surrounding Brexit and how to enact it that it is no wonder that financial markets have not collapsed already. A fall in foreign currency exchange is also likely, which will have a profound affect on both tourism and migration.

If European migration becomes harder for U.K. residents, even more will opt for migration to Australia. It is hard to say what that looks like, but even though there are lots of U.K. residents living and working within E.U. countries, if it becomes much harder for those residents to continue their work due to Brexit, we may see an even bigger migration to Australia from the U.K.

It’s hard to tell how Brexit will be enacted, but we know it will be costly. For many U.K. residents, the affect will be immediate. For us in Australia, the two most prominent issues are migration and the global economy. Heaven help us if it’s anything more than that!