I've known for 20 years that lots of high street stores were inevitably doomed because of online trading.

But in 28 days we lost

Debenhams
Topshop
Topman
Dorothy Perkins
Wallis
Outfit
Evans
Burton
Miss Selfridge
Jaeger
Peacocks
and
Edinburgh Woollen Mill...

Some of these brand names might live on. But Covid simply accelerated an inevitable process - millions will have bought clothes online in 2020 who never did before.

And that means they're not likely to go back to high streets as much as previously. The world changed...

It's catastrophic for the tens of thousands losing jobs. I'm so sorry. I hope you'll be OK.

Also terrible for the treasury, cos physical shops pay more tax than online retailers (who often park profits offshore to avoid national taxes).

Change is inevitable...

No matter how "pro-business" and "anti-tax" the Tories are, they still need money coming in.

So they're going to have to deliver policies that bring in tax revenue lost to online retailers exploiting cracks in international tax law.

And that means grouping together...

Cos the only way to deal with businesses that operate supranationally is to cooperate supranationally. You have to make global tax laws.

Britain doesn't have enough trade negotiators to cope with 27 nations of EU. How will we negotiate tax agreements with 190 countries?...

The only way to do this is as a collective - a group of cooperating nations, big enough to deal with China and USA on equal terms, and using economy of scale to act efficiently.

So that would be the EU, then.

As predicted, we'll need them, just as we leave.

We are so dumb.