The British Republic

Note: This article is about the future history of the Gamma Universe. The British Republic will mostly be an element in Rocket Redferne.

The British Republic is a country that was founded in 2064, and disbanded in 218X. It is the successor state to the former United Kingdom, excluding Northern Ireland, Scotland (except for the exclave of West Glasgow) and London (until 2109). Between 2064 and 2109, the capital city was York. This was carried over from the United Kingdom, from which London seceded in 2015.

Foundation

After the great revolution of 2014, the nations of Europe became a lot more distinct and free, with far less government intervention in people's day-to-day lives. This was initially welcomed in Britain, where the government had taken an extreme stance (even within in the EU) against freedom of speech, movement and association. However, the British people had become used to government guidance in many areas of their lives, and felt at a loss with their newfound freedom. Even before World War 3, there were already moves to reintroduce "modesty bags" to pornographic magazines in newsagents, wall off water features in shopping centres, and remove chocolate bars from the "impulse buy" section at supermarket checkouts. Protests at a "return to the dark days" of the EU were regarded as "flat earthist" conspiracy theories.

In the wake of World War 3, an event that drained post-revolution Britain's weak economy, the low taxes, freedom of entrapeneurship and lack of intricate planning permission to install things such as wind turbines and solar panels were seen as a "necessary evil" to restore the economy. Britain's economy never truly returned how it was in 1999, despite vastly increased productivity and almost total employment in the post-war economy. In 2031 Prime Minister Haltingdene famously said "we have never had it so good", to loud approval in the House of Commons. The remark was met with scorn amongst the ordinary people, though exactly who he had meant by "we" is unclear. Taxes remained low, but a lot of new laws relating to spot fines for motoring offences had been passed. This was to "ensure the same level of safety" that the pre-revolution adoption of self-driving cars had established. The money for these fines was all used to "improve the roads", by repainting the lines every two years. This is apparently an expensive process. A government ombudsman found on three seperate occasions that absolutely none of the fine money had found it's way into any ministers' pockets, except "accidentally" in "a few isolated incidents".

In the wake of the worldwide economic turmoil created by the war, Western Europe began to become ever more diverse, as temporary migrants fled civil wars and genocides. The children and grandchildren of these temporary visitors would go on to form the diverse, fresh-thinking and hopeful population of the British Republic. An ever-increasing number of White Britons began unfortunately leaving the UK for the Whites-only ethnostate, the NWAR. This was already an illegal action, as the New UN as a whole had deemed "unauthorised contact" with the "entity" in the Pacific Northwest against international law. Unfortunately the British government, after the revolution, had ensured people would have the freedom to travel whererver they wanted, so could not prevent them from going to the USA and slipping over the border. Some in the government decided they "didn't want those racists, anyway", and were in favour of letting them leave. Others, however, feared a "brain drain" from academia. The old anti-White policies of the EU had been swept away, and it was now acceptable to mention the great contributions White people had made to to science and progress. It was for this reason that visits to the NWAR, or any territory from which a Briton was liable to be able to reach the NWAR, was temporarily suspended. The drain of Whites from the 15% of top positions in STEAMPBV their quota allowed them to occupy was thus averted. The retaining of the White bricklayers, van drivers, farm labourers and taxi drivers who had formed the bulk of those actually moving to the NWAR was merely an accident of fate.

A lesser, but significant, "Gay-n Drain" of British homosexuals to Homonia had also been ongoing since 2040. Due to the re-legalisation of homophobic hate speech after the revolution, the government was initially "not surprised" that these "poor victims" of "our toxic masculine culture" were leaving. As time went on, and Britain became ever more diverse, however, it became increasingly difficult to describe Britain as "toxic masculine". This phrase did, of course, only apply to societies that are primarily White or Yamato. In the end, the government decided to compromise, allowing emigration to Homonia only after the emigrant had been given a lengthy breifing, and told that they would be expected to "uphold the British virtues of diversity" in their new home. The government also secured assurance from Homonia that British immigrants would be monitored to ensure they did not do anything "contra to the British value of tolerance" in their new home... such as smoke. The Homonian government proceeded to tear up the treaty and burst out laughing, as soon as the British delegation had left the room.

In 2052, gun control returned to the agenda after a "bloody week", where two mass shootings happened at seperate schools in Britain. The two shooters, both with a history of mental health issues, claimed 21 victims between them at two seperate schools in England. Both of them had been repeatedly denied gun licences on mental health grounds, but had later obtained them after interventions by the deputy head of the British Army, Alan Umtali. The latter fact was suppressed in the press, as it was not "in the public interest" and would "spread panic", leading to "unfounded conspiracy theories". Umtali did graciously accept a 6-month suspension from duty on full pay as his punishment. The "MASS Movement" (Mothers Against School Shootings) marched on London and demanded action, leading to a re-banning of concealable handguns, fully-automatic weapons and some accessories. The MASS were not satisfied, and set up a protest camp outside parliament for the rest of the existence of the United Kingdom.

Other protests followed, as entirely organic and grassroots activism demanded "limited" and "careful" reintroductions of censorship and safety laws which had existed under the EU. Though these were often carefully worded to avoid any association with the former, deposed regime. In fact, since 2043, school textbooks had been rewritten to "give a clearer picture" of the EU years. Some mistakes crept into these books, and it seemed as if the freedoms the revolutionaries of 2014 had been demanding were actually EU policies, and vice-versa. Unfortunately 30,000,000 books had already been printed, and the government could simply not afford to correct and reprint them. It was left to teachers to point out the errors, though guidance on how and when to do this was not issued, due to "prohibitive" printing costs. Copy and pasting an email to them all was also considered too expensive.

The true foundation of the British Republic came when, one summer holiday, a botched attempt at weather control brought freezing rain to the south coast. Holidaymakers enjoying the beaches hadn't bought coats with them, and rioted, looting shops. They began to chant that it was the government's duty to provide warm clothes in the event of such unexpected weather. Leading the chants were groups of female police officers and soldiers who were on large, organised holiday trips. The entirely organic and grasroots nature of this protest surprised the government in York, who fumbled the situation badly. Before long, the protesters had linked up with the MASS movement and stormed both parliament and Balmoral. The elderly King William V was dragged out and bludgeoned to death in an "extreme reaction". Cooler heads prevailed at parliament, where most MP's were spared, and merely sent to house arrest.

With the declaration of the British Republic, the first act was to hunt down and punish other members of the Royal Family. The MP's who had been sent to house arrest were, in time, given "compensation" in the form of the money once paid to the Royal Family. The Royal Palaces were converted into desperately-needed tenement housing, and more blocks constructed on what had once been royal parkland. Oddly, this included parkland which was open for the public to enjoy.

Policies

The new government of the British Republic instituted wide-ranging reforms, creating a "truly cradle to gave" model of "state care". Critics saw this policy as increasingly depriving British people of free will. These critics were branded "flat-earthers" by an apparent majority of the British population. Hate speech laws were reintroduced and reinforced, though under the title of "spreading panic" through "conspiracy theories". The term "conspiracy theory" had, by this time, become a generic term for "anything counter to the government's preferred narrative", even if it has nothing to do with a conspiracy.

Also reintroduced was widespread CCTV surveillance. Though "only to catch serious criminals", and certainly not to "monitor people", that evil action which had been done by the EU. The government had a harder time bringing back compulsory self-driving cars, but did "encourage" people to put their cars in automatic mode through tracking which mode was being used, and providing discounted road tax for every kilometre travelled in automatic mode.