But there's no representation on the EU standards bodies at all, and realistically there are two kinds of standard manufacturers tend to care about: US (mostly UL) and CE.

The EU's standards often just transcribe the standards agreed at a global level, though [1]

[1] https://ec.europa.eu/growth/sectors/automotive/legislation/u...

Often != Always, though.

Losing the ability to affect these European standards is a price to pay, Brexit being one big trade-off after all. But I'm still unclear on what the advantages are that make it worth it.

You need a certain amount of heft to have your way in standards bodies. 500m people in the EU vs 65m in the UK ...

Plus global standards are now being derived from EU standards.

That 500 million includes the UK...

Because like a human is less influential than a country, so is a country less influential than 28 countries.

28 countries that can barely agree that the sun rises every day

Which is why you need a formal political process! If everyone already agreed on everything then there wouldn't be much point

That's hardly an unreasonable situation given that it very much depends on where you are in the world and what time of year it is.

The wider point here being that of course they don't agree on "basic" matters - neither does everybody within a single country.