The Friday Blog: Interesting and Hard to Fathom
People have done some interesting, hard to fathom on the face of it, things this week. On and off the field you might say. Novak Djokovic lost his serve and his temper and dispatched a tennis ball into the throat of a line judge. He was promptly disqualified from the US Open. Two promising young soccer players decided that it was ok to invite some local admirers into the bio bubble that was the England team hotel in Iceland. Highly lucrative international careers are now on hold. With his opponents needing 18 runs from 12 balls, and Josh Butler and Moeen Ali at the crease, the Australian cricket captain, Aaron Finch, opted to deploy his leg spinner and gifted England a first ever bi-lateral T20 series win against its oldest and fiercest rivals. And Her Majesty’s Government introduced legislation, that, if it exercised some of the powers therein, would break international law. That last sentence sounds like a massive slight and might, ordinarily, have you writing in complaining about bias, not that I have any political affiliations. But they have admitted it. And admitted it on the floor of the House of Commons, captured by TV cameras and forevermore imprinted in Hansard.
If Channel 5 airs “When Ministerial Questions Go Horribly Wrong,” number one in the chart will be Brandon Lewis, the Northern Ireland Secretary, replying to Tory MP Bob Neill on Tuesday. “Yes, this does break international law in a very specific and limited way. We’re taking the powers to disapply the EU law concept of direct effect … in a certain very tightly defined circumstance.” Wow! Did he really say that? It is worth looking up the clip, not least to see the incredulous reaction of backbenchers. So, it is ok to break the law, as long as you do it in a very specific and limited way. I am going to remember that one. Should the need ever arise. His Shadow, Louise Haigh, could not believe her luck. She even quoted Margaret Thatcher. The UK does not renounce international treaties. You might argue that Lewis was at least trying to be honest, but a little research points more to haplessness. Social media is full of incandescent Tory Brexiters and blatantly sniggering journos pointing out that Article 16 of the Northern Ireland protocol offers the U.K. protections against the EU behaving in an unreasonable manner. It might, they argue, have been better for the Government if this was the line poor old Brandon had pursued.
Your opinion of the move will be shaped by your persuasion and your most trusted media source. The press pack covered the full gamut, from merely a necessary tidying up of potential loose ends in the event of a no deal, to a wilful reneging on an international agreement already signed, something that would irrevocably damage the reputation of the UK as a trusted partner in any future agreement with anyone else. The Sun did its usual, brilliant bit for Britain and blamed it all on Michel Barnier. Some fears appeared to be realised when the U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, commented that “If the U.K. violates that international treaty and Brexit undermines the Good Friday accord, there will be absolutely no chance of a U.S.-U.K. trade agreement passing the Congress. The Good Friday Agreement is treasured by the American people and will be proudly defended in the United States Congress.” All over Europe there are mutterings that this is betraying the UK’s real desire to leave with no deal, which is probably true of European Research Group types, who will make the argument, not actually unreasonably, that it would represent the purest form of Brexit. Walk away, rip everything up and start again. I think that is probably what a lot of people thought they voted for in the first place.
In truth, the Internal Market Bill was due anyway, consultation on how the devolved nations interacted with each other took place over the summer, but it was taken as read that because the Northern Ireland protocol had been agreed, the Province would be treated differently to the rest of the UK. It is worth reflecting that the arrangement offers significant advantages, Northern Ireland having unfettered access to both the EU and UK markets, and a thought that Belfast could become a powerhouse for international regulation. The, I presume, change, puts a different slant on things, and led to the resignation of Jonathan Jones, the senior civil servant in the Government’s legal department, on Tuesday morning. Jones, apparently, simply could not reconcile differences of opinion on plans to override parts of the Withdrawal Agreement with his boss, the Attorney General. The European Commission took it seriously enough to send its Vice President for Inter-institutional Relations and Foresight, Maroš Šefčovič, for urgent talks with Michael Gove. I think that this was one occasion on which the irony that the meeting took place at the same time as negotiations between Barnier and Frost continued, was not lost on anybody. I am not sure that the meeting went that well, Gove was unrepentant, and the EU is talking about legal action against the UK and demanding the legislation is withdrawn by the end of the month.
But before we all get too excited, we should perhaps remember that all this is happening during a negotiating period, and negotiating periods have deadlines. The PM’s statement that unless we agree a deal by 15th October, the UK will walk away from talks, should remind us of that. It may have sounded assertive and significant, but it was nothing we did not already know. If you do the count back from D Day (31st December) to allow time for any agreement to be ratified by both UK and EU Parliaments, and fit in with existing meeting schedules you alight on the mid-October EU Summit. But thanks anyway Prime Minister.
The negotiations, which started again on Tuesday, are always difficult to read. Media reports seldom seem to match official statements, and insiders have consistently painted a more optimistic picture than observers. That said, as I write there is little sign of progress in London over the past couple of days. And it must be serious, because Laura Kuenssberg has come out of hiding and is hijacking my TV screen again. We seem to be down to two issues, State Aid and the fish. I have spoken a lot about the fish on here, probably too much, but that is a reflection of the topic itself. In terms of absolute pounds and euros, it is tiny, but it is also massively symbolic. It featured heavily in the Referendum campaign, fleets from the West of Cornwall to the North of Scotland flying “Leave” insignia. And then there is the thing we keep coming back to. Sovereignty. Rule Britannia. Britannia rules the waves. In the end the delta is so small that some sort of agreement must be possible, and most us would not notice anyway. Some communities, like my own in West Cornwall, would be ravaged if tariffs impacted trade with the EU, where 80% of what is landed ends up. But if our fishing fleet were to disappear, the man on the Clapham Omnibus would still get his fish supper, and the man on the Manchester tram his chippy tea.
The State Aid thing does have me scratching my head a bit. We have seen massive amounts of it over the past few months, in all countries, and nobody seems to be breaking EU State Aid rules. From the furlough scheme to eat out to help out via a voucher to mend your bike, it is all State Aid.
Elsewhere, trade negotiations continue and there has been some quiet progress in far away places. A deal with Japan was sealed this morning and some astute observers from overseas had said to me for some time that a focus on Australia, New Zealand and Japan was smart, because it offered the prospect of joining the CPTPP (Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership), one of the world’s largest and most dynamic free trade areas.
International Trade Secretary, Liz Truss, alongside the current chair of the CPTPP Commission, Mexican Economy Minister Graciela Márquez Colin, opened discussions between senior UK trade officials and Chief Negotiators from all 11 members of the Partnership to discuss potential UK accession.
This is the first time the UK has met with Chief Negotiators from all 11 members of the Partnership, and the first time CPTPP members have had such a discussion with a country seeking membership since the Partnership was created in 2018.
I also took some comfort from the fact that there has been a huge surge in applications for nursing and other healthcare related degrees. These are from the young people that we are blaming for not taking COVID seriously and putting the rest of us at risk. At a similar stage of my life, I would probably have looked at healthcare and thought “forget that, it is too dangerous.” That so many, inspired, doubtless, by the NHS, are stepping forward is cause for much optimism. There is not much else. The Pubs might start being shut down again and Christmas appears to have been cancelled already. We should seek solace wherever we can.
