A few weeks ago I wrote about how, with public opinion now firmly settling to the view that Brexit has been an economically damaging failure, Brexiter ideologues were out in force to claim that this was just a new ‘Project Fear’. Typically this either came from, or drew upon the analysis of, the small group … Read more
Brexit is in one of its periodic doldrums. That’s not to say that all the ongoing problems and miseries it has created have abated, or that the almost daily reminders of them have ceased. And of course the perennially unresolved Northern Ireland Protocol row continues. More of the same What also continues is the rather … Read more
In recent years, my pattern has been to post on this blog once a week. But occasionally, if an issue of particular importance comes up, I write an extra one, as today. I’m also doing so out of sheer frustration. The issue is that of the delays and queues at Dover and Folkestone. The frustration … Read more
As the dust begins to settle on Boris Johnson’s downfall, it’s worth emphasizing that it was inextricably bound up with Brexit even though Brexit wasn’t its direct cause. Unusually and fittingly, it was his character and conduct rather than any particular policy which ended his premiership. Not, I think, because the Tory Party had some … Read more
We’re now six years on from the referendum, but I’m not going to do an ‘anniversary round-up post’ because I did that in April, to mark six years since the campaign got underway. That post was entitled ‘six years of failure’, and most of it still applies, although the saga of the Northern Ireland Protocol … Read more
From time to time I lose motivation to write this blog or even to continue following Brexit developments. It’s not as if there aren’t plenty of other things to write about and to care about. But invariably such moods are ended by reading something which immediately re-ignites my anger, irritation or astonishment about the sheer … Read more
A few weeks ago I wrote about what seemed to be an emergent ‘admission-yet-denial’ phenomenon amongst Brexiters. It was prompted by Rishi Sunak’s remark that the damage done by Brexit to trade with the EU was “inevitable”, whilst simultaneously brushing it aside as if unimportant. This phenomenon is also illustrated by recent statements from Jacob … Read more
This week, in one of his regular and excellent analyses of the Ukraine War, Sir Lawrence Freedman, Emeritus Professor of War Studies at King’s College London, makes an interesting observation about Vladmir Putin. His background is that of a spy, rather than soldier, and as such he “has an instinct for the covert, the fabricated … Read more
“Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practise to deceive” Sir Walter Scott In an article this week the Guardian columnist Nesrine Malik neatly skewered the present political situation in the UK. Referring to Brexit amongst other things, she wrote that “an entire government has been built on fantasy and false promises” and … Read more
There is a line, attributed to the mathematician G.H. Hardy, that “if the Archbishop of Canterbury says he believes in God, that’s all in the way of business, but if he says he doesn’t, one can take it he means what he says”. What, then, of the claim that “the hopes of those who voted … Read more