For over a year now the Johnson government’s response to Covid and its handling of Brexit have not just occurred in parallel but have exhibited numerous parallels. This week’s ‘freedom day’ fiasco is the latest example, with its blind insistence on meeting an arbitrary pre-set date having echoes of, amongst other things, the mulish obstinacy … Read more
This will be a slightly shorter post than usual. That’s partly because this week I’ve been working on the proofs of my forthcoming book, Brexit Unfolded. How no one got what they wanted (and why they were never going to). Yes, that is a shameless plug – it will be published by Biteback in June … Read more
We’re now a couple of months into actual Brexit, in the sense of the end of the transition period, although still only in the first phase of complete implementation of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA). That is because there are some grace periods for aspects of the arrangements for the Irish Sea border and … Read more
The electronic ink had hardly dried on my previous post which finished with a reminder that unexpected events are always liable to arise than just such an event occurred. During a very confused few hours last Friday evening the EU first proposed and then withdrew the proposal to impose export controls on coronavirus vaccines moving … Read more
The stories of Brexit disruption catalogued in my last few posts continue apace, not least because firms which had built up stockpiles in anticipation of the end of the transition period are now starting to replenish them. However, remaining stockpiles and the new* trade barriers, plus the pandemic, mean that freight movements between the UK … Read more
The last ten days were supposed to be my break from Brexit hence, as trailed two weeks ago, there was no post on this blog last Friday. But escaping did not prove easy, gloomily conscious as I was of taking my first trip to the EU since Britain ceased to be a member and my … Read more
With the last week of talks prior to the end of June cut-off for agreeing an extension finishing today, there is no sign (£) of progress towards a deal and no sign of UK willingness to extend the Transition Period. At the end of the first week of talks, just as coronavirus was beginning to … Read more
The Brexit process is in another of its periodic ‘lull before the storm’ moments. So this will be quite a boring post, but at least it’s fairly short. There were no talks scheduled this week but next week, when they resume, will be the last negotiations before a decision on whether to extend the Transition … Read more
There are numerous obvious connections between Brexit and the Dominic Cummings lockdown affair that has dominated the last few days. For one thing, the very existence of the present government is down to Brexit, its composition is based on the central test of Brexit loyalty, and its advisers, from Cummings downwards, came from the old … Read more
It is now increasingly clear that there is a complex web of interconnections between Brexit and responses to the coronavirus crisis. I have been writing about that on this blog since the beginning of March (and especially here and here) which I mention not as a boast for any perspicacity on my part but just … Read more