Introduction As we have left the EU, the “trivial” task of negotiating the Withdrawal Agreement (WA) is done. It is now a legally binding international treaty, including the Irish Protocol. We now move onto the far more complex future relationship talks. It always seemed impossible that the talks could be concluded successfully within the 10-month… Read more
Category:
European Union
A Fond Farewell to the UK from an EU27 Citizen? Part IV – class, racism and militarisation
Introduction In part I, I discussed origins, in part II three obvious differences between the UK and Ireland and in part III three differences which were less obvious. The final three, discussed in this post are ones whose power I had underestimated and thought were declining. The Royal Family, Class and Accents Racism and the… Read more
A Fond Farewell to the UK from an EU27 Citizen? Part III – politics, history and greatness
Introduction In part I, I discussed origins and in part II of this series three obvious differences between the UK and Ireland, which ultimately made Brexit more likely. The next three took longer to process: Political Culture and Structures Empire, WWII and Fake History Big vs. Small Country Syndrome First: Politically Ireland had a very… Read more
Is No Deal is vastly Under Priced and will the Johnson Government Ditch the Backstop?
Introduction The Johnson premiership has begun. The tortuously negotiated Withdrawal Agreement (WA) is hated by the new government. There are contradictory signals, and it is unsure what changes could be made to make the WA acceptable to HMG. We seem to have moved from a time limit on the Backstop to no Backstop. Even if… Read more
What a state we’re in
I see Fintan O’Toole is, again, pointing out the inconsistencies and logical failures of the two remaining prospective Conservative Party leaders. Indeed, as he implies, if there were actually a technological solution to the ‘Irish backstop’ then they do not need to bother their not so pretty little heads about it. Because a border without… Read more
Is the Euro China’s secret weapon?
It seems to have received little attention but, last week, Portugal successfully raised finance by issuing so called Panda bonds in Chinese currency. This is a country in the Euro issuing bonds in a foreign currency and in a Chinese one at that. According to the Madrid based EU affairs news website ‘South EU Summit’:… Read more
European Tactical Voting Advice
In case any readers have not subscribed, the following is the advice contained in an email from ‘Remain Voter‘ for tactical voting in order to ensure the best opportunity for additional winning remain candidates in every UK Euro constituency: Here is your voting recommendation for Thursday’s EU Election vote. First, 3 things 1 – Get… Read more
Labour dissonance
An interesting Labour leaflet arrived on my doormat yesterday announcing that “Labour (MEP) candidates in the South West believe in giving people a say….. there must be another public vote …” At last: But closer inspection (bottom right – click to enlarge) of the leaflet shows it is in fact, being promoted by USDAW in… Read more
The European Parliament: the Parties
Fig. 1 The distribution of seats in the European Parliament This is the second of a series of posts on the European Parliament. The first discussed the two Proportional Representation methods used in the UK. Fig. 1 shows the groupings with in the European Parliament (EP) in October 2018. The historical composition of the EP… Read more
Your country needs me
As we now know that English is pretty much the lingua franca (a good – imported – English phrase!) of the EU we also know that they have a deep understanding of (the idiocies of) current British politics. We are negotiating with ourselves in full sight of our fellow negotiators. It is some evidence of… Read more