Luvvie rues everything since Brexit

It has all gone downhill for A Horowitz, a writer,  and 'the author of the Alex Rider novels', according to el Garun, in a lament that recaps the stitching together of moral issues that the press and media have been undertaking so carefully (and sometimes not very carefully): Brexit/Boris/moral decline:

Britain’s decision to leave the EU made him “very personally upset”....he could not name anything that had made his life better since Brexit. “But it’s not only that. I’ve been so upset by the anger and division,” he said. “At the end of the day, we all lost because we’re so against each other even all these years later.”...he “can’t understand” the current government’s actions.Politicians have been saying things recently that are “blindingly, obviously untrue”, Horowitz said. He expressed dismay that despite the fact the public has seen photos and heard evidence, the government was willing to deny having gone to any illegal parties, and that others backed them up....

 

An old luvvie claim:

 

“And what I have now realised is that nowadays, the only place you can find truth is in fiction.”

 

Yet he is not fully at home in the new petite bourgeoisie yet, still not ready to subscribe to the Guardian or watch C4 News:

Yet the writer still has relatively Conservative views when it comes to social justice. When asked what his thoughts were on “cancel culture”, Horowitz said he was “very, very scared”. The author, who claimed in 2017 that he had been “warned off” writing black characters in his children’s books, said he thought there was a “culture of fear” in the children’s publishing world in particular. He said he was shocked by the notes his publisher gave him about things he “could or couldn’t say” in his most recent book.

Over here and overdoing it

 It has not started that well, according to the Guardina today:

‘One-sided’: unionists react with scorn as US delegation arrives in Ireland

Unionists have responded with scorn and scepticism to a US congressional delegation that is attempting to shore up support for the Northern Ireland protocol.

That seems pretty blatant, even for the GHraun -- not seeking agreement then, but shoring up the Protocol

The Democratic Unionist party (DUP) led accusations on Monday that the nine-strong delegation, which includes Democrats and Republicans from the House of Representatives and Senate, was partisan and out of touch..... “We’re going to have a particular challenge with Congressman Neal,” he said, referring to Richard Neal, the chair of the ways and means committee....[see the previous post for grounds for this suspicion] Others such as Jamie Bryson, a prominent loyalist, went further and accused Neal, an ally of President Joe Biden, of supporting the IRA. “We aren’t going to be dictated to by some foreign politician acting as a surrogate for republicanism,” he tweeted.

So have they met both sides in equal proportion so far?

The delegation met the Sinn Féin leader, Mary Lou McDonald, and the taoiseach, Micheál Martin, on Monday. Both lauded the visitors, reflecting a united front between Dublin and Washington on the protocol....The delegation is scheduled to meet DUP leaders before returning to the US on Wednesday.

What of the Unionist case?

In public and private, unionists have accused the Americans of refusing to recognise that the protocol is rejected by most unionists and thus undermines the Good Friday agreement....On Sunday Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader, said the delegation’s call for full implementation of the protocol was folly. “Implementing the protocol in full means ending grace periods, with an economic tsunami hitting Northern Ireland. Power-sharing only works with cross-community consensus.”

It all reminds me of the intervention by B Obama in the Brexit debate, urging all sensible people to remain -- that did not end well either, and looked a bit like some foreign politician acting as a surrogate etc

 

 

Over here -- the Yanks are coming...

 Says el gruniad

US delegation arrives in Europe for talks on Northern Ireland and Brexit

Neal [Chair of Ways and Means Ctte of Senate and leader of the delegation] has already made his displeasure known over the government’s plan to draft legislation to remove parts of the Northern Ireland protocol from the Brexit treaty despite warnings it could risk a full trade war with the EU.

[The] US... is acting as co-guarantor of the 1998 Good Friday agreement....“My purpose is manifold but we really want to reaffirm America’s unwavering commitment to the Good Friday agreement and to remind everybody that on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, it has worked splendidly,” he said.

But he told the Guardian his mission was to defuse tensions and help broker a UK-EU deal....He said it was important to pull back from the brink of unilateral action to breach the Brexit treaty.

This seems to imply that he sees the UK threat to take unilateral action as the only threat to the Good Friday Agreement, the standard EU line, of course

Shadow Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Kyle, said the US visit should be a welcome interjection given the Democratic Unionist party threats not to return to power-sharing until the new laws on the protocol were enacted....“The UK government is unable to provide the stability or platform for which political differences can be settled, so therefore it falls to another country.”

Again, changing the Protocol as a way of settling political differences and restoring stability is just rejected.Only EU policy will bring stability? The US delegation will persuade the DUP and otgher anti-Protocol groups to stop being so silly?

Their arrival coincides with a warning by Ireland’s deputy prime minister Leo Varadkar that the British position on Brexit was causing such divisions in Northern Ireland it would backfire and “weaken” the union.

This has been the EU line all along, of course. It was German policy once to deliberately 'weaken the Union' to punish the UK, although they denied it.

The delegation will also visit Ventry in Kerry, the birthplace of Neal’s maternal family, the Garveys, to meet with an agriculture delegation travelling to the Eastern States Exposition in September.

Let us hope that family feeling/fashionable imagined identity doesn't cloud his judgment. Like Biden,he might turn out to have English ancestors too?

 

 

Graun tells us what is 'just not true'

 El Grun today is awash with stories about the latest developments in the struggles over the NI Protocol, the Government threats to introduce new legislation, the EU threats to retaliate with a new trade war (presumably one that only takes 'proportionate measures' I assume), and all kinds of outraged spokespersons bloviating about how Britain cannot break its word internationally or risk world-wide ostracism. The BBC usually reminds us at every turn that Johnson signed the deal in the first place, and used slogans like 'oven ready' and all that.

One especially interesting story has the following unusually definite headline:

The Northern Ireland protocol is said to be a blight on regional economy. That’s just not true

Not true! Fancy! From the Gradinua! What can they mean? Not partaking in the regime of truth established by colonial epistemic whiteness? Not judged as true by the collective judgment of communities of indigenous people? Something more conventional it seems -- but a mess awaits...

Whenever Boris Johnson’s government wades into battle over the Northern Ireland protocol, it wields one assertion like a broadsword: that the protocol is ruining the region’s economy....The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), a rightwing thinktank, joined the fray last week with a report that estimated the annual cost of the agreement at £850m....“It underlines the many costs of the current situation – economic, fiscal, and in trade diversion,” said David Frost, the government’s former Brexit negotiator. “If the EU will not negotiate, then the government will be right to intervene unilaterally to restore stability.”

Lots of dog-whistles there  -- right wing, David Frost -- but just in case, the Graun makes it clear.

The problem with this justification for slashing the protocol – and risking a trade war with the EU – is that it is bogus. A growing body of evidence suggests Northern Ireland has adapted and started to profit from its new situation, with the benefits of full access to the EU single market and the rest of the UK outweighing the costs of administering checks on some goods entering the region from Great Britain.

Bogus! What is this 'growing body of evidence' then that exposes the IEA so comprehensively?

 “Every piece of evidence presented so far shows a positive impact,” said Stephen Kelly, head of Manufacturing Northern Ireland (MNI).... “Our members have largely gotten to grips with it. Three-quarters of them say there are opportunities and [they] are grasping those opportunities.”...Kelly called the IEA report “bunkum” – an extrapolation from a handful of businesses that overlooks wider evidence. MNI estimates the annual cost of administering protocol-related checks at £200m. This is dwarfed by Northern Ireland’s extra £1bn in trade with the Republic, plus its extra trade, yet to be calculated, with other EU countries, said Kelly

Presumably, Kelly has actually asked his members and obtained more than 'a handful' of responses? They are more representative than the sample drawn by the IEA? They see the costs of the Protocol as simply the costs of administering it? Their data on 'extra trade' allows for obvious matter like recovery  after covid? 

Other sources cited ion the article are a bit more confused about the 'truth':

Stuart Anderson, a spokesperson for Northern Ireland’s Chamber of Commerce, said the protocol affected different sectors in different ways, good and bad, and that overall business sentiment was positive. “We’re seeing an improving picture. About 65% of members say despite initial headaches they have adapted well,” he said. Just 8% of members reported serious problems....Anderson said it was difficult to say if the protocol was a net plus or minus since its costs blurred into global supply chain costs.

 The Graun continues:

A report by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research last week said Northern Ireland’s economic output had slightly outperformed the UK average. “This is partly an outcome of the Northern Irish protocol and its special status in the Brexit arrangements, including better trade and investment conditions as part of the EU’s single market and customs union,” it said. “Closer links with the EU, through trade and also potentially labour mobility, have benefited Northern Ireland post-Brexit.”..

There are two caveats. One is that the protocol has not been fully implemented: more extensive and rigorous checks on British goods entering Northern Ireland would increase costs and disruption.

The other is that the political battles over the protocol playing out in London, Brussels and Northern Ireland, where devolved government has collapsed, are hurting the region

 So -- have we got to the truth or not?

Guardian Explainer illustrates Guardian balance

 The Graun is trying for balance, at least for the patient reader. The less patient will find leading points, and there is quite a bit of dog-whistle and evasion:

What has happened now?

The UK foreign secretary, Liz Truss, issued a strongly worded and lengthy broadside against the EU late on Tuesday night criticising proposals it made last October to relax checks on goods crossing from Great Britain into Northern Ireland.

She said the proposals “would worsen the current trading arrangements and lead to everyday items disappearing from shelves” and lead to “other unacceptable burdens on business”....

She said Lincolnshire sausages and other chilled meats would need a veterinary certificate to enter Northern Ireland, sending a parcel to Northern Ireland would require more than 50 fields of information for customs declarations and there “would be powers to search people’s bags for food, like ham sandwiches, on departure from the ferry to Northern Ireland”.

She also said pet owners would need to pay £280 for certificates and jabs for their dogs or cats “just to go on holiday in the UK”.

And finally that VAT reliefs such as the recent energy saver could not be applied in Northern Ireland, “despite posing no risk to the EU single market”.

The Graun offers only thin reassurance:

Haven’t we heard all this before?...Yes, most of it. Recall the row over the Great British banger?

What are we supposed to conclude here exactly? It will all be a storm in a teacup? What exactly was this 'row'? Then:

Truss also protested that composite foods such as “Thai green curry ready meals, New Zealand lamb and Brazilian pork” could disappear from the shelves if the protocol was applied in full.

The Graun's response:

Remember the row about chlorinated chicken coming into the UK from the US? The Thai green curry example raises the same issue for the EU and goes to the heart of the protocol checks. They were agreed to ensure that third country goods – whether it was unregulated meat from South America or the US or counterfeit goods from China – could not slip into Ireland or the single market via Northern Ireland.

The Graun seems to be arguing that 'Thai green curry' literally gets imported from Thailand, that meat produced under regulations different from EU ones is  'unregulated', and that it poses the same risk as counterfeit goods. The whole thing repeats the rather flimsy claim that NI will become an unregulated gateway for massive imports into the rest of Europe, of course.

Finally:

What does the EU say?

Last October the EU offered to scrap 80% of Northern Ireland food checks and 50% of customs checks in four discussion papers it called “far-reaching” and a “new model” for the protocol.

It also repeatedly offered a deal to eliminate food checks if the UK agreed to maintain equivalent food standards as the EU. This was rejected in the overall trade deal as it could have raised a barrier in trade deals with the US and other countries with different food standards. But the EU offered the UK a bespoke deal for Northern Ireland that would have resulted in physical checks on food scrapped under an equivalence deal which would be reviewed in the event of a US trade deal. [I really don't understand that last sentence]

How did the UK react?

The then Brexit secretary, Lord Frost, claimed the “far-reaching” proposals were nothing of the sort – arguing the 50% reduction in customs checks was merely a reduction in 50% of the number of boxes vendors had to check when sending goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

He also demanded the role of the European court of justice as the arbiter in any potential disputes was changed.

The last point seems quite important really -- odd it has been left until last.

 

 

 

UK Government stance on Northern Ireland Protocol reveals plot to support Russia

Yet another in the series of ideological moral panics skillfully joining several issues of the day to make one dubious smear.  According to the Graub

UK’s threat to Northern Ireland protocol is boost to Putin, say EU insiders

Brussels officials ‘flabbergasted’ at timing of statement, which risks undermining international alliance

Much more than the indecision and division about Russian fuel supplies among EU members? 

European Union insiders have warned that the British government’s threat to abandon parts of the Northern Ireland protocol risks undermining the international alliance against Vladimir Putin.... [and, just to remind us of an older threat] UK efforts to secure participation in the EU’s research programme Horizon 2020 and secure other agreements.

The return of an old favourite smear too:

“The chaotic messaging doesn’t suggest they know themselves where they [UK Government] want to take this,” the [EU] person added.

However,  the normally decisive and ultra-prepared EC looks a bit wrong-footed too on this occasion

“The unilateral action looks like it would go further than article 16, but we don’t have anything agreed [in response] [original punctuation] said an EU official.

Unionist cat among Remainer pigeons as ever

 A self-explanatory story from el Gruna today really, with their own twist of course

UK will do ‘whatever necessary’ to reform Northern Ireland Brexit protocol, says minister

Raab warns stability in Northern Ireland is being ‘imperilled’ by dispute over protocol agreed by Johnson

 

A little Graun reminder at the end of the subheading to point to the idiot to blame, of course

After a resounding election victory for Sinn Féin, the DUP has said it cannot take up its position as deputy first minister until Brexit checks on goods entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain are removed. [Although} ...Lewis told the BBC’s Sunday Politics Northern Ireland programme the election results were “significant”, but pointed out that the three unionist parties still have more seats than nationalists.

 However, overall:

 “If you look at the results in Northern Ireland, 58% fully of people voted either for parties who support the union or for parties who do not support constitutional change and that is the message from the people of Northern Ireland,” Raab told Sky News.

Still not quite what the Graun hoped for then