Brexit not 'a disaster' shock

 The Graun clings to credibility (and readability, although I wouldn't pay for it) by continuing to employ the blessed L Elliott who defies them with pieces like this:

I’ve got news for those who say Brexit is a disaster: it isn’t. That’s why rejoining is just a pipe dream

 any successful [rejoining] campaign would need to do two things: convince voters that the UK economy had become a basket case since the Brexit vote and that life for those still in the club was so much better.

Neither criterion has been met. Britain’s economic performance in the seven years since 2016 has been mediocre but not the full-on horror show that was prophesied by the remain camp during the weeks leading up to the referendum. The doomsday scenario – crashing house prices (falls of up to 18% could result, warned then chancellor George Osborne) and mass unemployment – never happened.

there have been signs of the economy adjusting. Nissan’s decision to invest more than £1bn in its Sunderland plant with the intention of building three new electric car models is an example of that. Microsoft’s £2.5bn investment in the growing UK AI sector is another.

That’s not to say that the process is complete. Brexit provided opportunities to do things differently but those opportunities have so far not been exploited

Covid-19 scarred the economy deeply and the long-term costs of ill health and children missing out on school will grow over time. Even so, Brexit Britain has recovered more strongly than either France or Germany from the pandemic. Relative performance matters. The rejoin camp tends not to focus on what is happening on the other side of the Channel, and it is not hard to see why.... Over a prolonged period, not just since the arrival of Covid-19, the EU’s economic performance has been woeful.

A number of factors are to blame for the EU’s economic woes. The one-size-fits-all nature of the single currency is one; the lack of a federal budget to match in size that of the US is another; the adherence to neoliberal economic ideas– such as tough controls on the size of budget deficits – a third. The problems go right to the heart of the EU.

at the same time as its economy has struggled, the number of migrants has increased. One result has been the rise of aggressively rightwing politics...Something has gone seriously awry when politics in four of the founding members of the European project have turned so ugly....Sweden and Finland have both seen the emergence of ultranationalist rightwing parties....Britain is one of the relatively few European countries to buck this trend.

Throughout the whole campaign, a major silence was maintained on what  the EU could offer exactly, at least once the original Great Lie was nailed -- that the EU made a net contribution to the UK, generously funding community renewal projects all over the country. The myth remained that the EU was the source of economic prosperity, but even the Europeans doubted that could continue. 

 

That left only the romantic myth of 'Europe' as some blessed community based on British cultural cringe and memories of nice holidays.That might still energise apparent 'support' among the UK young for rejoining, although even el Graun is sceptical that it will lead to any actual politics.

 

Er...Brexit?...Wha?....gimme pencil...where do I put the X?...doh!

 News from the Times today ( subscription required). It is a cracker and I have mostly just reproduced it

The cleverer people are, the more likely they were to vote to stay in the European Union, a study has found.

Among those Britons in the top 10 per cent by a measure of cognitive performance, 73 per cent voted remain in 2016. Among those in the bottom 10 per cent, only 40 per cent did....

The relationship persisted, albeit less strongly, even when taking into account factors such as income, education and age, implying that it was not solely a reflection of cultural effects. It also remained when the scientists looked at couples in which husbands and wives voted in different ways. The remain-voting partner was, they found, more likely to do better on cognitive tests.

There is one bit I don't get -- could be a typo or something?:

According to the findings, only the cleverest third of leave voters would be classed as of above average intelligence among [compared to those among?] remain voters.

Chris Dawson, from the University of Bath — a remain voter — said that people should be wary of interpreting his findings. “People shouldn’t get angry with this, or joyful, depending on who they voted for,” he said. “This is about differences at a population level. If you drew two random people who voted leave or remain, it says very little about differences that might exist between those people.”

Very cautious here then -- not so cautious at the end .

The results came from analysing an on-running longitudinal study called Understanding Society. Since 2009 this has been following a nationally representative sample of households, collecting a wealth of data, including their performance on a suite of standardised tests. These tests involved assessments of reasoning, working memory and numeracy. More recently, it added questions about how people voted in the 2016 referendum.

Dawson and his colleagues looked at 3,183 couples involved in the study.

They also looked at the 463 heterosexual married couples who had voted in different ways but had managed to get through the referendum without divorcing. The fact that Brexit voting half [the Brexit voter?] in these couples was also on average the poorer cognitive performer was especially interesting, Dawson said. “If you have people living in the same household, having the same experiences of living in the UK, it controls for so much.” [so much other than cognitive performance?] 

Bit vague about which study provided the data, whether they were averaged from both etc. I might look it up. There is also the issue of  the standardised test, of course, and what other data they gathered...

Other scientists warned that although the study did appear to find a link between intelligence [same as what was measured by the test?] and voting intention [as opposed to actual voting behaviour?], it could not be used to say definitively that it was causal — that the reason people voted leave was because they were less clever....

“There’s an obvious temptation, perhaps particularly if one takes a certain set of views about the referendum, the campaign and its outcome, to assume that the finding of an association between measures of cognitive ability and the way people voted in the Brexit referendum means that having lower cognitive ability caused people to be more likely to vote Leave,” Kevin McConway, emeritus professor of statistics at the Open University, said. “While this research doesn’t rule that possibility out, it certainly can’t establish that it’s true.”

Establishing causality, rather than only correlation, is a standard problem with observational studies such as this. “People who voted in different ways in the referendum differed in a great number of respects other than their cognitive ability,” McConway said. “Some of those other differences may have been correlated with cognitive ability, but not caused by cognitive ability.”

Even so, Dawson said, in his view there were plausible reasons that intelligence may have been be one factor. “It’s an uncomfortable thing to say, but I think it’s important to be said. We have increasing amounts of fake news and it’s getting more and more sophisticated.”

[Dawson] said there was evidence that misinformation had played a role in the Brexit vote, and that cognitive ability was one factor determining whether people could spot fake news.

This is not tested as such though in the items specified?

 “This suggests that something we all have to live with is essentially the result of people being able to spread fake information and fake promises that some people just couldn’t distinguish from reality.”

 A major speculation here, which ties things up really nicely, joining suspicions that Leave voters are thick and nasty (and racist) with the stuff about fake news and fake promises on the bus and all that

 

 

 

A peep behind the scenes with the Observer

I am resisting the paranoia that sees every twist in UK politics as moves in the vendetta against Brexiteers in the Government. Certainly,some prominent ones have come to grief lately -- P Shore has been enmenshed in a sex scandal, and S Braverman has been dismissed as a Minister, ostensibly for opopsing the Government's immigration policy. Meanwhile the slimy abnd definitely dodgy D Cameron has been brought back as Foreign Secretary, having been made a Lord first because no-one actually voted for him as an MP, or probably would.

A piece in the Observer fills in the blanks, rather triumphantly, and under a slightly strange heading. It is nice and 'balanced' -- that is pretty speculative...

Britain still needs post-Brexit deals - but has the EU moved on?

many [in the EU are] seeing the new foreign secretary David Cameron as the latest step in a rapprochement...Another senior diplomat adds: “David Cameron was very useful for Germany, because the UK could play the role of mediator in rows over the budget with France.”...Among senior officials there is a mood of anticipation about what someone of his international stature will bring to UK-EU relations.

However..

But in reality there is little chance of the trade deal being improved or re-opened, whether Cameron remains in the Foreign Office after the next general election or a Labour minister takes over...

See-sawing back again,and the usual crap about the many, the some, 'among', 'sources'...

Some see alignment already happening at government level, citing the recent reversal of plans for a new UK safety mark to replace the bloc’s CE badge...Sources point to how quickly a corner was turned in UK-EU relations when Sunak and former foreign secretary James Cleverly took office last autumn...

And again...

Many, however, detect a lingering nervousness...“There is a sense still that the UK could still renege on its promises.” [that old calumny] ..An example of this was the threat by Suella Braverman, when she was home secretary, to leave the European convention on human rights. This risked leading to termination or suspension of the UK’s post-Brexit policing pact with the EU, as human rights obligations underpin the trade and cooperation agreement.

Maybe that's why they REALLY sacked her then? I think we should be told!

 

Small beer still served...

They never give up,and it is still in the same style. El Garubndino, who else, has this as a headline: 

 Brexit has hit UK’s economic openness, says Bank of England governor 

 

The actual article is nowhere near as scary, as usual: 

In an apparent swipe at those calling for the UK to develop a separate rulebook for banking and insurance activities, Andrew Bailey said free trade needed strong regulation based on agreements with foreign watchdogs....The governor is known to be concerned that a series of panics in financial markets since the Covid-19 pandemic was declared in early 2020 have required strong central bank intervention....financial investments known as money market funds, which lubricate buying and selling in short-term securities, were especially vulnerable and needed to be overseen by more robust international agreements.

Labour sidles back into Europe -- if they stop the boats

There has beem much excited discussion in luvvie circles lately about new rapprochements with the EC. It all began when the UK rejoined the Horizon Science programme. We could get European collaborators on science projects -- no doubt very good -- but there were some suggestions that this would also lead to extra funding for science. This is the same old stuff we have had ever since the Referendum Campaign --any funds flowing to the UK from the EC must be 'European money'.

Nevertheless, BBC News announced excitedly that new possibilities were on the cards in the form of various special deals. Curtice, a confessed psephologist, also said that 2/3 of the British population now wanted some sort of new relationship with Europe ( I haven't looked that up yet).

No surprise then to find the GHraun getting all excited with this

Labour will seek major rewrite of Brexit deal, Keir Starmer pledges

Party leader says he will pursue a closer trading relationship with the EU and much better terms for the UK than Boris Johnson managed

Starmer apparently claimed he would seek:

a revised deal – on business, veterinary compliance, professional services, security, innovation, research and other areas. He ruled out rejoining the EU, the customs union and the single market.

 But what has changed exactly to make the EU more conciliatory and offer better terms? Even el Graun thinks:

 European appetite for renegotiating a deal that commenced in 2021 is uncertain.

 Another reason for claims that the EC is seeking a new deal might be indicated by the proposal to address a major moral panic and electoral hot potato right here in the UK:

In Paris on Tuesday, Macron and Starmer are expected to discuss post-Brexit relations, as well as a potential returns agreement with the EU to stop people travelling across the Channel in dangerously small boats.

We don't know exactly what they want in exchange yet of course. 

Meanwhile, same issue but lower down:

Labour will not say how many migrants it would accept in EU returns deal

Keir Starmer dismisses Tory claims of plan to oversee 100,000 extra arrivals as ‘complete garbage’

 

'You do the propaganda --I just ask the questions'

This is a classic C4 News view of its own heroic stance on news presented by egregious newscaster K Gurumurthy (Krish)  last night, interviewing a Trump defender.

I know this blog is not about Trump,and God knows I don't want to defend him, but the liberal hysteria takes the same form as it did over Brexit. Liberals just cannot see why anyone can possibly disagree with them over Trump, and get positively nasty and panicky if anyone does.This makes them very vulnerable, but doesn't seem to have any lasting effect on their arrogance. Maybe Lukacs was right and they simply cannot escape their own ideologies? No wonder they hanker for strong men.

Liberal journalists have never done well against informed Trump defenders.A few years ago, S Gorka wiped the floor with a hapless E Davies on Newsnight simply by challenging the source of own of Davies's stories about Trump's intentions. Davies didn't know the source -- Islington dinner parties no doubt -- and Gorka pounced with a tirade about fake news. Davies didn't know that his previous interviewee was at the centre of a scandal (about scamming free tickets on an airline or something) either. That was all over the Web but had not got to Islington, obviously -- another easy goal for Gorka.

A couple of nights ago, M Frei of C4 News questioned a Trump-supporting lawyer about the new charges against him and was reminded that the US First Amendment guaranteed free speech. Slightly surprised, Frei tried to respond by saying it did not allow politicians to tell lies -- and was dismayed to hear that indeed it did, on the grounds that electorates should decide.

Last night, good old Krish tried again, haranguing and interrupting a Trump supporter as ever. The interview had been set up,again as ever, with clips of the Capitol riots of Jan 6th, intercut with Trump speaking, clearly implying Trump had instigated the riots (the 'insurrection' or even 'the coup', C4 had called it -- so had the BBC). News that Trump had been acquitted of impeachment citing that charge was not mentioned -- British liberals cannot believe it.

Krish was well into it, asking the (female) spokesperson if it could be right that a liar was still running for President. She reponded with citing the First Amendment (C4 never watch each other's broadcasts -- or again can't believe contrary answers?) and asked why KM was still pushing this propaganda even before the trial. Hence KM's reply.

He did try once more, asking (unwisely, with a condescending tone) if she had actually read the charges. Damn right she had, she retorted, and asserted that there was no mention in them of any actual law that had been broken. Obvioulsy outgunned, and perhaps to forestall any challenge as to whether he had read the charges, he terminated the interview.

Incidentally, an article in the Times today predicts the same sort of effect of liberal outrage and horror that happened with Brexit -- it makes people even more suspicious of liberals and, in this case,more likely to support Trump, and, longer term,more likely to see the whole system in partisan terms.

Revenge of the Remainers exposed

There have long been suspicions of the Remaineratis in high places working to get their own back -- classic 'woke' moral campaigns against Brexiteers in the Cabinet like Raab, and above all Johnson, of course.

Now another tentacle has emerged into the light with the debacle over the cancellation of a bank account at an elite bank (Coutts).The bank account is Nigel Farage's.

It is an odd tale all round. Would anyone normally care if anyone had their Coutts account cancelled? You need £1m to have an account there or £3m in investments or mortgage. But the nobs managed to score a massive own goal by cancelling Farage because the Chair of Coutts (or is it Natwest?) gossiped to a senior BBC journalist at a charity dinner that Farage's account had been cancelled because his assets had fallen below £1m, the failure.The journo rang the Chair to check next day.She confirmed. The story ran on BBC News. He claimed his business had been damaged -- and his reputation.

Little did they know the man. He got hold of Coutts' personal report on him and found they disapproved of him personally and politically in quite snobbish terms and claimed he would contravene their (mostly EDI) values. He publicised their report and caused a fuss, and gained a lot of public approval from people who responded to the issue that banks of all people should not really have these absurd moral missions, especially when they were taking serious cash from despotic regimes and making megabucks.

The parent bank of Coutts, NatWest,had been very unpopular in the Great Recession of 2008 under another name (RBS) and had been bailed out by the taxpayers (who still owned 40% of the shares).

The usual stupidity ensued. The leaker apologised.The Board of NatWest expressed full confidence in her. Some hours later she resigned.Some days later so did the Chair of Coutts.

The liberal press has been in a real dilemma over the whole thing. They can't support the banks who are widely detested. But the last thing they can do is support Farage.The result is a classic attempt to make it all into a Pyrrhic victory for Farage, as in today' s Observer

Whatever one thinks of Nigel Farage, back in the news for bringing about the resignation of NatWest’s chief executive Alison Rose and Coutts boss Peter Flavel, he has been instrumental in changing Britain 

Balance, you see. However, we must continue to remind the reader as strongly as possible that the chap is an utter bounder. Only we can see through him

An almost anachronistically English figure with his beer and blazers, his Carry On laughter and golf-club rhetoric...A virtuoso on the dog whistle...professional rabble-rouser... a gifted blamer of others... a serial loser in British politics...a born disrupter, a habitual fomenter of grievance with zero obligation to produce results...the loudmouth curmudgeon, the carefree voice of old fogeyism, the bar-room bore who thrives on the national stage...a consummate complainer, because his animating passion is to be against things... essentially a destructive talent....

Most curiously of all:

his populist opinions are not that popular with the British public [says an Observer journalist]

The Observer's sales were 136,656 in 2021