Tuesday 16 June 2020

What did we learn from yesterday's meeting?

Well Johnson had his virtual meeting with the three presidents and afterwards we got the usual bland diplomatic stuff from all four of them. The determination to press ahead to achieve a good deal and so on, later was being reported that Johnson has set "an end-of-summer deadline as he calls for more 'oomph' in trade talks."  By my calculation that is at least the seventh 'deadline' he or Mrs May have set most of which we failed to meet. It is as if we are clinging to the door jambs on the way out, still constantly threatening to leave, but nobody pushing us.

The two most telling points to come out of yesterdays meeting were, in my opinion, these:

Firstly, a tweet from Simon Fraser should be a salutary moment for all of us. After four years, all but a week, the two sides are still trying to find an understanding of the "principles" underlying any agreement:
Let's think about that for a moment. Brexiteers have been going on about it for more years than I care to recall - at least 25, we had months and months of intense campaigning in 2016 and negotiations have been going on since at least mid 2017 and now with six weeks before another self-imposed deadline and we are still trying to understand the principles behind an agreement. For heaven's sake.

This is the deal that Peter Lilley said would take '"ten minutes".

The other one is the difference in tone between Johnson's belligerent public utterances, always with that implied threat about quitting without a deal, and what looks like behind the scenes forelock-touching by Michael Gove.  The FT had an item yesterday, before the meeting took place.  In it we get this intriguing picture:

"EU officials said over the weekend that the mood on this point [the NI protocol] had been brightened by constructive talks on Friday with a UK team led by Michael Gove. They said the cabinet office minister gave assurances that the UK would quickly flesh out proposals it made last month on how to apply customs and regulatory checks in the Irish Sea. Maroš Šefčovič, who led the EU delegation at Friday’s meeting, said he was 'very much reassured' by Mr Gove's determination to rapidly turn the new system from 'aspirations' to 'operational conclusions'. ”

Gove comes over as a faithful lapdog and eager to please.  Don't forget the EU have said repeatedly that any future deal is incumbent on the NI protocol being implemented to the letter and the spirit.  The EU have not been happy before about the general approach we are taking or the absence of any details, or indeed the UK blocking them having an office in Belfast.  But now as we approach the crunch, Gove is falling over himself to "quickly flesh out proposals."

I think they know what the EU have known from the very beginning, we must eventually capitulate on almost every front.

Incidentally, when those details are "fleshed out" expect the NI business community to howl with rage and the EU will complain the protocol is not being faithfully applied.  The customs infrastructure and systems are not in place and are highly unlikely to be in place in six months so expect an extension to the transition period for that.

A Tweet from David Sassoli afterwards perhaps had a dig at Johnson in latin:
I know you will all be familiar with pacta sunt servanda but I'm not and I had to look it up. It means agreements must be kept. The EU are watching very carefully.

It would be interesting to know how much time and effort is being spent in Downing Street on thinking about how it can all be presented as a great win for Britain and for Brexit when it will have been a humiliating climb down and four wasted years to achieve a position far worse than the one we had before the referendum.
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