Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Northern Irish government has suspended some of the Irish Sea border checks at Larne following intimidation of East Antrim Council staff responsible for the checks and increased "security risks". At the same time there's graffiti in Loyalist areas saying "all border post staff are targets". Hopefully their safety can be improved (but in many ways this is how the Troubles escalated - border checkpoints to stop arms smuggling were attacked, so there were police checks to improve security and they were attacked, so there were army posts along the border to protect the police protecting the border check).

I remember that leaked PSNI report that Loyalist groups have an estimated 15,000 people signed up and that both them and dissident Republicans are at their highest levels of recruitment since the Troubles. One of the big drivers of the peace process was that the various terrorist groups had in many ways been "defeated" - whether Republican or Loyalist they were riddled with MI5 and police informants that meant there was huge amounts of infighting and zero trust etc. I wonder if that's still the case given that the focus for the last 20 years has, I imagine, been on Islamist groups and now the far right plus I think the new Loyalists and dissident Republicans are a bit more of an online presence than the old school groups which may make it easier or more difficult to infiltrate?

Edit: Also slightly interesting in comparison to that US Senate chart - the UK cabinet's very Gen X

[Josquius]

So its Gen X who are the problem.

[Tamas]

Yeah so the Brexit agreement lived what, one month?

I mean, it totally sucks for those customs officers but the zero enthusiasm to do what we agreed to do seems obvious.

[Sheilbh]

I mean, it totally sucks for those customs officers but the zero enthusiasm to do what we agreed to do seems obvious.

Maybe - it's not customs officers it's council staff. The checks are still happening in Great Britain and the documents are still being reviewed in Northern Ireland. But any border in Northern Ireland was going to face this (it's also why I think it's for the best that the EU will use a co-working space as necessary rather than open an office in Belfast). At the minute lorries are being re-directed.

Apparently the council told the police that their staff were being intimidated and that they were receiving threats - so it's not a situation where the police were aware of a threat. It's things like people noting council staff's licence plates, evidence people were trying to get staff's details - name, address etc. There's apparently no known link to active Loyalist paramilitaries, but the police have warned about the numbers and community tensions. So far the police have increased patrols and their presence at all entry points to reassure staff but they're still not comfortable (and the council isn't with it's duty of care) to returning.

The council have said they're keeping it under review when they're willing to deploy staff again and doing risk assessments etc with the police. I can certainly see why if I was just a council environmental health officer that I would not be comfortable working with that type of risk. It might be a bit different if you're an actual border guard. I think there are jobs where you accept there's a degree of risk to your safety and that's part of the job, and then there are ones where that isn't the case and council environment health and safety officer is very much in the no risk category so I understand why the staff are saying they're not comfortable

Arlene Foster's "utterly condemned" it as "utterly reprehensible" and said that everyone needs to stick to "constitutional politics". At the minute it's a decision the council have made and notified the Northern Ireland Executive who are meeting on this today.

Edit: Incidentally this is totally separate but reminds me of Brexit because I remember UK ministers routinely sounding off only to discover that they can hear us in Europe. Following the vaccine issues in Europe there's a string of senior politicians - Belgian PM, French President, French Europe Minister, Commission President - who have now done press interviews or similar where they say the difference between the EU and the UK is that the UK is taking "many risks" or using "quasi-ineffective" vaccines and I just want them all to stop. It's a health crisis, lads, and pissing about with misinformation can costs lives

The thing that annoys me is that people can hear these comments over here where they are covered as, for example, "French President claims AstraZeneca vaccine 'quasi-ineffective'" or "Belgian PM accuses UK government of using people as 'guinea pigs'" which people may believe. I feel like it almost needs to be treated like a Trump comment "falsely claims" for example. But also these are the same vaccines that are being authorised and rolled out in Europe I don't see how consistently throwing doubt on them being rolled out safely or them being effective will help build confidence within the EU. It's really irresponsible in a pandemic - I have no issue with them pointing to other things like the NHS/centralised single healthcare provider or the UK having protectionist contracts or something (I've no idea if that's true) but I don't think politicians should be casting any doubt on the safety or effectiveness of these vaccines at this stage.

The only risk I can think the UK is taking is around delaying the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine - which I think is justifiable in the contexto of 1k + deaths a day. The rest is basically the same as in the rest of Europe.

[Iormlund]

So its Gen X who are the problem.

[Valmy]

So its Gen X who are the problem.

We were too cool for school. A bunch of apathetic slackers.

Not really inspiring leaders

[Sheilbh]

We were too cool for school. A bunch of apathetic slackers.

Not really inspiring leaders

Sounds about right for Cameron, Clegg and Miliband While Starmer and Johnson are both late boomers.

[Sheilbh]

Number 10 senior policy advisor on the union has been fired. This isn't important in itself (there's someone else now leading a "Union Unit" who apparently wanted a clean slate.

But this detail is painful:

The confrontation on Friday was not happy one. According to one official  "they did such a bad job of sacking him, he didn't realise he had been sacked. The HR was appalling."

Imagine being fired but not realising and turning back up for work

[Zanza]

Johnson named Ian Duncan Smith as new head of the post-Brexit deregulation taskforce in No 10. I am sure that will be productive. 

[The Minsky Moment]

Number 10 senior policy advisor on the union has been fired. This isn't important in itself (there's someone else now leading a "Union Unit" who apparently wanted a clean slate.

But this detail is painful:

The confrontation on Friday was not happy one. According to one official  "they did such a bad job of sacking him, he didn't realise he had been sacked. The HR was appalling."

Imagine being fired but not realising and turning back up for work

Sometimes British understatement can be too understated even for the British.

[Sheilbh]

I see the Treasury are back pushing for lockdown to be lifted as quickly as possible and Sunak's concerned the scientists are moving the goalposts.

I do not understand how all the very clever people in the Treasury have still not realised that the virus is what causes economic issues not just lockdown. Being on top of the virus (or just accepting a lot of deaths) is the precondition for returning to growth, not lifting lockdown. But no doubt they'll be joined by the usual suspects of idiot MPs.

I liked Mike Bird's (WSJ correspondent in Hong Kong) tweet:

We can do it, Britain! One last disastrous, early reopening. Two more months of lockdown for a couple of weeks in the pub. I believe!

[Josquius]

Number 10 senior policy advisor on the union has been fired. This isn't important in itself (there's someone else now leading a "Union Unit" who apparently wanted a clean slate.

But this detail is painful:

The confrontation on Friday was not happy one. According to one official  "they did such a bad job of sacking him, he didn't realise he had been sacked. The HR was appalling."

Imagine being fired but not realising and turning back up for work

Kind of happened to me once when my contract renewal paperwork didn't go through right.
I could just see the lady on reception's gears grinding as she tried to figure out how best to break the news that I didn't work there anymore....
Infinitely more embarrassing with actual firings and high level government posts of course!

[Tamas]

I see the Treasury are back pushing for lockdown to be lifted as quickly as possible and Sunak's concerned the scientists are moving the goalposts.

I do not understand how all the very clever people in the Treasury have still not realised that the virus is what causes economic issues not just lockdown. Being on top of the virus (or just accepting a lot of deaths) is the precondition for returning to growth, not lifting lockdown. But no doubt they'll be joined by the usual suspects of idiot MPs.

I liked Mike Bird's (WSJ correspondent in Hong Kong) tweet:

We can do it, Britain! One last disastrous, early reopening. Two more months of lockdown for a couple of weeks in the pub. I believe!

Yeah it really is becoming incredible. 100 thousands deaths and counting and it seems we'll just go on with the same messed-up cycle.

I am really glad the vaccinations are going impressively well, that's our only hope of this government not collapsing the country.

[Sheilbh]

And I think after the event Matt Hancock might come out of this quite well - he's been on the right side of the lockdown fights. But crucially, part of the reason we have a good vaccine program is early investment/support of the Oxford project in February last year but also Hancock blocking a deal between Oxford and Merck because Merck wouldn't either guarantee UK supply or manufacture the vaccine in the UK. That was at the peak of the PPE fights when Trump (and France) were seizing other countries' orders of PPE.

It was the right decision as was hiring a venture capitalist to run procurement - the UK government has basically taken on the risk for vaccine manufacturers (Valneva and Curevac have also opened sites here) as well as made pre-orders which changes the commercial picture for those companies. I think he (unlike the Treasury) has actually understood that the economic benefit of being able to re-open safely and not have rolling lockdowns, vastly outweighs the cost of investing money in a vaccine that doesn't work out. Hopefully Johnson and the rest of the Cabinet can push back against Sunak and the more stupid Tory MPs.

Plus I think a lot about this line in the paper from October:

Because it suggests that Hancock was literally the only person in government paying attention to the news from vaccines which in October were already very positive - there were rumours coming out of Pfizer and AZ that they might have a vaccine ready for use by the end of the year. It's really scary that Hancock was apparently the only person in government aware of this and that it was a running joke in the rest of the government

[The Brain]

An anonymous source claimed to have heard unnamed people talking in unnamed departments?