Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Zanza]

German healthcare is a strange setup of mostly private, some communal actors both in healthcare supply and insurance, combined with very intensive state or at least public body regulation. I guess it works okay, but definitely room for improvement. It's also very expensive. Not something to emulate.

[Sheilbh]

So the government continues to face rebellions over the "genocide amendment" and the Trade Bill:

UK ministers accused of cynically blocking clear vote on genocide
Amendment would have given UK courts a role in determining if genocide is taking place
Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor
Tue 9 Feb 2021 19.57 GMT

Ministers have been accused of making a "mockery of democracy" by blocking a clear vote on giving the UK courts a role in determining whether a genocide is taking place.

The issue, wrapped up in the trade bill, will now return to the Lords where the proposal for a role for the UK courts – driven by allegations that Uighur Muslims are suffering a genocide at the hands of the Chinese government – is likely to be inserted for a third time.

Ministers had arranged Tuesday's vote so that if Tory rebels backed an amendment passed by the Lords giving UK courts a role, they would also be backing a separate Labour-sponsored amendment imposing human rights audits before trade deals are signed.

Some Tory MPs were prepared to rebel to give the courts a role, but not if by so doing they would also be backing the Labour-sponsored plan.

The independent peer Lord Alton said after the vote: "I am this evening preparing to retable the genocide amendment to enable the elected house to have the opportunity to vote on a fundamental issue. Denying them that right makes a mockery of democracy." There is a significant majority in the Lords for giving the courts a role in determining genocide.

If peers reinsert the proposal, Tory rebel MPs, in alliance with opposition parties, have promised to try to ensure a clean vote on the issue when it returns to the Commons, probably next week.

In the only boost for ministers, MPs passed by 318 to 303 a government-sponsored compromise giving the foreign affairs select committee a role to investigate genocide and make recommendations in a Commons debate. Most MPs on the foreign affairs select committee regarded the offer as worthless, with one member, Chris Bryant, describing it as "the worst piece of parliamentary jiggery pokery" he had seen in 20 years.

The Labour MP added: "The bottom line is that this government seems to want to do everything in its power to prevent us as a nation clearly and unambiguously standing up against human rights abuse in China." He said ministers had blocked a vote knowing they would lose.

Ministers used their control of the Commons order paper to prevent a clean vote on a Lords amendment to give the high court a role in advising parliament if a country with which the UK may negotiate a trade deal is committing genocide. Instead ministers welded two separate issues – the Labour proposal for human rights audits of trade agreements and the proposed role for the UK courts in genocide – into a single vote on the order paper.

The trade minister Greg Hands said it was a longstanding convention for related Lords amendments to be packaged together, but Tory MPs accused him of underhand tactics that were beneath him.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith said: "The government's attempts to deny MPs a vote on the genocide amendment are cynical to the extreme. Now is not the time for parliamentary games. Members from across the house have voiced their support for this amendment and they must be heard."

The episode has revealed nervousness in the executive about the triple threat of losing control of its China policy, extending ministerial accountability to parliament for its trade policy and providing a novel UK judicial route to determine if foreign powers are committing genocide.

Ministers also appear to have been caught off guard by the power of a campaign largely built up outside parliament demanding tougher action to protect Uighur Muslims. The alliance spans religious groups, victims of genocide, human rights campaigners and international lawyers.

Thirty-three Tory MPs rebelled the last time they were given a straight vote on a role for the courts to rule on genocide, cutting the overall Commons majority to 11. The scale of the whipping led to a backlash and claims that the then chief whip, Mark Spencer, considered his job to be on the line with the vote.

To an extent this is sort of to be expected. Trade policy/strategy has been an European competency for UK governments and MEPs, which means that it's not really been an issue in parliament. Now that Brexit's happened UK government and parliament have to actually decide what approach to trade they want to take and I think it might create some odd coalitions precisely because it's not really been that much of a political issue for so long.

I support a form of the "genocide amendment" but I do think the government has a point that I'm not sure that UK courts should necessarily have a role. The issue is basically who determines if there's a genocide - supporters of the amendment, rightly, point out that international law moves very slowly and has so far primarily focused on "weak" powers which doesn't reflect what's happening in Xinjiang so they want UK courts to have the right to hear evidence and declare if a genocide is happening. But I'm not sure why UK courts should have that right either and I feel that as the consequences are political and effect trade agreements, that the decision should be political and made by parliament.

It is worth saying it wouldn't actually affect the UK's position in trading with China because we don't have a trade agreement - but I think it would stop the government from trying to negotiate one. And obviously it could affect other countries with trade agreement

What's really interesting though is the extent this is splitting the Tory party and the rebels are not giving in. There was a piece by Esther Webber in the Times with some Tory MPs calling the amendment "batshit" while some of the rebels "went full Cummings" () and said they would be inserting this amendment or something similar into every piece of legislation the government try to pass. And given that Iain Duncan-Smith was a Maastricht rebel who became one of the "bastards" who made John Major's life hell for the next 5 years, the rebels probably have the experience and knowledge to wreck a government's legislative agenda - even with a decent majority.

I would not have predicted a while ago that relations with China and trade would be the issues most likely to cause divisions in the Tories.

[garbon]

I support the amendment. I get why the government doesn't want its hands tied but I think it needs just that. We've seen legislators all to happy to equivocate and cozy up to murderous regimes. Someone should be setting a clear standard.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah and I agree with that and the issues with international courts as an alternative. I'm just not necessarily sure that it should be something British courts get to decide - I suppose it's ultimately deciding a factual situation which is what courts do.

It just feels like British politicians making a decision which impacts our trade policy is one thing and something that happens in other countries. British courts making a decision about whether a genocide is happening in another country is a bit more presumptuous, like the UK court sort of speaking to the world which I'm a little uncomfortable with.

[garbon]

Yeah and I agree with that and the issues with international courts as an alternative. I'm just not necessarily sure that it should be something British courts get to decide - I suppose it's ultimately deciding a factual situation which is what courts do.

It just feels like British politicians making a decision which impacts our trade policy is one thing and something that happens in other countries. British courts making a decision about whether a genocide is happening in another country is a bit more presumptuous, like the UK court sort of speaking to the world which I'm a little uncomfortable with.

But don't politicians already do this - with a lot less factual determination? Biden's presidential campaign declared it a genocide.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah but I think politicians are politicians and that carries less weight than a court.

I can't really explain it more than that it just makes me feel a little uncomfortable.

[garbon]

Yeah but I think politicians are politicians and that carries less weight than a court.

I can't really explain it more than that it just makes me feel a little uncomfortable.

I guess I'm less worried as it isn't like there's an issue if High Court declares something a genocide that others think is just genocide-adjacent. Still worth blackballing in my opinion.

[Sheilbh]

From the Covid thread because this is more a particular British politics point than a covid thing, but:

Death by firing squad and then toss their corpses off the cliffs of Dover.

Exactly.

I think a lot about this poll:


Even Tory MPs are, on average, less authoritarian than the Great British public

[Josquius]

Kind of to be expected I'd say to be fair given MPs have a much higher average level of education and a broader experience than the average person.

[viper37]

You know, the French have a tried and tested solution to end this kind of royal interference in government... 

Vive la France!

[Josquius]

Because its Sheilbh's birthday sometime this year here is a present.

https://archbishopcranmer.com/just-6-of-anglican-clergy-voted-conservative-in-2019/

A Savanta ComRes poll was published just over a week ago on the political affiliation of Church leaders, and it hasn't had much coverage. In fact, it doesn't appear to have any media coverage at all, which is a little odd given the nuggets of insight it offers, not least of which being the fact that 'Church leaders' mental health takes a knock during lockdown'. The number of church leaders who said they had poor mental health doubled during 2020, apparently jumped from 7% to 15%. This is very concerning in the Body of Christ: if the mind is sick, the arms and legs are invariably impaired. The main media usually leap on such things as incontrovertible evidence of how bad the Tories have been in dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic; how damaging Brexit is for the health of the economy and the essential wellbeing of society; and how Mrs Thatcher's evil policies still haunt the country.

But more revealing is something tucked away on Table8: "Q4a. Thinking back to the General Election that took on the 12th December 2019, which of the following parties did you vote for, or did you vote for another party?"

Just 6% of Anglican clergy voted Conservative. None in the Church of Scotland voted Conservative, and none in the Church in Wales voted Conservative.

And yet.. (wait for it..)

A whopping 40% of Anglican clergy voted Labour (remember, this was Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party), and 26% voted for the Liberal Democrats.

Now, you may say this isn't quite the whole picture of clergy political affiliation, because 10% of Anglican clergy "prefer not to say" which way they voted, but (given Jeremy Corbyn's curmudgeonly character and manifest antisemitism) it is as likely that these 10% included 'shy' Corbynites as well as 'shy' Tories.

Equally fascinating is that 27% of Roman Catholic clergy voted Conservative at the last General Election, while only 9% voted Labour, which represents something of a seismic shift of political affiliation in that denomination (not least because "Get Brexit Done" was an inescapable mantra of the campaign).

The Archbishop of Canterbury believes diversity to be very important for the Church of England. And it is, of course: if there is 'neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus', then such diversity ought to be manifest in the Church of Jesus Christ, and the infinite variety of humanity ought to be welcomed.

And so there are initiatives to increase the number of BAME clergy at the highest levels, and the number of women, and the number of LGBT, for whom special services are created in order to offer a 'safe space'. The diversity focus is invariably based on ethnicity, race, sex, gender, and sexuality, in order to better reflect the nation to which the church is ministering.

Any yet Anglican clergy are somewhat removed from the political affiliation of the country, as expressed in the 2019 General Election:

There's a table here but it doesn't copy

Diversity in the Church of England is very often quite literally skin deep: nobody seems to care very much at all about political, intellectual or philosophical diversity (apart, that is, from certain conservative-inclined laity), and yet it is this 'deeper' diversity which offers a more profound missiology. By conveying essential fraternity with socialist and liberal philosophies (and politicians), and active hostility toward conservative philosophy (and politicians), the Church of England inflicts a wound upon its own mediating body, and so impedes its prophetic function in the spiritual life of the nation. When half the people of England feel that their Established Church offers them no welcome because they voted 'Leave', or because they rather like free markets, low tax, a small state, independence, individuality, self-determination and national sovereignty, the alienation is palpable.

The church's missional vocation to foster national unity is hindered by clergy who assert a visceral partisanship, indeed contempt for things which C/conservatives hold sincerely and believe deeply. If no way is found to restore social, political and intellectual diversity, and people feel increasingly alienated as they cease to feel that their political aspirations and social perspectives are reflected (or at least treated with respect) at the highest levels, the Church of England will simply decline further: people will leave — if they haven't already left.

Fascinating.
Bloody catholics.

[Sheilbh]

Interesting book review on a couple of books I'm looking forward to reading. I think this does capture my view that history education doesn't change politics - it just makes politically opponents able to make better, more historically accurate/informed points

Why the British empire alone cannot explain the politics of the present
As two new books make clear, we cannot deny the influence of our colonial past on our society. But the empire is not the starting point of British history.
BY
STEPHEN BUSH


THE GRANGER COLLECTION / ALAMY

This review is the product of empire, and not just because the two books in question take empire as their topic. I am here today because my grandmother, the South African descendant of white British colonists – who erected a complex system of racial apartheid in order to continue minority rule – met and had a child with a descendant of the enslaved Javanese population, who were  brought to South Africa by the Dutch empire. Heavily pregnant, my grandmother exercised her right as a Commonwealth citizen to come to the United Kingdom. There she met my grandfather, the descendant of eastern European Jews who fled the anti-Semitic persecution of the Russian empire to come to Britain in the 19th century. Years later, while working at the Africa Centre in London, my mother met a British Zimbabwean, himself only here because his ancestors, like many Commonwealth citizens, were encouraged to come to the UK to top up the labour force.

If any of those three empires had not existed – if just one of them had collapsed due to internal strife or external defeat a little earlier – then I would not exist and you would not be reading this sentence. (I leave the question of whether this fact goes in the "pros" or "cons" column of those empires up to you.)

The legacy of Europe's empires is so bound into our society that trying to remove their influence upon us is as futile a task as attempting to remove the egg from a baked cake, to borrow an analogy that the author and Times writer Sathnam Sanghera uses in Empireland. As he superbly chronicles, the legacy of the British empire is everywhere you look. Perhaps most fittingly of all, the word "loot" is itself appropriated from the Hindi word "lut": the spoils of war.

Although Empireland is the product of wide reading rather than original research, it is a fantastic introduction for anyone who wants to learn more about the British empire. Sanghera shares his knowledge without pretension or affectation.

He also has a peerless eye for a killer fact and a great story. My favourite is that of Sake Dean Mahomed, who in the course of just one life managed to become the first Indian author to be published in English, the founder in 1810 of the UK's first curry house and the man who established the first dodgy massage parlour – though not in the same building.

My time with Sanghera's book was so enjoyable that it feels almost churlish to admit that I found its overarching argument wholly unconvincing. Nevertheless, I am churlish, so here goes.

Sanghera suggests that greater awareness of our imperial past would reshape our understanding of our post-imperial present. He argues that Brexit is, in part, "an exercise in empire nostalgia". There is, to my eyes, an obvious problem here: it's hard to claim that the Netherlands has fully come to terms with the Dutch empire, which left its mark on my family history as much as the British empire did. "Blacking up", now rightly considered to be a shameful practice in the UK, is still widely tolerated in the Netherlands. Tony Blair apologised for Britain's role in the slave trade in 2007; the Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, is still resisting making a similar apology in 2021. Yet it is unlikely that the Netherlands will follow the UK out of the European Union any time soon.

And what about France? As Robert Gildea details in his peerless 2019 book Empires of the Mind, France and Britain's attachments to their empires were so great that, even when their struggle against Nazi Germany was at its bleakest, the French government-in-exile and the British government spent precious time squabbling over the future of their imperial possessions. France is an essential component of the modern EU, and yet like the UK struggles to confront its imperial legacy. Sanghera is right that we can no more disentangle the UK of today from the imperial power of time gone by than we can remove the egg from a cake – but if we're comparing it to other countries we do need to be sure that they don't have the same problem.

***

Sanghera puts far too much faith in the power of historical education to change minds and thus change the present. If only people were taught that so many of Britain's "black and Asian people had been made citizens through the imperial project", then the debate over multiculturalism would be "instantly transformed".

This is obviously untrue. To take the system of apartheid in South Africa: it was not erected because its architects were ignorant of their imperial legacy but because they feared terrible retribution in the event of black majority rule. Nor would anyone sensible be reassured by the idea that immigration and multiculturalism are simply "colonizin' in reverse", as the poet Louise Bennett puts it. Colonisation was a violent, disruptive and sometimes extinction-level event for the colonised people. Anyone who thought that immigration was the same process via a different means would be mad not to resist it.

There is much to agree with in Sanghera's book – his case for the restitution of stolen treasures is very powerful indeed – but I struggle to understand how someone who has read so much imperial history could think that a better public understanding of that past would in itself "instantly transform" our shared understanding of the world today. Even historians don't agree on what the empire tells us about either the Britain of 1821 or the Britain of 2021.

In the UK, an improved understanding of the horrors of the Holocaust has not made our politics any more tolerant or welcoming to refugees and victims of genocide today. Since the Holocaust moved the world to recognise and define the crime of genocide, neither the United Nations nor the UK has ever managed to declare that one is taking place until after the crime has happened. Improved understanding of the past is a good thing, but it is not a substitute for winning political arguments in the present.

One person who would agree with my assessment is Kehinde Andrews, professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University. He also agrees with Sanghera that you cannot remove the legacy of empire from the present economic and global order.

In The New Age of Empire Andrews argues that two of the Enlightenment's greatest thinkers, Immanuel Kant and David Hume, "provided the universal and scientific framework of knowledge that maintained colonial logic", and that their own racism and bigotry was built into their thinking. In turn, the systems of thought that we have built on their ideas also bear the indelible stain of that prejudice. As the formal structures of empire have been abandoned, new and more insidious ones, in the shape of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), have taken their place. They, too, are irretrievably tainted by the imperial ambitions of their founders.

Modern ideas of racial tolerance and unity do, unquestionably, have a racist ancestor. But the germ theory of disease can also trace its development through a number of discredited ideas: the miasma theory that illnesses are spread by "bad air"; and the idea that the mere act of smelling food could eventually contribute to fattening you up. Yet our modern understanding of how disease spreads is not doomed to failure because of its ancestry in what we now know to be flawed thinking.

***

Andrews derides what he calls the "white left" and its narrow focus. He dismisses the "Preston model" beloved by many Corbynite thinkers. "One of the cooperatives so praised in Preston is a coffee shop," he writes, "and while we celebrate the benefits to the worker in Britain, the shop's success is only possible because of the racial exploitation of the poor people farming the coffee beans it uses for next to nothing." The new British left actually wants not a social democracy, but a return to the old "imperial democracy".

His solution is to throw the whole cake into the dustbin of history. His focus is on "uniting Africa and the African diaspora to create a true revolution, which remains the only solution to the problem of racism", and for the African diaspora to return to a "promised land" in Africa. This seems to me to be a little more difficult than simply getting the Preston café to pay a fair and equitable price for its coffee.

But it is central to Andrews' belief system that it is easier to persuade the African diaspora that their aspirations are best realised back in Africa – and to persuade Africans to abandon both the borders inherited from colonialism and the dream of new borders for each of the continent's many different peoples – than it is to get a northern English café to sell lattes at a fair price. As he writes at the conclusion of the book, "if you have come this far and believe that White people offering a meaningful hand of friendship is the solution then you have missed the point".

I have to declare an interest here: I am the product of several generations' worth of belief that enduring relationships can be struck across racial divides: a white South African can fall in love with a Cape Malay South African. A white British woman and a Jewish man can raise a family together. And, hell, a British-African man can father a child and disappear into the sunset without causing too much undue damage to the child in question. I have skin in the game: literally, my skin, the tone of which sits somewhere between my father's and my mother's.

It's never made precisely clear in The New Age of Empire what the vision for people like me is in this united diaspora: do we get to return to Africa, or not? Is there a place for my white partner in the pan-African promised land? Do I ever get to see my mother and grandmother again? Would I have to reconcile with my father in the promised land? Would I be able to visit my great-aunt and great-uncle, who are Jewish? I'm not saying that all of these questions are deal-breakers for me, but I would certainly like to know the answers.

And if we are to discredit and discard the Enlightenment thinkers, how can pan-Africanism be the answer? Pan-Africanism is itself a product of the empire. The movement wasn't dreamed up in Africa but by its displaced descendants in the West. The most influential and successful African supporter of the movement and a key force in the creation of what is now the African Union, Kwame Nkrumah, was likewise educated in the West, and was influenced by Marxism – which is, in turn, informed by the very ideas and philosophies that Andrews regards as irreversibly contaminated by their own imperial legacy.

Sanghera and Andrews share a common blindspot: while modern Britain is shaped by the empire, the British empire should not itself be seen as the starting point for British history. The empire was shaped by its pre-imperial past, and the Britain of today is shaped by both. The transatlantic slave trade, which undoubtedly still has an influence on the world today, can trace its roots to the slave trade within Africa, as the historian Marcus Rediker describes in his 2007 book The Slave Ship.

The empire cannot plausibly be the cause of what Sanghera considers to be a unique brand of racism, not least because that would account for neither the West's pre-imperial anti-Semitism nor its pre-imperial racism. (As Sanghera recounts, long before empire, Elizabeth I was complaining that London's Moorish population had grown too large.)

There is a similar problem in Andrews' approach: my African ancestors, who sold the luckless members of other tribes, were not motivated by white supremacy but by a far older and universal sin: greed, and a desire to treat the perceived "other" – whether they look like us or not – as less than themselves.

History can illuminate the present. But it is only by confronting our shared and continued capacity for brutality against those we perceive as being unlike us – for profit or convenience – that we can build a better future.

Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain
Sathnam Sanghera
Viking, 320pp, £18.99

The New Age of Empire: How Racism and Colonialism Still Rule the World
Kehinde Andrews
Allen Lane, 288pp, £20

Edit: Posted accidentally too soon.

I was going to add that I saw Bush posting on Twitter after this review - and I agree - about how the focus on imperial nostalgia may be an easy analysis of Brexit but how it does seem wrong. In addition to the points about France or the Netherlands, the post-imperial nostalgists for British power were on the Remain/pro-Europe side of British politics: Jenkins, Blair, Cameron (Britain "punching above its weight", Britain as a "bridge" to Europe, "Great Britain not Little England").

And as he notes Leave leaders often cite Singapore, I think Leave voters want Canada or Japan (I'm also seeing more interest in South Korea - especially around innovation, investment in R&D etc). Whatever you think of them as plausible models - they are all small to medium powers, none of them are imperial or have pretensions to imperial style power. Now they may not be plausible models but they're not obviously the ones you'd choose if you were motivated by imperial nostalgia, it's why I think the better, more accurate analysis is around particularly English nationalism (it's about both the nation state and the state of the nation) not just empire nostalgia.

[Maladict]

Thanks guys.

Amsterdam is now the largest financial trading centre in Europe

By Rachael Kennedy
@rkennedy228

Amsterdam has overtaken London as Europe's biggest financial trading centre following Brexit-related changes to finance rules made last month.

According to data from CBOE Europe first reported by the Financial Times, an average 9.2 billion euros (£8.1bn) worth of shares were traded on Euronext Amsterdam every day in January, alongside CBOE Europe and the Turquoise exchange.

This compares to London's 8.6 billion euros (£7.5bn) in the same time frame.

It comes after the end of the Brexit transition period, which saw US banks no longer able to buy European stocks via London - and as the UK capital and Brussels continue to hash out a memorandum of understanding.

Around 7,000 financial sector jobs have already shifted from the UK to the EU since the 2016 referendum, and have since been followed by the Turquoise exchange platform, owned by the London Stock Exchange Group.

On Wednesday, Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey said going forward the EU could not force the UK to follow its rules to the letter, adding that agreements on "equivalence" were needed.

He said: The EU has argued it must better understand how the UK intends to amend or alter the rules going forwards.

"This is a standard that the EU holds no other country to and would, I suspect, not agree to be held to itself. It is hard to see beyond one of two ways of interpreting this statement, neither of which stands up to much scrutiny."

"I'm afraid a world in which the EU dictates and determines which rules and standards we have in the UK isn't going to work."

Mr Bailey added: "I can't predict what will actually happen exactly because it's not within our control, but I think we have to state the argument for why it's important to have global standards, global markets and safe openness. And if we all sign up to that, there isn't a need to go in that direction."

Also responding to the news on Thursday, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said Chancellor Rishi Sunak would need to do more to protect the City following Brexit.

Speaking to reporters at Heathrow, he said: "Our financial markets are hugely important. I was very worried when I saw the Brexit deal that there was almost no provision for financial services.

"So what I want is to see progress here. The Chancellor said that he would look after the City of London on financial services, he needs to make good on that promise because we absolutely need to protect our financial services."

https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/amsterdam-has-overtaken-london-as-europes-biggest-trading-centre/

[The Brain]

"I'm afraid a world in which the EU dictates and determines which rules and standards we have in the UK isn't going to work."

Someone tell him that the UK isn't in the EU anymore, so the EU can't dictate anything to the UK.

[The Brain]

Again and again you come across this enormous sense of entitlement. Being a weak party in international negotiations was the whole point of Brexit: alone on a wide, wide sea. The "Bad foreigners don't put UK interests first!!! Waah!" isn't a very flattering look.