Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Note of course that it isn't my preferred solution, but do you think it could ever happen in the near to medium term?  Is there a deal that could be offered to convince just enough Protestants to say "yes" to a unification vote?

I understand of course that has far more to do with identity than with specific policy concerns, but was just kind of wondering.

I don't think so in the medium to near term.

As you say it's about identity and one of the challenges is that Irish identity is largely based on the nationalist/Republican story while unionist identity is based on their Britishness and their resistance to nationalism/Republicanism. It would require the creation of a new Irish identity that had space for both narratives and both communities - I'm not sure what that would look like. It's not something that has yet been created in Northern Ireland - so I don't know how it would work in a united Ireland.

I have a very left-wing, properly nationalist Irish friend who always asks other Irish people - how far would you go to make unionists comfortable in a united Ireland? Normally I think they're just about comfortable with changing the national anthem (which is a rebel song) and re-joining the Commonwealth, but anything beyond that is more challenging. I'd be really interested to hear the opposite and ask unionists - what changes could Ireland make that would make you feel part of a united Irish state? I've no idea what the answers would be.

The largest party in the Dail and likely to form a government in the near to medium term is Sinn Fein. That reflects a generational shift in Irish politics because Sinn Fein were ostracised for decades because of their association with terrorism, which is now seen as sort of ancient history by Irish voters. It is a far more present past in Northern Ireland. So as well as the fears of a loss of their identity I think there's also fears that they'd sort of be victims of a re-writing of history that minimises/excuses IRA violence etc.

I have heard mutterings that increasingly the young generation aren't getting so wrapped up in the radical loyalist nonsense much like young people in mainland GB have little interest in brexit et al.
It doesn't seem too far fetched that in a decade or two enough people from protestant families could vote for their rational self interest (even if that is Irish unification)

I think the opposite is true. I've mentioned before but the PSNI has seen recruitment into loyalist paramilitaries at the highest level since the Troubles. I think there is a sense that the Troubles was their parents' generation's fight and this is theirs. The NIP is the latest in a series of issues that unionists feel are undermining their identity - so there's been promotion of Irish which is a core issue for Sinn Fein. But the most relevant is the flag protests which I think radicalised and got young unionists into contact with more hardline loyalists. The issue there was that Belfast City Hall flew the British flag every day - they decided to move to only flying it on 18 days of the year (which is the norm in GB and in line with government guidance) but that provoked multiple riots orchestrated by loyalists and people putting up UK flags in lots of public spaces including nationalist areas. But again it comes from that state of siege feeling that their unionist identity as Brits is being undermined.

And I don't know how anyone could think people will vote for rational self-interests over identity

[Zanza]

Seriously? Your government is led by charlatans who deliberately decided at every turn for the option that made solving the Northern Irish dilemma harder.

They rejected the EU, they rejected EEA and CU, they rejected May's frontstop with the Chequers common rulebook, they rejected all regulatory alignment, they rejected a SPS agreement, they rejected a longer transition period. All in the name of sovereignty. 

The voters rejected the EU.

No, the voters in Northern Ireland did not. They were forced out of the EU against their will by English voters.

On the rest I think almost all of that follows from the referendum. The big issue was freedom of movement so any solution that involved staying in the single market would need a lot of political support to go against the referendum (and in my view a second referendum). Despite the government not having a majority that support didn't coalesce. Once you're out of the single market then I think you have to reject regulatory alignment because you're getting none of the benefits, you're not shaping the rules so the only marginal gains you'll get will be from diverging (and those gains will, likely, be lower than the benefits of staying the single market - but again that decision was made in 2016 and re-affirmed in two elections). I don't think a longer transition period would really have added much.

I think it's really difficult - absent a second referendum or the government (who I agree are profoundly untrustworthy - and, in Johnson, an ego-driven charlatan) losing an election to not end up at this position. To me it's like the EU negotiating mandate - this is logically where you end up if you go down the decision tree without either a second referendum or a new government.

I disagree completely. This hardest possible Brexit was a political choice by the British government. There was nothing inevitable about it. Plenty of statements pre-referendum suggesting others paths. Plenty of turning points between then and now where they invariably picked the option that made Northern Ireland harder to solve. Your suggestion that all of this was somehow destined to happen on 24th June 2016 ignores the gigantic political struggles about it in Britain over the last five years. I may refer you to this 1000 page thread for reference. Your argument just denies ownership of this mess by the British government and suggests all of this was preordained by fate. If that's necessary to cope with this utter disgrace of policy making, suit yourself. But it's not an argument that convinces me, and probably few others that followed Brexit..

What are those supposed measures the British are taking that help the NIP? Unilaterally not implementing the measures of the agreement? Measures, which only became necessary because they had before rejected everything else?

Exactly that I posted the article a while ago but the essence is this section (again he's a political correspondent and I saw this being shared by unionists and nationalists):

A key element of the government's decision this week not to enforce parts of the new border relate to food crossing from GB to NI. Mr Lewis said that without urgent action, "there's a very real risk that actually what we've had in a few weeks would have been back to the issues of empty shelves...[and] we'd have seen a further lack of confidence and undermining of the protocol itself...the work we're doing is to ensure it doesn't get further undermined."

With a background in the food industry, Mr Lewis stressed that supermarkets work far in advance and the EU-UK negotiations were grinding along at a slow rate where one grace period expired a fortnight ago and a far greater hardening of the food border is due at the end of this month. Another last-minute deal would be of little help in those circumstances, he argued.

However, the EU and the Irish government were outraged, with Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney saying that the EU was now dealing with a country it couldn't trust.

Yet the Irish opposition to this move has been entirely procedural – they have for weeks accepted that the grace periods urgently need extended.

The European Commission's position is less clear. Over recent weeks Maroš Šefčovič has argued that the Irish Sea border checks needed to be expanded, and has berated the UK for not implementing the protocol more rigorously.

At a time where the protocol is causing major practical and economic difficulties, where most of unionism is dismayed at the scale of what is involved, and when potentially dangerous levels of anger are building within loyalism, the EU appears blind to how its dogmatic approach appears to those it claims the protocol exists to protect.

The EU can plausibly argue that the Irish Sea border is necessary to protect its single market. But rather than make that nakedly economic argument, it has claimed that what it is doing is to protect the Good Friday Agreement.

The fact that almost all of unionism – including David Trimble, the key unionist architect of that Agreement – say that the protocol itself undermines the 1998 accord is implicitly dismissed by the commission's actions.

Although the absence of an EU office in Belfast may partially explain the commission's apparent ignorance of how it is perceived here, and it may also have mistakenly believed that Mr Johnson was representing unionism's interests, it is remarkable that so long into the Brexit process the EU does not appear to understand some of the basic aspects of political division in a region whose peace it says has been central to its stance.

Even before the hardening of the Irish Sea border which is to come, its scale is becoming increasingly hard to justify. In staggering evidence to a Stormont committee on Thursday, Northern Ireland's chief vet said that when one of the grace periods – that on moving GB supermarket goods into Northern Ireland – expires, the number of agri-food checks required at the Irish Sea border will be close to the number currently processed by the EU as a whole.

With just 12 vets at his disposal, Robert Huey said that he had told the commission that he was simply unable to undertake that level of work.

Dr Huey's boss, Department of Agriculture permanent secretary Denis McMahon, told MLAs that food and plant safety checks currently only applied to 30% of the agri-food goods that will be potentially subject to the new processes when an exemption period for retail and supermarket goods expires.

Mr McMahon said that Northern Ireland was processing a greater volume of documentation "than all other entire countries across the European Union".

Some in the EU have privately lampooned Brandon Lewis's claim that there is no Irish Sea border and that comment showed the Secretary of State's questionable understanding of how his words are received in Northern Ireland.

But it should alarm Brussels that even Mr Lewis sounds genuinely concerned that the EU does not comprehend that with which it is dealing.

The EU is now demanding that the UK abandon its unilateral action, with the European Parliament postponing ratification of the EU-UK trade deal in protest and the commission preparing for legal action Yet if the UK acquiesces – as it may well do – that would arguably further undermine support for the protocol, showing again to Northern Ireland that both the EU and the UK are prepared to put their procedural debates ahead of what both of them accept are serious practical difficulties here.

While both sides claim to care passionately about peace in Northern Ireland, increasingly this region appears to be a proxy battleground far from the centres of power in two large blocs where they can express frustrations with each other without consequence for areas about which they care more deeply.

Edit: And I should say if the purpose of the NIP is to protect the single market - then fine, there should be strict implementation and consequences be damned. If the purpose is to support peace in Northern Ireland then it needs to be implemented in a way that gets support and buy in from both communities.

The EU can only compromise on technical details if the British government first accepts the principle of the Northern Ireland Protocol, which is not the case (see Johnson, Raab lying about it still). Just giving in now would not be acknowledging the Northern Irish unionist concerns. It would be validating Johnson's cakeism.

The British government did not fulfill its side if the measures agreed in December to allow for further concessions on the checks. In addition to the political choices it made, it also fucked up implementation. Just take the example from your article: Having just twelve vets in place is clearly a failure of the British government. Or are you telling me the fifth largest economy on earth has no resources for a thirteenth vet?

The British government does not own its political choices and is inept in implementation. If it would own its political choices, unionists would see that it wasn't the EU that sold them out. But Boris Johnson. Pretending that this can be fixed by allowing bangers to be imported without checks for a while longer is not helpful for the long-term development of Northern Ireland. They will eventually have to face the fact that the English nationalists ruling in Westminster do not have their interests at heart.

[Zanza]

Here is a bit from the FT on the choices of the British government making the NIP more problematic than it needs to be:
https://mobile.twitter.com/pmdfoster/status/1372951564378324993

[Sheilbh]

No, the voters in Northern Ireland did not. They were forced out of the EU against their will by English voters.

The UK voted.

I disagree completely. This hardest possible Brexit was a political choice by the British government. There was nothing inevitable about it. Plenty of statements pre-referendum suggesting others paths. Plenty of turning points between then and now where they invariably picked the option that made Northern Ireland harder to solve.

Which other option allows the UK to end free movement? I don't think you can have a referendum where the single biggest issue is immigration and then not address that. Unless you build an alternative and win which didn't happen.

Your suggestion that all of this was somehow destined to happen on 24th June 2016 ignores the gigantic political struggles about it in Britain over the last five years. I may refer you to this 1000 page thread for reference. Your argument just denies ownership of this mess by the British government and suggests all of this was preordained by fate. If that's necessary to cope with this utter disgrace of policy making, suit yourself. But it's not an argument that convinces me, and probably few others that followed Brexit..

So I think it is highly contingent and logical at the same time. There are loads of moments when things could have turned out differently - the Labour leadership, the 2017 election, May's deal, the radicalisation of both sides into hardest possible Brexit v remain, Change UK even etc. Despite all of those (mostly futile) political struggles the one thing they failed to do was either undermine the result of the referendum as fundamentally legitimate and something that should be implemented, or force an alternative. So those struggles are just what-ifs now.

But on the other hand I think if your starting point is ending free movement - then I think you logically end up here. There were loads of statements to that effect before, during and after the referendum. I might not like the result but we've ended up with the result we were warned about, which is hardly surprising. It's just like the EU's decision making and chart of what the options where. I've always thought we'd only end up with a pretty unimpressive trade deal.

The EU can only compromise on technical details if the British government first accepts the principle of the Northern Ireland Protocol, which is not the case (see Johnson, Raab lying about it still). Just giving in now would not be acknowledging the Northern Irish unionist concerns. It would be validating Johnson's cakeism.

Northern Ireland should not be the place to test the UK's intentions or Johnson's cakeism. If the purpose of the NIP is to support peace both communities need to support it - the key ideological driver of unionism is that they are Brits like any other Brits. What benefit do we get from the UK government saying there is a border between that community and the rest of the country? We need to de-dramatise it - though it's probably too late - position it instead as another step on the pre-existing agricultural checks.

The British government did not fulfill its side if the measures agreed in December to allow for further concessions on the checks. In addition to the political choices it made, it also fucked up implementation. Just take the example from your article: Having just twelve vets in place is clearly a failure of the British government. Or are you telling me the fifth largest economy on earth has no resources for a thirteenth vet?

This goes to who has to implement what - that's run by the Northern Irish Department of Agriculture - no doubt the UK government should provide extra funding. And for the record the Northern Irish civil service are taking legal advice around their duties to implement the NIP even though that goes against the orders from the DUP members of the executive (including Agriculture). But how many vets does the entire EU frontier have because that's the number of checks Northern Ireland will need to conduct.

The alternative would be to do more of this in GB because there are more resources here than in a province of 1.8 million people. As well as more resources literally no-one in GB cares about there being an Irish sea border - whereas people do in Northern Ireland.

The British government does not own its political choices and is inept in implementation. If it would own its political choices, unionists would see that it wasn't the EU that sold them out. But Boris Johnson. Pretending that this can be fixed by allowing bangers to be imported without checks for a while longer is not helpful for the long-term development of Northern Ireland. They will eventually have to face the fact that the English nationalists ruling in Westminster do not have their interests at heart.

Unionists see that. There has been graffiti in unionist areas of Belfast with Michael Gove's home address and "we don't forget/we don't forgive". Unionists are accusing London of the "greening" of Northern Ireland. There is immense unionist anger at their betrayal by Westminster - they've literally nicknamed the Withdrawal Agreement the Betrayal Act. But I don't see what correct allocation of blame has to do with fixing the problems or how it will make unionists shift a core part of their identity.

[Sheilbh]

Who is the tory candidate?
They always bring in people with London addresses up here. Didn't stop them winning.
Though it could be a smart move for them to go hard for populism.

Given the strength of Hartlepool labour it is surprising they'd have a candidate from the next town. Though I do note he is a doctor. That could be an area where Labour score well-the tories complete bollocksing of corona and betrayal of the nhs.

Brexity stuff.... Not a huge deal for many I think. And it needs remembering a key reason for so many of labours losses is as well as actual tory vote gains, votes lost elsewhere.
The prospect of the lib dems becoming number 2,as far fetched and mad as it is, seems a big concern to Labour. The European election really rattled them.

I don't know if the Toreis have announced their candidate - at the election they chose a councillor from Stockton. The local Labour Party have announced they're very pleased with the "great choice" of one (1) candidate on the long list who they have announced will be their candiate

For what it's worth there's been a leak of internal polling by the Labour Party that most people aren't blaming the government for corona. They basically think it was a huge challenge that would have caused problems for any government, which is more forgiving than I'd be. Also interesting is that the Northern Independence Party have been in talks with another carpet-bagging Labour ex-MP. Not sure if it'll happen but they've been chatting to a Corbyn loyalist who lost her seat in 2019 and has since quit the Labour Party (over Corbyn's suspension). That might be another challenge for Labour. It feels like the sort of thing the Lib Dems used to be good at in using by-elections to get attention

The Labour candidate is now also facing lots of condemnation for tweets from about a decade ago about "Do you have a favourite Tory MILF?" It might give them a good opportunity to ditch him and start again.

I don't think Brexit will matter much but I can easily see how you can tie in second referendum campaigning, with former MP and imposed on the local party by HQ into a pretty easy attack line.

[Josquius]

The hardest brexit as a political choice - agreed.
Polling since before the ref and after consistently shows a majority of voters wanting a soft brexit when it is presented in clear terms of what everything means. However we have had 5 years of gas lightning and footballisation of politics by those in power to push us towards the mess we are in. Also doesn't help that the terms hard and soft are used - may mean little to the middle class but to the lumpens this is a big deal. They don't want to be soft.

Loyalist recruitment up - I think this is just the natural outcome of the current situation. Numbers signing up to terror groups are a fraction of the population as a whole and its pretty standard that these incelly sorts will go counter to the general population.
If northern Ireland gets the brexit advantages we expect it'll be even better for them.

Identity vs best interests - it worked with under 40s in the brexit ref. The key will be not spinning it in terms of Irish vs British but simply on what's best for Northern Ireland.

[Zanza]

The point that Northern Ireland voted to stay in the EU is relevant. In a less majoritarian state than the UK, considering the wishes of smaller communities would have had an influence on policy making. But it barely had. Without pressure from the EU and Ireland, Northern Ireland would likely have been ignored completely by the British government. 

As free movement of persons is the only thing that is still in place in Northern Ireland under the CTA, this was obviously not the sticking point.

The idea that there is somehow a "logical" path without alternatives from the referendum that leads to the UK preferring its sovereignty to diverge over an agreement on SPS checks is ridiculous. It denies agency of the government. Choices were made with consequences. Other choices were available, all of course with different cost/benefits.

There were and probably are virtually no leave voters that take an interest in technical things like SPS checks. It was a political choice by Britain not to enter an agreement on these, likely with a view on a potential US trade deal or out of ideological pureness. Despite public protestations that thet dont want to lower food standards. They prioritized these abstract goals over making life easier for Northern Ireland.

And Johnson's cakeism needs to be challenged over him still lying about what he signed regarding Northern Ireland. The treaty party the EU interacts with is not the unionist faction, but HMG.

By the way, I find the stats on how many checks the EU does versus what Northern Ireland does dubious and have only ever seen anecdotal claims that are based on what the Northern Irish can see in an EU IT system. On the other hand it shows that other EU neighbours made a different political choice than the UK and signed an SPS agreement, e.g. Norway or Switzerland.

[Sheilbh]

The hardest brexit as a political choice - agreed.
Polling since before the ref and after consistently shows a majority of voters wanting a soft brexit when it is presented in clear terms of what everything means. However we have had 5 years of gas lightning and footballisation of politics by those in power to push us towards the mess we are in. Also doesn't help that the terms hard and soft are used - may mean little to the middle class but to the lumpens this is a big deal. They don't want to be soft.

I still think there's basically been two core choices: immigration or the economy; and GB divergence or UK alignment. Everything flows from those decisions - May and Johnson were agreed on the first and disagreed on the second.

I agree on soft Brexit but opinion polling and majority opinion means nothing if there's no political force to deliver it. I think there's always been consistent majority support for the death penalty and for nationalising various industries - but those policies haven't been delivered because there's no political way to obtain power and pass those laws. But I think this is one of those contingencies - there is an alternative world where we end up with a far softer Brexit. I think the key points are the 2017 election which creates the belief that getting rid of a Tory government will be a matter of one more push which I think radicalises remain opinion because they see a route to stopping Brexit rather than just managing it. And the other is that radicalisation which I think then has a centrifugal effect.

I always refer to it but the key moment for me was the defeat of May's deal when you had two competing demonstrations in Parliament Square - one was of hard-core Brexiters who were addressed by Francois, Rees-Mogg etc and the other were Remainers with speeches by Umuna, Lucas etc. And both demonstrations cheered when May's deal was defeated - that was the point when it was really clear that both sides had gone all in which means one side would win utterly. I didn't know which side it would be, but I suspected it would be the hardline Brexiters because they were all basically in the same party while the Remain side was divided between Labour, Lib Dems, Change UK, Greens, Plaid etc. I think before the 2017 election Soft Brexit is most likely, by 2019 the only people who supported Soft Brexit were a few Labour MPs like Nandy and Kinnock and the Tory MPs Johnson purged.

Identity vs best interests - it worked with under 40s in the brexit ref. The key will be not spinning it in terms of Irish vs British but simply on what's best for Northern Ireland.

But isn't a big part of political identity of young people that they're anti-Tory? I mean whether it's the 60s kids who tried to kidnap a Tory Prime Minister and were influenced by the protests in the US and Europe, but went on, in their 40s and 50s, to vote for 18 years of Tory government; or the Young Ones or people from John O'Farrell's memoirs about being young and left-wing in the 80s, who went on, in their 40s and 50s, to vote for a decade of Tory government plus Brexit. As they age and acquire property and earn more money I think it's likely that, as with previous generations, they become Tory voters. Plus 2017 and 2019 show how shiftable it is, I think the cross-over point of a majority of people voting Tory was around 55 for May and down to about 40 for Johnson.

The point that Northern Ireland voted to stay in the EU is relevant. In a less majoritarian state than the UK, considering the wishes of smaller communities would have had an influence on policy making. But it barely had. Without pressure from the EU and Ireland, Northern Ireland would likely have been ignored completely by the British government. 

Without pressure from the EU and Ireland, the nationalist view in Northern Ireland became key. Unfortunately the UK government is not the same as unionist opinion and no-one really engaged with them. I agree that's largely on the UK government. Although I also kind of blame unionists - they're really, really bad at international relations or persuasion as opposed to pressure. If you compare them with nationalists who have many friends in Washington and have worked pretty well at building alliances when they were in the European Parliament it's really striking.

It's the weird position of unionism that their biggest fear is being betrayed by London, but they've never really tried to make the case for why people in the UK, far less the wider world, should care.

The idea that there is somehow a "logical" path without alternatives from the referendum that leads to the UK preferring its sovereignty to diverge over an agreement on SPS checks is ridiculous. It denies agency of the government. Choices were made with consequences. Other choices were available, all of course with different cost/benefits.

Of course there are alternatives - but as I say I think there's basically two choices made and the rest are consequences. We all could have sat here in 2016 and say what would happen if the UK's focus was ending free movement - and it has happend. It's the same with divergence v alignment. There are definite contingencies and ways things could have gone differently - but I think those choices basically rely on a different reality - if immigration wasn't the key issue in the referendum, or the 2017 election went a different way, or maybe if Labour positions itself differently.

There were and probably are virtually no leave voters that take an interest in technical things like SPS checks. It was a political choice by Britain not to enter an agreement on these, likely with a view on a potential US trade deal or out of ideological pureness. Despite public protestations that thet dont want to lower food standards. They prioritized these abstract goals over making life easier for Northern Ireland.

Agreed. It wouldn't erase the issues but it would help and I think practically speaking there is zero chance of a US trade deal because of agrifood (we've already had a national panic over chlorinated chickent) and there is a very low chance we'll be significantly changing food standards anyway (I could see the UK moving to a more relaxed position on GM).

And Johnson's cakeism needs to be challenged over him still lying about what he signed regarding Northern Ireland. The treaty party the EU interacts with is not the unionist faction, but HMG.

What difference does it make except for pissing off one of the parties to the GFA which the NIP is designed to support? As I say I think it's too late to de-dramatise but I'd be focusing not on the barrier/border but on the opportunities for Northern Ireland within GB where they are in a better position to export to Europe than other UK companies and in a better position to export to the UK than EU companies (which is a better position for Northern Ireland than would exist in a united Ireland). I'd try and sell that, minimise the disruption for individuals and try to position the border/barrier as basically a little bit of extra admin that doesn't fundamentally alter NI's position within the UK or unionists' position as Brits.

By the way, I find the stats on how many checks the EU does versus what Northern Ireland does dubious and have only ever seen anecdotal claims that are based on what the Northern Irish can see in an EU IT system. On the other hand it shows that other EU neighbours made a different political choice than the UK and signed an SPS agreement, e.g. Norway or Switzerland.

It is based on what the Northern Irish can see for sure. But it was evidence given by independent Northern Irish civil servants (who, again, also testified that they were seeking legal advice on how to fulfil their obligations to implement the NIP over the orders of their political bosses) to Stormont. I don't think there's any reason to think it's not true - based on what they can see.

[Sheilbh]

This feels like a story that is going to develop and go mainstream. He reportedly also texted Sunak on his personal phone - according to the current reports that was ignored by Sunak (annoyingly the Times and the FT are the one breaking everything on this so you need to get past two paywalls for all the details ). But this basically feels like the most natural thing Cameron's done in his career - and possibly the most work he's ever put in to something:

Cameron lobbied UK government on behalf of Greensill Capital – report
Former prime minister approached Treasury and Downing Street to gain financial firm access to Covid loans
Kalyeena Makortoff
@kalyeena
Fri 19 Mar 2021 13.09 GMT

The former prime minister David Cameron reportedly lobbied senior government officials to give Greensill Capital special access to the largest available tranche of emergency Covid loans just months before the lender collapsed.

Cameron, who was an adviser and shareholder in Greensill, is said to have contacted former colleagues to try to help the supply chain finance firm tap cheap, 100% government-backed loans through the Covid corporate financing facility (CCFF).

By borrowing money via the CCFF, Greensill would have been able to lend more money to its borrowers – including one of its largest clients, the metals magnate and Liberty Steel-owner Sanjeev Gupta.

Liberty, the UK's third-largest steelmaker, has been forced to pause production at some of its UK plants to conserve cash in the wake of Greensill's collapse. Its parent company, GFG Alliance, employs about 5,000 people in the UK.

But granting Greensill access to the CCFF would have meant bending the rules for the doomed finance firm.

Greensill representatives tried to make its case to two of the Treasury's most senior officials, who held 10 virtual meetings with the firm between March and June last year, according to the Financial Times.

When officials resisted, Greensill claimed that "concerns about their eligibility for the CCFF were misplaced or could be addressed", the paper said, citing records released under the Freedom of Information Act.

Cameron later stepped in, approaching the Treasury and 10 Downing Street via his personal email and at least one phone call, according to FT sources. Cameron's office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

CCFF loans, which are doled out by the Bank of England on behalf of the Treasury, are aimed at helping the UK's largest companies weather the pandemic. Crucially, the rules in effect bar lenders such as Greensill taking part by stating that only "non-financial firms" can take part.

Borrowers – which have included Rolls-Royce, Honda, British Airways, EasyJet and Ryanair – are meant to apply directly to the central bank rather than through an intermediary lender such as Greensill. The loans are also restricted to firms with a strong investment-grade credit rating that make a "material" contribution to the UK.

Greensill was accredited as an intermediary lender for the second-largest scheme – known as the coronavirus large business interruption loan scheme, which came with an 80% government guarantee – last year.

However, supply chain finance firms such as Greensill were only allowed to issue individual loans worth up to £50m to each borrower. When the firm was denied access to the CCFF, its Australian founder, Lex Greensill, asked ministers for permission to write loans worth up to £200m, in line with other lenders such as Barclays.

That request was reportedly denied by Treasury officials, who said it would represent a "significant exposure", the FT said.

It emerged earlier this month that the British Business Bank, which administers the bulk of the emergency Covid loan schemes, revoked Greensill's government guarantee, leaving the firm, rather than the UK taxpayer, on the hook for any customer defaults.

Labour is now calling for an investigation into Cameron and Greensill's alleged lobbying efforts.

The shadow chancellor, Anneliese Dodds, said: "These revelations raise extremely serious questions about the chancellor's priorities in the middle of a pandemic. The government must leave no stone unturned with a full and thorough investigation into this.

"Taxpayers and businesses deserve answers about why it appears Greensill was given so much access to the Treasury at a time when the chancellor was refusing to engage with groups representing the millions of people he excluded from wage support.

"The chancellor must urgently set the record straight."

A Treasury spokesperson said: "Treasury officials regularly meet with stakeholders to discuss our economic response to Covid.

"The meetings in question were primarily about broadening the scope of CCFF to enable access for providers of supply chain finance, which – following a call for evidence and discussions with several other firms within the sector – we decided against and informed the businesses concerned."

[Sheilbh]

I've said before it'd be worth considering whether NI checks could be done in GB - where people don't care.

A Larne port worker has been forced out of his home in a Protestant area because he was working on the border checks. Apparenlty he was contacted by the police and informed they'd become aware of serious threats to him and his family.

Being Northern Ireland there's actually a state body that buys properties from individuals who move due to intimidation or threats - historically this would normally (but not exclusively) have been Catholics working with British "occupying" forces. It would also probably include people in both communities who were threatened because they were alleged informants etc. I'm not sure if it was open to Catholic women who were accused of having relations with Brits or Protestants - there used to be a lot of violence against them including tarring. Basically they get certificate from the police and the state buy it at market price allowing that person to move more easily. It used to be a fairly common thing in Northern Ireland (Arlene Foster may have used it - her family were forced out of their farm because her dad was in the police) but there's only been a couple in the last year.

The umbrella group that includes all the major Loyalist groups have "utterly condemned" and deplored this and said that "one's home should be sacrosanct and should be respected by everyone, regardless of your beliefs or who you are."

But this was the port that shut down border checks because they discovered that people were trailing inspectors and trying to find out their personal details such as their addresses, family etc. So hopefully this is a one of, but there's a risk other workers at Larne may be subject to similar threats.

[Sheilbh]

Interesting polling on the intersection of covid and Brexit:


As ever I am fascinated by the 5% of Leavers who think it's made things worse - a bit like I'm always interested in the 5% of Lib Dems who want to bring back flogging or whatever

I'm broadly in the Remainer/made it better category and obviously this is profoundly shaped by the vaccine program - I don't think any of the other aspects really connect to the EU. Lockdown, care homes, test and trace etc all seem to be national failures or not, much like vaccine roll-out is different for each member state and only the procurement angle is really the responsibility of the EU. From people I follow on Twitter Remainers seem to now be fracturing across the entire spectrum of opinion.

[Tamas]

There's no doubt we are doing it better than the EU, but can we seriously believe the UK would have joined the common EU vaccination plan if still in the EU? It would have been a first.

[Sheilbh]

There's no doubt we are doing it better than the EU, but can we seriously believe the UK would have joined the common EU vaccination plan if still in the EU? It would have been a first.

Yeah - if the UK voted Remain I think there's zero chance we opt-out of common procurement and authorisation. Especially given that the EMA was based in London. I think we'd be wanting to demonstrate the benefits of remaining. Opting out of the common procurement was fairly roundly condemned by Labour, Lib Dems, Remainer former Tories and the more pro-European press - I think that opinion would probably be stronger after a Remain vote.

On a purely practical level I don't think the MHRA could have done emergency authorisations. The MHRA won around a third of the EMA's tenders for regulators to review/analyse trials and do first drafts etc (it's part of the reason the EMA was based in the UK). I don't think the MHRA would have the resources or capacity to do their own emergency authorisations plus the work they would be doing to support EMA decisions.

The bit I wonder is if the UK had stayed in if the EU plan would have been slightly different because the UK might have been pushing for taking on slightly more risk and prioritising speed a little bit more - I don't know if they would have won that argument. It's the unknowable bit.

Similarly I wonder if there'd be something around European gene sequencing if the UK had remained just because that's something that the UK state focused on quite early in the pandemic - and is now offering to support other countries in Europe with spare capacity/expertise. It strikes me as another area where you can see an argument for a common European plan, but the main European sequencer is Denmark and I wonder if there'd be more on this area if there was also a big member state doing lots about it.

[garbon]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/mar/22/twelve-police-officers-injured-in-bristol-kill-the-bill-protests

Twenty police officers injured in Bristol 'kill the bill' protests

Twenty police officers have been injured at a "kill the bill" demonstration in Bristol during which protesters stoned a police station and set fire to vehicles in what the city's mayor has condemned as "self-indulgent" and counterproductive violence.

Avon and Somerset police have made seven arrests so far but have vowed to track down hundreds of people involved in what its chief constable, Andy Marsh, described as "criminality and thuggery".Bristol mayor, Marvin Rees, said the violence was counterproductive to the campaign against the government's plans to give police more powers against protesters as part of the police, crime, sentencing and courts bill.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I am from communities who are disproportionately likely to be on the receiving end of the criminal justice system and receive unfair treatment. What they have done has done nothing to make me, and people like me, safer. This was selfish self-indulgence, self-centred, you know, violence."

Marsh told Sky News: "Twenty of the brave officers who were trying to quell that violence and deal with that disorder have been injured, two of them seriously. We've made seven arrests and we've now launched a very significant investigation."

Marsh said one of those injured suffered a collapsed or punctured lung after being stamped on, and the other had broken bones. He added: "Neighbourhood officers police community support officers were effectively trapped inside this building with people on the roofs firing fireworks at them hurling projectiles at them."

Marsh said up to 3,000 people took part in demonstrations against plans to give police increased powers to shut down peaceful protests. Speaking to the BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he said they included a group of up to 500 people "who really were intent on violence, damage and criminality".

After 6pm on Sunday evening, they began throwing stones at Bridewell neighbourhood police station in central Bristol.

Marsh said 12 police vehicles were damaged and the station's toughened glass windows were broken. He said: "We know that they've burned out three marked vehicles, nine vehicles that are used for safeguarding the most vulnerable have also been damaged, the windows of the station have been put in."

The force will be issuing photographs later on Monday of those involved as part of a "huge investigation", Marsh said.

He added: "We've made five arrests so far, it wouldn't have been possible or practical to make more [arrests] on the night given the volume of people involved, but rest assured by the end of today we will be releasing pictures of some of the people we want. There will be a huge investigation, and I do expect very serious consequences for those involved."

He also defended the policing of the demonstration. He said: "The group that were sitting down creating a scene outside the Bridewell police station were, by the assessment of my team, looking for a trigger to provoke a violent response. And as is good practice what we didn't want to do was give them a trigger that could be avoided, and simply wading in and making a handful of arrests from a mob of hundreds of angry people would have left the officers more vulnerable, the station more vulnerable to being overrun. By about 5.30pm it became clear that whatever we did, we wouldn't be able to avoid a very violent confrontation."

He added: "We are talking about a violent minority of criminals, and we will track them down and we will bring them to justice.

...

[garbon]

Oh and Royal Family + diversity czar.