“Our interests cannot be detached from those of our fellow Europeans, and so we must abandon our delusions and draw closer to the EU” – this crisis is proof of the opposite. An independent Britain has been able to chart its own course while the German-French axis was tripping over itself.
Also see: vaccine development and roll-out. And scrapping COVID regulations. It makes sense to have Britain and the EU acting independently and us learning from each other.
That’s why the only assertion in the article I would quibble with is *serious commentator* applied to Rafael Behr who is always consistently adoring towards the EU and anything it does.
Peter LR
2 years ago
It sounds like MacMillan’s reflection on politics: “Events, dear boy, events!” I’m glad Boris has had a chance to show how his leadership works. He was saddled with rudderless Brexit by May and a pandemic through Wuhan incompetence. A sympathetic interpretation of partygate is that he is not an aggressive bossy authoritarian leader (aka Bercow) and wants people to get enjoyment (and maybe felt arm-twisted into pandemic restrictions). But when facing a challenge responds decisively which this emergency is showing. He’s got another couple of years to demonstrate to the country that this is not a flash in the pan.
PS if he stops them pouring concrete down the shale wells next Monday, his approval rate would get into the positive realms.
But the real problem is not the shale wells in the North. It is the shale wells in the Home Counties which will never take off. Nuclear power would be the same.
Indeed. I live near Dorking in Surrey, where fracking was proposed.
The local opposition was massive and vocal (just search for fracking Dorking to get a taste).
Fine….but forget about having electricity or gas then. I KNOW Dorking and lived there (for my sins) and even went to school there. The local philosophy has always been to throw money at problems with the idea that richness equals godliness.
I have no problem with fracking, even if it were to be proposed in my town,.
The ridiculously low level of tremors that are allowed couldn’t even be felt on the surface.
Cameron called Boris a ‘greased piglet’ for getting out of scrapes. It really did seem as if cakegate was the end yet here he is, with the very real possibility that his premiership will be what he was probably made for – a Churchillian moment. If someone wrote the story of Boris’s time as PM we would think it fiction – divorce, marriage, prorogation of Parliament, pandemic, a near-death experience, two babies – and that’s just the drama I can remember. All packed into two years. He’s like a cat with nine lives.
The busines of our personal freedoms are, however, but if he shelves the anti-democratic and unachievable green agendas, he might just swing it. Assuming Putin doesn’t push the red button.
I don’t believe Johnson has done anything that some other countries have done. What is missing, is the strategic vision. The US and Canada have provided military support dating back to 2014 as well. We can all see that our reliance on imported energy is a major problem, yet we hear nothing from him. Yes he tells us that it’s going to be painful this year, but that’s about it.
Boris was never in trouble as the Tories didn’t have a decent alternative to appoint, and it’s another 2 years to an election when any events would put partygate into perspective.
Whats truly shocking about our news media and politicians is their obsessive pursuit of Johnson over mere work parties as we made a major economic change with Brexit and dealt with a pandemic.
But it took a major European war for these numpties to realise the extent of their hysteria. It would be laughable, Python style, if it wasn’t so bleedin’ tragic.
…got to bear in mind that the PM is the most electorally successful politician of his generation (two times Mayor of a Labour City, eighty-seat majority) and was the best-paid columinist in the Country for some years…in two notoriously envious and vindictive professions, much of what politicians and journalists say about him is probably jealous bile, well-stewed by years of simmering spite.
To which we might add, with his male critics…for a chap who mostly looks like an unmade bed…he is a surprisingly successful Don Juan. I often wonder how many of them stew over a humiliating memory of seeing his blonde mop and burly frame departing the party arm in arm with the “one they brung”?
Katharine Eyre
2 years ago
Thank you so much for this balanced article. My comments:
1) The Home Office. My goodness – this ministry needs to be taken apart, swept right out and put together again. It is a disgrace. And not just because of this latest disaster with Ukrainian refugees. Having had my own tangles with it in the last year, I can assure you it is an equal opportunities bureaucratic nightmare. Incompetent, uninformed employees, contradictory/incomplete info on the website – just chaos. This latest disaster should absolutely be the starting point for real reform.
2) I do not say this ungrudgingly, but yes – the UK should move closer to the EU again in some ways. This is for the benefit of all. But no rejoining. During the pandemic, there were several times when Austria at least was looking towards the UK to see what it was doing in terms of restrictions and opening up and then using that experience to chart its own course. The UK’s experimental “just-go-do-it” kind of approach can be really valuable. But the EU desperately needs to come away from this pathological obsession of seeing a free Britain as a mortal threat which must be stamped out, it is absurd. I hope that it does not take them as long to realise this as it took Germany to wake up to its new reality.
3) My respect for Olaf Scholz is increasing. He did exactly the right thing and was very brave. Sadly, the basis of his own party and that of the Greens are starting to bellyache already and are demanding more consultation about this policy change with the grassroots. This seems entirely self-absorbed and decadent at this point and I hope Scholz holds the line and doesn’t revert to typical German consensus seeking, or we could find this brave new Germany having its wings clipped.
4) Emmanual Macron. Nul points. Forever.
Is it time to break up the Home Office? It is responsible for: terrorism prevention, policing, fire services, border control and passports and visas. Each one of those areas have had recent disasters: Liverpool bomber, David Amis murder, Sarah Everard murder and aftermath, kneeling coppers, Grenfell, dinghies, Ukrainian visas. It has been a mess for as long as I can remember under all governments.
Of course we should be extremely close to the EU. As has been said so often it has become a cliche, we are the bridge between the USA and Europe. But as you say it takes two to tango – now would be a great time for some serious compromises on Northern Ireland protocol.
I share your hope but fear if a ceasefire and peace talks happen soon, the Germans might quietly backtrack. And then live to regret it.
I would say that the UK rejoining the customs union would be a good move – wouldn’t that sort out a bunch of problems with NI already (sorry, am not up to speed on this)?
There could also be defence and military cooperation in the offing – but the EU would have to compromise on things like returning Channel migrants (in return for Britain taking in a number of refugees per year from Greek camps, for instance) and equivalence for financial services.
My worry here is that these tender shoots of willingness to reconcile on the British side will either be nuked before they have chance to turn into something larger by some bull in a china shop like Guy Verhofstadt making obnoxious remarks. Which is unfortunately quite likely.
Both sides should just swallow their pride a bit and avoid the whole “this was all your fault” narrative. Whether this will happen? Hmmm.
No. Many who voted to Leave, as I did, hoped for comprehension from Brussels that we wished simply to run our own affairs without being subsumed by the EU’s suffocating “rules”. It was a finely judged decision to vote leave, but it has become increasingly clear since we left that they will never accept any partnership that they will not attempt to dominate. I will never regret my decision. So we must keep a distance that allows us to operate as we have done over Covid and in our actions so far over Ukraine. Close, but never ever again submissive.
That’s why I suggested rejoining the customs union and not the single market. This would be an arrangement like the one the EU has with Turkey. I think it’s an exaggeration to say that that would make GB submissive and no longer in control of its own affairs. Tbh if Britain isn’t capable of taking advantage of the freedoms it fought so hard to regain, then maintaining a hard Brexit (sorry, that sounds rude but you know what I mean) is just making your own life harder for no real gain.
I would not take your point as “rude” . However, after the last five years of childish, and grossly unprofessional political slanging coming out of Brussels, and it has often been little short of schoolyard tantrums, I’m afraid I see no indication that Brussels will approach any arrangement in good faith. I would personally not wish to tie myself into any union, even customs, with them at present. I suppose the situation might change in future, but not necessarily with those presently in charge. They are not even apparently capable of accepting us as continued companions in the ESA Galileo project.
I have no axe to grind with the people or countries of Europe, quite the reverse in fact, but until we have properly completed Brexit and settled the vexed question of Northern Ireland (and I have no idea how that very complicated situation should best be resolved), I do not believe Brussels are capable of accepting we are not theirs to direct.
The fact remains that neither they nor we have been blessed with straightforward, open and skilled politicians of vision for several decades, but perhaps that is too much to expect. Having said that, it may be that the events unfolding now will present us all ultimately with a very different perspective. We shall see.
Agree on #2.
Should have started as soon as UK left, (which should have been accomplished maximum two years after referendum result. Instead, May’s dithering encouraged the saboteurs) As far as I can see, UK has been making all the overtures but EU has been resisting and determined that nobody should leave their club unscathed.
Katherine, you are spot-on about the Home Office. Decent Home Secretaries such as Chris Clarke, John Reid, David Blunkett and Amber Rudd quit after being stitched up by the civil servants. There was outrage when Patel was accused of telling her Sir Humphries that they were f*****g useless. She had a point.
Lesley van Reenen
2 years ago
Who will ever forget the 5,000 helmets that Germany sent to Ukraine to indicate support.
“the centralising purpose and disregard for national sovereignty are not entirely dissimilar” – bang on. The ‘there’s no such thing as sovereignty’ rhetoric from the EU is reflected in Putin’s denial of Ukrainian sovereignty. Both pertain to a post-national way of thinking.
R S Foster
2 years ago
…worth adding that our being outside the EU decision-making framework made it possible to forge a different path, which undoubtedly put serious pressure on the EU to step up…I am certain that had we still been involved, we would simply have been outvoted…and the main EU priority would have been forcing Zelensky to surrender, so as not to interrupt the German energy supply…
…make no mistake, they are now acting to avoid the public shame of not doing so, not because they actually want to abandon Russian energy and rebuild the German Armed Forces…
And, in the article for ‘building LNG terminals’, (and much else besides) I would sub edit ‘talking about building LNG terminals’, (and much else besides).
Sholz isn’t out there in week two since his abrupt conversion with rivet gun and trowel building these things and spending the £100B..I doubt anyone else is either.
Ian Stewart
2 years ago
“The basic idea is that the invasion is a wake-up call for this country. Our interests cannot be detached from those of our fellow Europeans, and so we must abandon our delusions and draw closer to the EU.” Peter, you do know that Britain’s main goal for several hundred years prior to the existence of the EU was to manage the balance of power in Europe? We didn’t need to be in a trade body to do it – just flexible enough to enter and leave military alliances without the need for referendums.
Dustshoe Richinrut
2 years ago
Maybe the German tabloids might reprint this? A very rumbustious, entertaining read.
“Rumbustious” – what a great word, didn’t know that one!
Dominic A
2 years ago
BJ/DT/BJ/DT….One more reason not to vote in narcissists – they have an uncannny ability to make everyone talk about them all the time.
Rasmus Fogh
2 years ago
The Boris has admittedly handled this one well – though I admit to asking myself, every time I hear his prononcements, how long it is till the next, effortless, U-turn. He is still, by nature, temperament and talent, an irresponsible clown.
If the nations of Europe really want to oppose Putin, they need to cooperate, to act as one. Whether that is most easily achieved by an organisation with rules and procedures for cooperation, or by everyone doing his own sovereign thing and expecting the others to accommodate him can be left as an exercise for the reader.
That’s moi! I keep asking people who would their alternative be, and they come up with nothing.
Kevin Dee
2 years ago
I can’t really think of a worse option for the people of Ukraine than a long drawn out war and insurgency that they are doomed to lose. So sending weapons and cheering them on from the sidelines seems the exact level of involvement to maximise that possibility. Maybe this is all a big ploy to stall Russia and get a negotiated deal and that would be an excellent result but so far I’m unimpressed by the British strategy.
Kharkiv is 20 miles from the Russian border. Two weeks in and the might of the Russian army has failed to take it. I wouldn’t say the Ukraine are bound to lose. This war will bankrupt Russia, to China’s delight.
Dennis Boylon
2 years ago
George HW Bush was a one term president. Biden’s approval ratings have gone up also. War doesn’t necessarily mean you will win the next election. George W Bush had near 90 percent approval ratings after 9/11 and barely won the next election. Yes if you can lead the hysterical over reactions you will gain a lot of initial support. Plenty of time to the next elections though. These feelings will begin to dissipate. Especially if energy prices don’t stabilize.
“Our interests cannot be detached from those of our fellow Europeans, and so we must abandon our delusions and draw closer to the EU” – this crisis is proof of the opposite. An independent Britain has been able to chart its own course while the German-French axis was tripping over itself.
Also see: vaccine development and roll-out. And scrapping COVID regulations. It makes sense to have Britain and the EU acting independently and us learning from each other.
Von der Leyen’s recent comments on accelerating Ukraine’s application to join the EU are not exactly helpful either. Makes Putin’s point for him.
That’s why the only assertion in the article I would quibble with is *serious commentator* applied to Rafael Behr who is always consistently adoring towards the EU and anything it does.
It sounds like MacMillan’s reflection on politics: “Events, dear boy, events!” I’m glad Boris has had a chance to show how his leadership works. He was saddled with rudderless Brexit by May and a pandemic through Wuhan incompetence. A sympathetic interpretation of partygate is that he is not an aggressive bossy authoritarian leader (aka Bercow) and wants people to get enjoyment (and maybe felt arm-twisted into pandemic restrictions). But when facing a challenge responds decisively which this emergency is showing. He’s got another couple of years to demonstrate to the country that this is not a flash in the pan.
PS if he stops them pouring concrete down the shale wells next Monday, his approval rate would get into the positive realms.
But the real problem is not the shale wells in the North. It is the shale wells in the Home Counties which will never take off. Nuclear power would be the same.
Home counties oil wells (which have been operating safely for decades) mostly aren’t shale. Some are, but so what?
Indeed. I live near Dorking in Surrey, where fracking was proposed.
The local opposition was massive and vocal (just search for fracking Dorking to get a taste).
Fine….but forget about having electricity or gas then. I KNOW Dorking and lived there (for my sins) and even went to school there. The local philosophy has always been to throw money at problems with the idea that richness equals godliness.
I have no problem with fracking, even if it were to be proposed in my town,.
The ridiculously low level of tremors that are allowed couldn’t even be felt on the surface.
Cameron called Boris a ‘greased piglet’ for getting out of scrapes. It really did seem as if cakegate was the end yet here he is, with the very real possibility that his premiership will be what he was probably made for – a Churchillian moment. If someone wrote the story of Boris’s time as PM we would think it fiction – divorce, marriage, prorogation of Parliament, pandemic, a near-death experience, two babies – and that’s just the drama I can remember. All packed into two years. He’s like a cat with nine lives.
I’d up that to 900 lives.
Who plays him on the Netflix box set?
George Lucas from Little Britain.
LOL….LOL
I suggest that the media sensations that were supposed to bring him down were not really big issues to most people.
Hear hear.
The busines of our personal freedoms are, however, but if he shelves the anti-democratic and unachievable green agendas, he might just swing it. Assuming Putin doesn’t push the red button.
I don’t believe Johnson has done anything that some other countries have done. What is missing, is the strategic vision. The US and Canada have provided military support dating back to 2014 as well. We can all see that our reliance on imported energy is a major problem, yet we hear nothing from him. Yes he tells us that it’s going to be painful this year, but that’s about it.
Boris was never in trouble as the Tories didn’t have a decent alternative to appoint, and it’s another 2 years to an election when any events would put partygate into perspective.
Whats truly shocking about our news media and politicians is their obsessive pursuit of Johnson over mere work parties as we made a major economic change with Brexit and dealt with a pandemic.
But it took a major European war for these numpties to realise the extent of their hysteria. It would be laughable, Python style, if it wasn’t so bleedin’ tragic.
…got to bear in mind that the PM is the most electorally successful politician of his generation (two times Mayor of a Labour City, eighty-seat majority) and was the best-paid columinist in the Country for some years…in two notoriously envious and vindictive professions, much of what politicians and journalists say about him is probably jealous bile, well-stewed by years of simmering spite.
To which we might add, with his male critics…for a chap who mostly looks like an unmade bed…he is a surprisingly successful Don Juan. I often wonder how many of them stew over a humiliating memory of seeing his blonde mop and burly frame departing the party arm in arm with the “one they brung”?
Thank you so much for this balanced article. My comments:
1) The Home Office. My goodness – this ministry needs to be taken apart, swept right out and put together again. It is a disgrace. And not just because of this latest disaster with Ukrainian refugees. Having had my own tangles with it in the last year, I can assure you it is an equal opportunities bureaucratic nightmare. Incompetent, uninformed employees, contradictory/incomplete info on the website – just chaos. This latest disaster should absolutely be the starting point for real reform.
2) I do not say this ungrudgingly, but yes – the UK should move closer to the EU again in some ways. This is for the benefit of all. But no rejoining. During the pandemic, there were several times when Austria at least was looking towards the UK to see what it was doing in terms of restrictions and opening up and then using that experience to chart its own course. The UK’s experimental “just-go-do-it” kind of approach can be really valuable. But the EU desperately needs to come away from this pathological obsession of seeing a free Britain as a mortal threat which must be stamped out, it is absurd. I hope that it does not take them as long to realise this as it took Germany to wake up to its new reality.
3) My respect for Olaf Scholz is increasing. He did exactly the right thing and was very brave. Sadly, the basis of his own party and that of the Greens are starting to bellyache already and are demanding more consultation about this policy change with the grassroots. This seems entirely self-absorbed and decadent at this point and I hope Scholz holds the line and doesn’t revert to typical German consensus seeking, or we could find this brave new Germany having its wings clipped.
4) Emmanual Macron. Nul points. Forever.
Good comment. My thoughts:
I would say that the UK rejoining the customs union would be a good move – wouldn’t that sort out a bunch of problems with NI already (sorry, am not up to speed on this)?
There could also be defence and military cooperation in the offing – but the EU would have to compromise on things like returning Channel migrants (in return for Britain taking in a number of refugees per year from Greek camps, for instance) and equivalence for financial services.
My worry here is that these tender shoots of willingness to reconcile on the British side will either be nuked before they have chance to turn into something larger by some bull in a china shop like Guy Verhofstadt making obnoxious remarks. Which is unfortunately quite likely.
Both sides should just swallow their pride a bit and avoid the whole “this was all your fault” narrative. Whether this will happen? Hmmm.
No. It would require subjugation to EU rules, laws and courts. No.
No. Many who voted to Leave, as I did, hoped for comprehension from Brussels that we wished simply to run our own affairs without being subsumed by the EU’s suffocating “rules”. It was a finely judged decision to vote leave, but it has become increasingly clear since we left that they will never accept any partnership that they will not attempt to dominate. I will never regret my decision. So we must keep a distance that allows us to operate as we have done over Covid and in our actions so far over Ukraine. Close, but never ever again submissive.
That’s why I suggested rejoining the customs union and not the single market. This would be an arrangement like the one the EU has with Turkey. I think it’s an exaggeration to say that that would make GB submissive and no longer in control of its own affairs. Tbh if Britain isn’t capable of taking advantage of the freedoms it fought so hard to regain, then maintaining a hard Brexit (sorry, that sounds rude but you know what I mean) is just making your own life harder for no real gain.
I would not take your point as “rude” . However, after the last five years of childish, and grossly unprofessional political slanging coming out of Brussels, and it has often been little short of schoolyard tantrums, I’m afraid I see no indication that Brussels will approach any arrangement in good faith. I would personally not wish to tie myself into any union, even customs, with them at present. I suppose the situation might change in future, but not necessarily with those presently in charge. They are not even apparently capable of accepting us as continued companions in the ESA Galileo project.
I have no axe to grind with the people or countries of Europe, quite the reverse in fact, but until we have properly completed Brexit and settled the vexed question of Northern Ireland (and I have no idea how that very complicated situation should best be resolved), I do not believe Brussels are capable of accepting we are not theirs to direct.
The fact remains that neither they nor we have been blessed with straightforward, open and skilled politicians of vision for several decades, but perhaps that is too much to expect. Having said that, it may be that the events unfolding now will present us all ultimately with a very different perspective. We shall see.
applause!
no…here is why: there are a dozen other ways:
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Agree on #2.
Should have started as soon as UK left, (which should have been accomplished maximum two years after referendum result. Instead, May’s dithering encouraged the saboteurs) As far as I can see, UK has been making all the overtures but EU has been resisting and determined that nobody should leave their club unscathed.
Katherine, you are spot-on about the Home Office. Decent Home Secretaries such as Chris Clarke, John Reid, David Blunkett and Amber Rudd quit after being stitched up by the civil servants. There was outrage when Patel was accused of telling her Sir Humphries that they were f*****g useless. She had a point.
Who will ever forget the 5,000 helmets that Germany sent to Ukraine to indicate support.
Not the Ukrainians, I bet.
Don’t forget the field hospital!
“the centralising purpose and disregard for national sovereignty are not entirely dissimilar” – bang on. The ‘there’s no such thing as sovereignty’ rhetoric from the EU is reflected in Putin’s denial of Ukrainian sovereignty. Both pertain to a post-national way of thinking.
…worth adding that our being outside the EU decision-making framework made it possible to forge a different path, which undoubtedly put serious pressure on the EU to step up…I am certain that had we still been involved, we would simply have been outvoted…and the main EU priority would have been forcing Zelensky to surrender, so as not to interrupt the German energy supply…
…make no mistake, they are now acting to avoid the public shame of not doing so, not because they actually want to abandon Russian energy and rebuild the German Armed Forces…
And, in the article for ‘building LNG terminals’, (and much else besides) I would sub edit ‘talking about building LNG terminals’, (and much else besides).
Sholz isn’t out there in week two since his abrupt conversion with rivet gun and trowel building these things and spending the £100B..I doubt anyone else is either.
“The basic idea is that the invasion is a wake-up call for this country. Our interests cannot be detached from those of our fellow Europeans, and so we must abandon our delusions and draw closer to the EU.”
Peter, you do know that Britain’s main goal for several hundred years prior to the existence of the EU was to manage the balance of power in Europe? We didn’t need to be in a trade body to do it – just flexible enough to enter and leave military alliances without the need for referendums.
Maybe the German tabloids might reprint this? A very rumbustious, entertaining read.
“Rumbustious” – what a great word, didn’t know that one!
BJ/DT/BJ/DT….One more reason not to vote in narcissists – they have an uncannny ability to make everyone talk about them all the time.
The Boris has admittedly handled this one well – though I admit to asking myself, every time I hear his prononcements, how long it is till the next, effortless, U-turn. He is still, by nature, temperament and talent, an irresponsible clown.
If the nations of Europe really want to oppose Putin, they need to cooperate, to act as one. Whether that is most easily achieved by an organisation with rules and procedures for cooperation, or by everyone doing his own sovereign thing and expecting the others to accommodate him can be left as an exercise for the reader.
For years Johnson has had a reputation of being a “clown who gets the big things right”
People seem happy with this trade-off.
That’s moi! I keep asking people who would their alternative be, and they come up with nothing.
I can’t really think of a worse option for the people of Ukraine than a long drawn out war and insurgency that they are doomed to lose. So sending weapons and cheering them on from the sidelines seems the exact level of involvement to maximise that possibility. Maybe this is all a big ploy to stall Russia and get a negotiated deal and that would be an excellent result but so far I’m unimpressed by the British strategy.
Yes they should just give in, and accept being part of Putin’s Russia, with it’s many freedoms.
Thing is, the Ukrainians can do that. But it’s their decision and not ours. To push them that way would would be deeply shameful.
Kharkiv is 20 miles from the Russian border. Two weeks in and the might of the Russian army has failed to take it. I wouldn’t say the Ukraine are bound to lose. This war will bankrupt Russia, to China’s delight.
George HW Bush was a one term president. Biden’s approval ratings have gone up also. War doesn’t necessarily mean you will win the next election. George W Bush had near 90 percent approval ratings after 9/11 and barely won the next election. Yes if you can lead the hysterical over reactions you will gain a lot of initial support. Plenty of time to the next elections though. These feelings will begin to dissipate. Especially if energy prices don’t stabilize.