Atlantic Sentinel

Tag: United Kingdom

  • Be Careful About Bringing Back Big Government

    Union Station Washington
    South Front Entrance of Union Station in Washington DC, July 4, 2019 (Unsplash/Caleb Fisher)

    Big government is back.

    Massive rescue programs have prevented business failures and unemployment on the scale of the Great Depression, even though last year’s economic contraction was nearly as bad. The European Union agreed a €750 billion recovery fund, financed, for the first time, by EU-issued bonds. The money comes on top of national efforts. The United States Congress passed a $2.2 trillion stimulus, worth 10 percent of GDP, in March and added $484 billion in April. An additional $900 billion in relief was included in this year’s budget.

    Joe Biden, the incoming president, wants to spend $2 trillion more over the next four years to transition the United States to a greener economy and create a public health insurance program. Corporate tax would go up from 21 to 28 percent.

    In Spain, a socialist government has introduced the biggest budget in Spanish history — partly to cope with the impact of coronavirus, but also to finance digitalization, electric cars, infrastructure, renewable energy and rural development. Taxes on income, sales and wealth are due to increase.

    In the United Kingdom, the ruling Conservative Party is building more social housing and thinking about renationalizing rail. Unlike during the last economic crisis, it does not propose to cut spending even though tax revenues are down.

    Same in the Netherlands, where all the major parties agree the government needs to do more to reduce pollution and prevent people at the bottom of the social ladder from falling through the cracks.

    I’m not opposed to more government per se. I’ve argued the United States should imitate the policies of Northern Europe to improve child care, health care and housing.

    But let’s be careful not to throw more government at every problem. Sometimes government is the problem. (more…)

  • Gibraltar Brexit Deal is Victory for Spain

    Gibraltar
    View from the Rock of Gibraltar, December 20, 2018 (Unsplash/Michal Mrozek)

    Gibraltar is joining the Schengen free-travel area and will accept European border guards in its ports.

    The agreement, reached shortly before New Year’s between the governments of Britain and Spain, avoids the need for a hard border and pulls the Rock closer into the European Union than it was before.

    It is a victory for Spanish nationalists, who have long dreamed of regaining a foothold in Gibraltar after three centuries of British rule.

    Accomplished, ironically, by a left-wing government. (more…)

  • What to Make of the EU-UK Trade Agreement

    European Union flags
    Flags of the United Kingdom and the European Union outside the Berlaymont in Brussels, January 29, 2016 (European Commission)

    I haven’t read the 1,246 pages of the EU-UK trade agreement, so I’m going to rely on trusted sources to make sense of the accord.

    First, a couple of notes on terminology.

    This treaty, the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, governs the future cross-Channel relationship. It is due to go into effect on January 1, although it will still need to be ratified by the parliaments of the European Union and the United Kingdom as well as the European Council.

    Last year’s withdrawal agreement regulated Britain’s exit from the EU. It provided for a one-year transition period, which expires on December 31, and included a protocol for Northern Ireland, which keeps the province in the European single market for goods and effectively (but not legally) in the EU customs union to avoid the need for a border with the Republic of Ireland.

    Both treaties have been unhelpfully referred to as “the deal” in the English-speaking press, but only the withdrawal agreement was crucial. The trade agreement, while good to have, since Britain does most of its trade with the EU, was always optional. (more…)

  • Britain Still Won’t Accept Tradeoff at Heart of Brexit

    Boris Johnson
    British prime minister Boris Johnson chairs a cabinet meeting in London, England, September 30 (10 Downing Street/Andrew Parsons)

    Britain is still trying to have its cake and eat it too.

    • It doesn’t want to lose access to the European market, but it doesn’t want to follow EU rules and regulations either.
    • It doesn’t want a border in Ulster, but it doesn’t want to keep Northern Ireland in closer regulatory alignment with the EU than the rest of the United Kingdom.
    • It doesn’t want a customs border in the Irish Sea, but it doesn’t want regulatory divergence between Northern Ireland and Great Britain.

    And it still thinks it can spook the EU into relaxing its red lines by threatening to exit the transition period that ends on December 31 without a trade deal when the absence of a trade deal would hurt the UK far more than the EU. (more…)

  • Statism Makes a Comeback in the United Kingdom

    Cabinet Office London England
    The British flag flies over the Cabinet Office in London, England (Shutterstock/Willy Barton)

    Two months ago, I argued Britain was once again the sick man of Europe. It had the second-highest per capita COVID death rate among major countries. Economic output had fallen 20 percent from the year before.

    The crisis wasn’t lost on policymakers. The dual shock of coronavirus and Brexit — Britain formally left in 2019 but still applies EU rules and regulations this year — has led to something of a quiet revolution in Whitehall: the potential rebirth of the interventionist state.

    There is still much wrong with how the British government has handled both events, the poster child for COVID being the decimation of the British aviation and travel industry as well as the arts. Not since the closing of the coal mines has an entire industry shrunk so dramatically.

    Yet the seeds of a new statism have been sown — by a Conservative government. (more…)

  • British Conservatives Shouldn’t Root for Trump

    Theresa May Donald Trump
    British prime minister Theresa May speaks with American president Donald Trump the Oval Office of the White House in Washington DC, January 27, 2017 (10 Downing Street/Jay Allen)

    Like in 2016, there are those on the British right who are rooting for Donald Trump’s reelection.

    Like in 2016, they are deluding themselves if they think the Republican will be better for Britain than his Democratic challenger, Joe Biden. (more…)

  • Johnson Puts British Diplomacy, Internal Relations at Risk

    Boris Johnson
    British prime minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street in London, England, January 22 (10 Downing Street/Andrew Parsons)

    British prime minister Boris Johnson has been accused of “legislative hooliganism” and running a “rogue state” for bringing forth legislation that would breach international law.

    The Internal Market Bill, which Johnson’s government is planning to enact in order to establish the legal framework for Britain’s internal market following the end of the Brexit transition period, would contravene the withdrawal agreement Britain has negotiated with the EU.

    The withdrawal agreement subjects Northern Ireland to EU rules on exports and state aid in order to avoid the need for a border with the Republic of Ireland. The open border has helped keep the peace between Catholics and Protestants in the region for twenty years.

    The Internal Market Bill gives UK ministers the power to opt out of those rules. (more…)

  • Spain Proposes Schengen Membership for Gibraltar

    Gibraltar
    Bay of Algeciras seen from the Rock of Gibraltar (Unsplash/Freja Saurbrey)

    Politico reports that Spain has proposed to include Gibraltar in the EU’s passport-free Schengen Area to facilitate cross-border travel.

    The arrangement would be similar to Liechtenstein’s, which is not in the EU but a member of Schengen. Andorra is negotiating a similar status. Monaco, San Marino and Vatican City are in neither the EU nor Schengen but maintain open borders.

    The proposal is backed by Gibraltar’s chief minister, Fabian Picardo.

    96 percent of his citizens voted to remain in the EU in the 2016 referendum, but they were overruled by majorities in England and Wales.

    Although Britain formally left the EU at the end of 2019, the bloc’s rules and regulations still apply until the end of 2020.

    Gibraltar, like Britain, was never in the Schengen Area, but it was in the EU single market, allowing it to trade freely with the EU’s 27 other member states. Before the pandemic, commuters were typically waved through by Spanish border police. (more…)

  • Britain Still Thinks It Can Bluff Its Way to a Better Deal

    European Union flags
    Flags of the United Kingdom and the European Union outside the Berlaymont in Brussels, January 29, 2016 (European Commission)

    What do you call doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?

    Brexit.

    I’ve also called it the Tsipras approach to negotiating with the EU, after the Greek prime minister who thought he could get his way by threatening to blow himself up.

    It didn’t work for Alexis Tsipras, and it hasn’t worked for the United Kingdom. Despite threats to walk away without a deal, Prime Minister Boris Johnson last year agreed to essentially the exit agreement the EU had proposed all along.

    Now his government is unhappy with the agreement it made and, once again, threatening to walk away. (more…)

  • Singapore-on-Thames Is Unlikely

    London England
    View of London, England at night from The Shard, December 11, 2017 (Unsplash/Giammarco)

    With the Brexit transition period ending in just four months, concern is rising that the United Kingdom might crash out of the EU’s common market and customs regime without a deal.

    Not everyone is worried. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s predecessor, Theresa May, argued it “wouldn’t be the end of the world” if Britain left without a deal. Right-wing economists are looking forward to setting “attractive tax rates” once the United Kingdom is free of the EU’s grasp. The UK, they believe, could become a “Singapore-on-Thames”, gain a “competitive advantage” over the EU and draw businesses and investment away from continental Europe.

    That is unlikely. (more…)

  • Britain Is Once Again the Sick Man of Europe

    London England
    View of the City of London, England from The Shard at night, June 13, 2018 (Unsplash/Tim Arterbury)

    During the 1960s and 70s, Britain, economically stagnant and losing its empire, was known as the sick man of Europe. With COVID-19, the sickness has returned — and this time it may be even harder to heal.

    More than 300,000 cases of coronavirus have been confirmed in the United Kingdom. 41,000 Britons have died of the disease, giving the country the second-highest per capita death rate among major countries. British economic output fell 20 percent in April, the worst rate by far among industrial nations.

    This comes after a decade of austerity and on top of the economic fallout of Brexit.

    It was the tough medicine of Thatcherism that allowed the United Kingdom to recover from its previous bout of ill health and find a new faith in itself — “Cool Britannia” — under New Labour.

    But the seeds of the current malaise were planted in the same era. (more…)

  • Should Scotland Become Independent?

    Unicorn Edinburgh Scotland
    Statue of a Scottish unicorn in Edinburgh, March 11, 2014 (byronv2)

    Scottish public opinion is shifting in favor of independence with several recent polls giving the separatists a 1- to 7-point lead.

    Independence lost in the 2014 referendum by 10 points, but Britain’s exit from the European Union, and the growing likelihood that it will end the year without a trade deal to replace its access to the European single market, has many Scots wondering if they might not be better off leaving the UK in order to rejoin to EU.

    The answer is probably still no. (more…)

  • Britain’s Demands in EU Trade Talks Are Not Unreasonable

    Boris Johnson
    British prime minister Boris Johnson leaves 10 Downing Street in London, England, January 22 (10 Downing Street/Andrew Parsons)

    EU and UK negotiators have made little progress in talks for a post-Brexit trade deal since March. With half a year to go before the transition period — during which EU rules and regulations still apply in the United Kingdom — expires, and Britain insisting it will not seek an extension, the risk of a no-deal exit from the EU is once again rising.

    Without a deal, tariffs and borders will go up on January 1. Agriculture, which the EU protects with an elaborate system of rules, subsidies and tariffs, would be hit hard. So would services, which now benefit from open borders, open skies and harmonized regulations. British and European authorities have separately calculated that the UK economy could be 10 percent smaller in fifteen years under a no-deal scenario. (more…)

  • British Rediscover Normalcy in Abnormal Times

    Milton Abbas England
    Festival in Milton Abbas in the south of England, July 29, 2017 (Shutterstock/Vivvi Smak)

    “Normal” may not be the best word to describe the situation in the United Kingdom, where 60,773 people, including Prime Minister Boris Johnson, are known to have contracted coronavirus disease and 7,097 with the infection have died.

    Yet after years during which Britain’s exit from the European Union overshadowed everything, there are also signs that political life on the island is returning to normalcy.

    As the government has tightened restrictions on public life in order to contain the outbreak, communities across the country are helping each other out. Almost every neighborhood now has a “COVID-19 Community Group” that organizes care for the needy and most vulnerable. Bitter divisions over Brexit have been set aside. (more…)

  • Starmer Wins Labour Leadership Election

    • Keir Starmer has been elected leader of the British Labour Party with 56 percent support.
    • Rebecca Long-Bailey, who represented continuity from outgoing leader Jeremy Corbyn, placed second with 28 percent.
    • Lisa Nandy placed third with 16 percent.
    • Over 490,000 out of 784,151 eligible Labour Party members and supporters voted in the contest.
    • Corbyn stepped down after losing last year’s election to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservatives by a margin of 11.5 points. (more…)