More Stuff Happens

There's still a lot of winners remorse going around regarding Brexit. Apparently all the troubles are due to remainers.  When Boris Johnson became PM on the 23rd July 2019 the UK was still a member of the EU and all paths were open. Johnson assumed power and was in the driving seat. Johnson spent the autumn negotiating ( or having negotiated for him ) an EU Withdrawal Agreement. It was entirely up to him and his Brexit cabinet to negotiate the content of the Withdrawal Agreement with the EU. I don't think any remainers were involved and Johnson was able to try to negotiate any Withdrawal Agreement he wanted with the EU. It was Johnson's choice to base his Withdrawal Agreement on the EU's original proposal with the Irish Sea Border rather than the one May negotiated with the Backstop. Once Johnson was happy he chose to take that 'Oven Ready Deal' to the nation and hold a General Election in which he promised to 'Get Brexit Done'. He chose to do that rathe

 It's interesting to ponder how the UK Governments provisions for the Irish Sea Border and its desire to ensure a uniform internal (*) market (oh! the irony) in the UK will interact. (*) obviously politics means this won't be called a single market. The UK Government has recently published a policy paper titled " Moving goods under the Northern Ireland Protocol: Introduction " and in the overview they state: 1. Overview The guidance outlines that, under the Northern Ireland Protocol, the UK Government will ensure that: Moving goods from Northern Ireland to Great Britain should take place as it does now – there will be no additional process, paperwork, or restrictions on Northern Ireland goods moving to Great Britain, delivering unfettered access. Changes for goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will be kept to an absolute minimum - with a new Trader Support Service, available to all traders at no cost, to be established to provide wraparound support,

I'm not a fan of Freeports as they've always seemed to be form of tariff manipulation taking advantage of 'tariff inversion'. The process seems to be: Import high tariff parts but pay no tariffs because you're in a Freeport. Make a low tariff finished item in the Freeport. Import that low tariff finished item into your country. The net effect is that less import tariffs are paid to your country's Government. Does that mean everyone else is subsiding your business? Here's an interesting article by the UK Trade Policy Observatory at Sussex University that looks into Freeports and what opportunity there is for them in the UK. They've looked at the UK's proposed tariff and they say that there are few opportunities for tariff inversion in the UK's proposed tariff structure. The summary to their analysis is: The above analysis takes three different approaches to investigate the potential for duty savings from introducing Freeports in the UK. They all

While I've no idea if it will come to anything, it's interesting to see one Hong Kong property tycoon's response to Hong Kong's current predicament. Build a new city for 50,000 ex Hong Kongers in Ireland: “We like Ireland,” Ko told the Guardian on Tuesday. “Corporate taxes are very low. You have a very strong manufacturing and biomedical companies. Major tech giants have European headquarters there. Overall we think Ireland is very good.” and Attractions included Ireland’s low population density and Brexit creating opportunities for its financial services sector, Ko said. He added he was considering additional countries, which he declined to name. Moving to Ireland because of Brexit creating opportunities for its financial services is hardly a vote for London or the effects Brexit will have on it! On the other hand, the Irish seem less sure about the whole idea: A department of foreign affairs spokesperson in Dublin confirmed there had been talks with Ko but app

Here's another silly comment article in The Telegraph . If the EU wants a deal the solution is simple: fire Michel Barnier High-handed, patronising and provocative, the Frenchman has been a complete failure over three years Well, he may have been a failure for the UK but he's been a success for the EU. He agreed the Withdrawal Agreement that Johnson and the EU27 leaders were happy to have ratified. The EU27 are pleased with that so, from their view point Barnier is a success. In fact they re-appointed him after the Withdrawal Agreement to negotiate a trade deal. The author writes: The EU keeps saying it genuinely wants a deal. But if that is true, there is a simple solution. It should fire Michel Barnier, its chief negotiator. Over three years, the Frenchman has been a complete failure. High-handed, patronising and provocative, he never seems to have grasped that the job of a negotiator is to find a compromise, not simply antagonise the other side. His key job is to get a deal

The UK Government is expected to announce new measures to try and curb obesity and they may include a ban on TV junk food adverts before the 9PM 'watershed'. A more useful approach to tackling obesity may be better food standards and in particular requiring more protein in fast food. I found this May 2020 New Scientist article very interesting for what it said about appetite, hunger and overeating. Simplistically, we get hungry and eat until no longer hungry. The article suggests there's more to it than that. In particular, we get hungry for a number ( five ) different things and ideally eat until we're no longer hungry for all five. Of those five, the hunger for protein is the one that really needs to be satisfied. We'll keep eating until we've had enough protein even if that means eating more carbs. This is basically how the low carb keto diets work. Stuff yourself with steak and you won't have any chips and you overall energy intake will drop. Sadly the