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David Henig Profile picture
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15 Mar, 4 tweets, 2 min read
Like the idea of a national bus strategy. Though as the government doesn't have much control over buses wondering how or if it will be delivered.

Also wary of government announcements of big numbers which probably mean little (former champion G Brown) bbc.co.uk/news/business-…
The end of bus deregulation will be seriously popular outside London (which never had it to start with). Regardless of whether no timetable buses are possible (not outside of major bus corridors).
Link to the buses announcement - gov.uk/government/new…
And thread on the buses announcement. Some of the detail doesn't stack up, but the direction of travel is welcome.

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More from @DavidHenigUK

David Henig Profile picture
16 Mar
A marginal improvement in UK vaccine twitter today towards considering that EU and other countries decisions might not be primarily motivated by jealousy of the UK. But there was a worrying amount of UK insularity such that even EU-sceptics in the EU were critical of us.
Obviously twitter / UK tabloids etc but it is always the absence of nuanced debate that concerns me most. Like Brexit where neither glorious triumph or epic failure is the likely result, just changed circumstances which will have consequences.
And for the 'why always so negative' crowd, you do realise that serious businesses spend serious time and money considering everything that can go wrong? It isn't quite the gung-ho capitalism that excitable media and politicians seem always to assume.
Read 5 tweets
David Henig Profile picture
15 Mar
I know you're all experts now so will realise that a country pausing vaccinations in response to a possible concern may not be choosing to deliberately kill their citizens but just to investigate further e.g. problematic batches or common medical conditions.
Quite aside from anything else the level of UK smugness over vaccination is quite off the scale for a pandemic which is still a danger to us. That we are hopefully on the right track is rather good, but not justifying lecturing Europe on our superiority.
And on balance I think it unlikely that non-EU countries like Norway and Iceland have suspended use of a vaccine in solidarity with the EU against the UK. I don't want to second guess medical regulators, but I suspect their remit is health and safety not responding to UK media.
Read 7 tweets
David Henig Profile picture
15 Mar
The 5-year mistake of treating leaving the EU in the same way as being members in terms of Whitehall structures. To 2016 the Prime Minister's Sherpa sat at the centre of a complex web of UK-EU connections. Since 2016 the sherpa has been interpreted as the lead, with poor results.
We're going to 'tilt' to the Indo-Pacific region while the centre of government has a Cabinet lead for EU relations (not to mention the special relationship) tells its own story of confusion. theguardian.com/politics/2021/…
When the 'great prize' is membership of a thin trade deal composed of countries who we mostly already have trade deals with you, which compared to the EU and US comprises less of our trade or attention, it really does seem a rather tokenistic 'gap year' effort.
Read 4 tweets
David Henig Profile picture
13 Mar
An apparent analysis, details not provided, suggesting the UK will save tens of billions by beating the EU in vaccinations by one to two months, leads The Times front page. The very real ONS data showing a 40% drop in exports to the EU is a small story on page four.
As before the UK is doing well on vaccinations. It probably has an economic benefit. We did badly on preventing deaths previously though, meaning tougher lockdowns and a bigger economic hit. But that seems forgotten in the current fawning media coverage.
Meanwhile the biggest rise in trade barriers in modern history, with a likely long term economic hit of several percent of GDP, is considered either unimportant or more likely inconvenient.
Read 8 tweets
David Henig Profile picture
12 Mar
On the question of import checks on food and other products coming into Britain. As ever in trade and regulatory policy this is not straightforward. Fewer checks on EU products is going to mean more risks, and also demands for same from other countries.
Now given that failing to check food products coming into Britain (Northern Ireland is under EU rules) risks illness, death, contamination of our products and much more you need to get this right. The public will be all over any failure and rightly so.
On the other hand you don't typically check every single individual item coming into a country, rather you have broader agreements with other countries underpinned by by an overall system and regular checks. It is quite a process. See here for EU. ec.europa.eu/food/safety/in…
Read 5 tweets
David Henig Profile picture
12 Mar
It won't be a single EU response to UK provocations but a series of decisions that collectively affects the UK economy in the way the local economic superpower can. But like the December agreement the UK government and naive supporters might claim triumph. ft.com/content/d19633…
It is still quite something to behold to see the UK government and supporters claim two great trimuphs in EU negotiations that gave the EU everything they wanted, and the UK far less. More damagingly it is those negotiatring failures causing much UK belligerence.
UK negotiating strategy with the EU is currently that to overcome the problems of the two failed negotiations they must double down on the threats that led to the failures. It is an unconvincing strategy.
Read 5 tweets

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