Thread by @faisalislam

So a week ago FCDO officials briefed foreign journalists on record, correctly, that Govt was parking the ECJ red line on NI (there was another briefing to foreign journalists on this in Brussels) … it was then denied in a Cabinet Office statement and a tweet from Lord Frost.

https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1469350565616496642

Mail now says Lord Frost resigned a week ago but was persuaded to stay on till January…

Yesterday the row back on both the ECJ that had been denied (and the threat to invoke Article16 this year) was officially announced…

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1…

found the notion one set of officials would on record brief foreign journalists with material change in policy, and then domestic journalists had that denied by a different set of officials, v v strange. Not cited in Mail as reason but this is what was happening at time last week

DUP leader says Frost departure (still not confirmed officially) raises serious questions for PM re his approach to NI Protocol, and the PM will have to decide whether stability of institutions or Protocol matter more…

mydup.com/news/frost-dep…

language of that UK briefing to europress Via @bolzen - “accepts EU 'has no mandate to renegotiate Withdrawal Agreement' to remove ECJ oversight for now”. “If Protocol works as advertised, it can provide advantages' for NI Econ” seemed rather to undercut many of Frosts arguments

NI committee chair not a huge fan:

https://twitter.com/simon4ndorset/status/1472313829677752321

On the other hand, ex colleague at No 10:

https://twitter.com/nmdacosta/status/1472305518874087430

Official Frost resignation letter

https://twitter.com/nickeardleybbc/status/1472329219329900553

And the spigot bursts again… quite the leak…

https://twitter.com/samcoatessky/status/1472331053775958016

interesting political economy question in that letter and the WhatsApp group. Frost openly writes, the whole point of Brexit was a move to a “lightly regulated low tax” economy… was that the 2016 or 2019 winning public message? As many reasons to see post Brexit = bigger state…

Eg

350m to NHS = bigger state
Levelling up = bigger role for state, at least initially
Wage rise for all = bigger state (living wage)
Build back better/industrial strategy = bigger state (satellite cos, gigafactories etc)

And that’s before Covid increase in size of state.

Foreign Sec Truss takes over EU responsibilities and the whole Article 16 discussion over NI Protocol. Unlike Frost, she is also chief diplomat with European capitals bilaterally and with the US secretary state Blinken too…

So while there is greater scope for bilateral diplomacy for Truss, and getting eg the US to understand British Govt position, when push comes to shove, she will not be able to ignore the diplomatic consequences of eg triggering Article 16 - immediate call from State Dept etc.