BC UK

1/8 Britain is in almost complete lockdown. Nine months since the first. Europe is closing its borders to the British. Across Europe the pandemic is worsening. The US has over 300,000 dead. Far from getting better, the situation in the West is getting worse. The West has failed.

2/8 At what point will the West wake up to the fact this is an historic crisis of Western government, society and culture? Without a vaccine, the West has shown that it cannot deal with the virus. It has been forced to admit defeat and live with it. And it is losing the battle.
3/8 The West likes to think it is cosmopolitan. Wrong. It is increasingly provincial in its mentality. East Asian societies have conquered Covid-19. We barely even acknowledge the fact. We desperately try to ignore that China has succeeded where we have catastrophically failed.
4/8 If the West was cosmopolitan it would seek to learn from East Asia, ask why it is successful. Yet the worse things get, the less curious the West has become about East Asia. This is the story of the West as a failing, self-absorbed, inward-looking culture and civilization.
5/8 The success of East Asia, with China at its heart, has many explanations including: 1. Competent and strategic government; 2. Great respect amongst the people for government and authority; 3. A deep commitment to society and social bonds rather than selfish individualism.
6/8 One small example. My son was in Seoul for 3 months: he didn't see a single person not wearing a mask outdoors. Covid has been largely dealt with. That's social discipline and respect. We lack a culture that believes society rather than the individual is paramount
7/8 It is no use simply putting the West's plight down to bad luck or an unpredictable disaster. The greatest test of government and societies is their ability to deal with such disasters, be they war or pandemics. It is clear that Western societies fundamentally lack resilience.
8/8 Western governments have failed miserably at being single-minded about the priority, eliminating the virus. They have failed to think strategically. They have failed to give leadership. And the people lack the kind of social discipline and social respect that is essential.

More from Uk

Better late than never. Here we go. What does this deal mean for borders, border formalities, customs & trade facilitation?

Long one. TL:DR very little at the moment but has potential

/1


Borders
When compared to no deal the deal changes very little in terms of border procedures. All formalities and checks will still be required.

Reminder - we're not starting from 0 here – both our container ports and our ro-ro ports are already congested

/2

On top of that, all the issues related to border readiness: lack of capacity and space, IT systems not ready, shortages of customs agents, treader readiness – have not been solved.

The deal doesn’t help with that.

/3


Here is where we are:
☑️The UK will phase-in border formalities over 6 months (customs and SPS)
☑️The EU will introduce full formalities in 3 days (customs + SPS)
☑️Irish Sea border also fully operational in 3 days with some short-term SPS easements

/4

Pre-notifications (safety & security declarations) not initially required on the UK side, needed for imports into the EU.

So what's in the deal?

/5
Yesterday, of course, Jeremy Corbyn launched his Peace and Justice Project, to much excitement on here. Laudable goals too:

Take on Murdoch ✅
Green New Deal ✅
Support for food banks ✅
Speed up vaccine delivery in developing countries ✅

That's all excellent.

I'm not sure if anyone can argue with those four aims: they're irrefutable and all massively important. You bet I'd like to see Labour doing likewise; you bet I'm frustrated that it's so quiet on all of it.

HOWEVER...

Contained within the announcement was exactly the same selective blindness which makes the entire thing all too easy to shoot down - and again, means Corbyn is pretty unlikely to persuade anyone who's not already persuaded.

The sort of blindness which makes me tear my hair out.

Peace and Justice - sounds great, doesn't it? So why did the Peace and Justice project proudly announce the support of a corrupt criminal not remotely interested in either of those


Rafael Correa, former President of Ecuador. Let's run through his record, starting with the positives.

Slashed poverty from 36.7% to 22.5% ✅

Reduced inequality from 0.55 to 0.47 on the Gini index ✅

So far, so good. Except, um...

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