This is, of course, the big news from the past week. The whole Farage/Trump/ambassador thing is little more than a febrile combination of unwillingness to follow protocol, mutual back-scratching and intentional destablising, while the Autumn Statement simply underlines that no-one in government really knows what Brexit means. But the resumption of legal contests – now in the Supreme […]

These days, my bedtime reading consists of books on the EU referendum: The Brexit Club, Bad Boys of Brexit, Unleashing Demons and (currently) All Out War. All have provided another level of understanding to what happened over the past year or two, confirming some suspicions and challenging some assumptions. Most strikingly so far has been the strategising that took place. […]

Today’s High Court ruling in Miller/dos Santos has provoked a flurry of reaction, across the board. To read the comments of some Remainers, this is the first step to reversing the referendum result and building a new, pro-EU consensus in the UK. For Leavers, it’s being called a travesty of democracy and justice. As someone […]

Anyone in hope of elucidation on Brexit this week will have been a bit disappointed, even by recent standards. With submissions to the High Court providing no killer arguments either side – and both sides firmly stating that any loss will be challenged up to the Supreme Court and an immigration debate that has sunk to the […]

Of the many, many frustrations about Brexit, one of the most paradoxical has been the lack of scrutiny. On the one hand, there has been almost endless public criticism and debate about the outcome of the referendum, with endless holes being picked in whatever is offered up by those in positions of power. But on the other, […]

Due to circumstances beyond my control, I found myself listening to the Today programme this morning, with Matteo Renzi being interviewed. Three points struck me about this. One was that I must try listening to the radio more often. More consequentially, the second was that Renzi seemed adamant about the need to disconnect the two […]

A few weeks ago, I wrote on the challenge facing the British eurosceptic movement: the achievement of victory in the referendum removes the key binding agent in the coalition of interests, with many now likely to redirect their activity elsewhere. Since then, we’ve seen some marginal movements in affairs, including the election of Diane James to lead UKIP and […]