I’ve realised that now I am no longer using Twitter, there is no systematic overview of all the flow diagrams I have made over the years. So this is a post looking back over all the things I have diagrammed, and why! Please click on any image below to load a high resolution PNG version. Links to folders with XML, calculations, and high resolution PNGs and PDFs are provided in each case. It started back in 2017. I stumbled across the peculiar case of the Maltese Professor Joseph Mifsud, and the web of strange relations he weaved. The best way to map this web was to use a diagram – essentially ..read more

An excellent Twitter thread by Alistair King caught my attention yesterday, critiquing Keir Starmer’s supposed new slogan “make Brexit work”. Meanwhile Andrew Adonis summed it up visually with this: “Make Brexit Work” pic.twitter.com/ExqjoKThal — Andrew Adonis (@Andrew_Adonis) November 7, 2021 Aside from the snarky tweet, there is a nugget of something serious in this, namely how the Labour Party – as the only real parliamentary opposition there is in the UK just now – needs to get its messaging right. Labour faces a conundrum: how does it manage to win back ex-Labour voters, many of them w ..read more

This tweet caught my eye this morning: Underlines the problem facing the EU as retaliatory steps liable only to reinforce this perception. The EU may be an effective negotiator, but it is pretty terrible when it comes to comms. https://t.co/zaBwCAtf5L — Anand Menon (@anandMenon1) August 2, 2021 My first reaction: why would the EU even care? My second reaction: even if the EU did care, there is nothing the EU can really do about this anyway. And also then, beyond that, even writing this, and writing it this way, is rooted in a superiority complex of the Brits (well of course the EU must ..read more

This Twitter thread by Holger Hestermeyer caught my eye yesterday: Some thoughts on a trade tweet that – as many have pointed out – is wrong. Now I try to no longer critcise tweets of others, but there’s a point here and I would ask you to refrain from any ad hominem attacks (thread) pic.twitter.com/URkl7aswkt — Holger Hestermeyer (@hhesterm) May 20, 2021 Holger is one of those brilliant people who I’ve encountered thanks to Brexit, one of a whole community of people who have painstakingly pointed out all the technical, legal, political and practical headaches with what the UK Government ha ..read more

Yesterday the European Parliament Conference of Presidents agreed that two Committees – INTA and AFET – would vote on the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) this week, but that any decision as to when the plenary of the European Parliament would vote on it was deferred. The decision was tweeted by INTA Rapporteur Christophe Hansen here. So what’s the obvious question? What happens if the European Parliament does not vote on the TCA by the end of April? Does Politico ask that in this story by Maïa de la Baume about the decision (that also quotes Hansen’s tweet, but doesn’t link t ..read more

Days before the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) finally emerged on Christmas Eve, the European Parliament had already expressed its concern at the process, and refused to be bounced into last minute ratification as the House of Commons was. Chair of the EPP Group Manfred Weber wrote this at the time: Political games from Westminster have wasted too much time. It is now impossible for Parliament to assess a deal before the end of the year. We will not rubber-stamp any text, it is too important. As the only directly elected EU body, we should not rush our decision. #Brexit — Manfre ..read more

The elevation of David Frost to Cabinet, and him largely replacing Michael Gove as the UK Government’s coordinator of all things Brexit, understandably generated considerable debate. Jill Rutter penned a piece for UK in a Changing Europe about what we do and do not know about the UK Government’s new machinery, and Brigid Fowler cast a critical eye over the parliamentary accountability headaches Frost’s appointment causes, not least because his membership of the House of Lords prevents scrutiny of his work through oral Parliamentary Questions in the House of Commons. More political takes on wh ..read more

For years on this blog I have painstakingly been documenting the Brexit saga – in more than 50 diagrams and more than 200 blog posts. I don’t know if anyone can really have described themselves as a Brexit expert back at the time of the referendum, but over the past 4 years that is, in some way, what I have become. Through a combination of knowledge of the EU before I started writing about Brexit, an ability to research, and sheer hard work to get to the bottom of all sorts of aspects of it, I have become some sort of an expert. But why, actually, is it worth my while bothering? When the poli ..read more

One of the consequences of leaving it so late – 24 December 2020 – to agree The EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) was that ratification could not be completed before the Agreement entered into force on 1 January 2021. The European Parliament stated it would not have the time to scrutinise the text adequately, and hence Provisional Application would be needed – essentially everyone behaves as the Deal is in force, but formal ratification happens afterwards. This is explained on Page 429 (although weirdly it’s Page 416 of the PDF) of the TCA – emphasis is mine: Article FINPROV.11: Ent ..read more

Slam dunk. Lambast Michael Gove with a hasty tweet hammered out while drinking my morning coffee. Push the emotional buttons of both Remain people and Scottish pro-Indy people in one go. *So* much to unpick in a 10 word tweet! 1️⃣ So Michael, you now agree there is a hefty cost to Brexit? 2️⃣ This is a report by experts. Do you trust them now? 3️⃣ If there's a cost to Brexit and Indy, and a cost to breaking unions, why do you favour one not the other? https://t.co/Mlk6JRIXXj — Jon Worth (@jonworth) February 5, 2021 Impressions: 120k+ (based on Twitter’s Analytics) Retweets: 300+ Contributio ..read more