Thoughts from Galicia: 10.12.17

Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.

- Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain. 

If you've arrived here because of an interest in Galicia or Pontevedra, see my web page here.

Cataluña

• Sr P says the only 'plan' he has is to remain president of the Catalan government. From a safe distance, of course. 
• A Guardian columnist casts a jaundiced eye over over both national and regional media here. Taster: You can see the clapped-out legacy of this approach in Catalonia now.  The state-owned news from Madrid isn’t trusted. Still worse, the Catalan channels, richly funded by the local parliament and putting nationalist devotees in charge, has created a roseate picture of independence that simply doesn’t fit the facts. 

Spain

• Madrid would like a longer Brexit transitional period than that currently on the table. This might well happen, but not really merely because Spain wants it. 
• Meanwhile, thanks in (small?) part to pessimism re said Brexit, applications for Spanish citizenship are reported to be up by 33%. I'm still holding off, if only because I could choose between this and the Irish variety.
• We're all increasingly worried about plastic. And, yet, here in Spain it's the devil's own job stopping shopkeepers giving you totally unncessary plastic bags. One for a small packet of paracetamol yesterday.

The EU, UK and Brexit

• Here's a couple of extracts from the pertinent article at the end of this post:- What an absurd pantomime that was. By last Monday the only possible conclusion seemed to be that this whole thing was a misbegotten waste of time. Even convinced as I was that Leave had been the right answer, I wondered whether I could carry on supporting this shambolic endeavour.  . . .  But the melodrama and grandstanding of the past weeks between the UK and Brussels will pale in comparison to the spectacle of the poor Mediterranean countries within the eurozone struggling to protect their interests against the dominance of richer northern ones, and the former Warsaw Pact countries resisting the French push toward greater centralised control.  . . Brexit will look like a warm-up act for the real European drama that is to come. . . .  In the end, all those Brexit disagreements may come to look like so much posturing and prancing when the internal EU discord erupts.

Galicia

• The forecast storm - the first in Spain to be given a (female) name - has duly arrived. And the palm tree ouitside my window is bent double. And we're all loving the rain . . . Honest.

Finally

Witless British TV ads

- Thorntons toffee: Pass the love on

- ASDA supermarket: Best Christmas ever

- M&S store: Spend it well

- Dysons: Give a gift that means more

- VIPoo[sic] air freshener:  The gift that keeps on giving

- Turkish airlines: Lighten your world

- Nissan car: Creating families

Today's Cartoon

 Stong and stable government . . . 

THE ARTICLE

After a week of preposterous grandstanding and melodrama, now the Brexit fun really begins: Janey Daley, The Daily Telegraph

At last we are ready for trade negotiations – which is the EU’s nightmare, as its own divisons are opened up revealed

What an absurd pantomime that was. By last Monday – which now seems about a century ago – the only possible conclusion seemed to be that this whole thing was a misbegotten waste of time. Even convinced as I was – and as around half of the stalwart British population still appeared to be – that Leave had been the right answer, I wondered whether I could carry on supporting this shambolic endeavour.

And then, miraculously, came the deliverance which anyone remaining lucid must have known was inevitable. It has always been clear that there was a perfectly credible solution to the Irish border problem: a combination of modern technology and old-fashioned common sense could deal with what is, in trade terms, a quite small matter.

But no, the EU had arbitrarily chosen to put this issue to the top of the list of Things That Must Be Settled Before Real Negotiations Can Begin. And to reinforce this sudden elevation of the Irish border to make-or-break status, it promoted the inexperienced Taoiseach Leo Varadkar to world stardom. Well, you know the rest.

We don’t need to retrace the steps of what looked like a tragedy until it turned out to be a farce. 

Suffice to say that the head of the pantomime horse was occupied by our old friends on the European Commission and the rear end was filled by Mr Varadkar, who must have been thrilled by his personal visitation from Donald Tusk to announce that Ireland would have a unilateral veto over Brexit terms. This was, it has to be said, quite a wickedly irresponsible thing to do because it threatened to open a breach in a terrible, bitter dispute which has only recently – and tenuously – healed.

Mercifully, somebody pulled the strings that needed to be pulled in time so we have a solution to the Irish border question which will, I am willing to bet, hold up indefinitely. Oddly enough, on that long Thursday night, we also seem to have settled a couple of other outstanding difficulties.

The final exit bill for the UK will be, according to reliable sources, £35-39 billion, which is higher than Theresa May’s initial offer of £20 billion but far below the figure of £100 billion (with an indefinite commitment to future instalments) that had occasionally been bandied about in the more excitable quarters of Brussels. What is more, everybody now accepts that EU citizens in the UK will continue to have the same rights as they had before, as will UK citizens in EU countries. You don’t say.

Have any of these outcomes ever been in genuine doubt by realists on all sides? If not, what was all that hysteria in aid of last week? Of course, it was partly the fault of the UK government, which seemed to have been peculiarly obtuse in its dealings with the sensitivities in Ulster, but it also seemed to fit too well with the Brussels game of ritual mortification which must be visited upon Britain. As I may have said before, this is not a negotiation, it is a hostage crisis, in which payment (in both cash and abnegation) must be agreed before the terms of release can even be discussed.

But something had clearly gone badly wrong. Watching Jean-Claude Juncker’s face and listening to his uncharacteristically gentle diplomatic words as he delivered his statement at the press conference of doom on Monday, it was clear that he was genuinely alarmed. This was not going according to plan. Ireland had gone from being one more mischievous trick on the British to an actual obstacle with possibly tragic consequences. In short, the EU had dangerously overplayed its hand.

Mr Juncker and Mr Varadkar fairly tripped over one another in their eagerness to pull back from the brink. So, in the dead of night, rabbits leapt out of hats, the intractable became manageable and the deal was done. We had now, it was solemnly intoned, made “sufficient progress” to be allowed to enter the proper negotiations over future trade relations which should have been going on simultaneously with that peculiar trio of pre-conditions ordained by the EU.

Never mind. We are back in the real world now, which might seem like a relief to us but is the EU’s nightmare – which is why they have been so busy staving it off. Because when the truly problematic matters of trade have to be dealt with, serious divisions within the European Union will be flushed into the open.

That’s when the fun really starts. The melodrama and grandstanding of the past weeks between the UK and Brussels will pale in comparison to the spectacle of the poor Mediterranean countries within the eurozone struggling to protect their interests against the dominance of richer northern ones, and the former Warsaw Pact countries resisting the French push toward greater centralised control. Just wait. Brexit will look like a warm-up act for the real European drama that is to come.

Germany, which as yet has no government, has provided a splendid trailer for the upcoming feature. Last Wednesday, Martin Schulz, head of the SPD, whom Angela Merkel is fervently hoping will join her in a viable coalition, announced his proposal for a new EU treaty creating a true United States of Europe to include unified (and centrally controlled) fiscal and defence policy. Any member state which could not accept this would be forced to leave the union.

(In fact this would happen automatically, since any new treaty must be ratified by all member states, most of which would be obliged to hold referendums for the purpose. Failing to ratify would trigger immediate withdrawal from the EU.)

Fiscal and military union would mean that there would be little point in voting for a national government ever again, since tax and spending policies and the defence strategy are the chief grounds for deciding which party one supports.

Mrs Merkel has, for the moment, rejected Mr Schulz’s suggestion. But in France, Emmanuel Macron is promoting more monolithic centralisation too, if in rather less crass terms. In the end, all those Brexit disagreements may come to look like so much posturing and prancing when the internal EU discord erupts.