No.196 - Well Done Team Boris! You’ve Got Something Right at Last!

Dear James,

Credit where credit is due. Team Boris has got something right at last. Early in the pandemic, it ordered millions of units of a variety of vaccines before any had proven their efficacy. By last Friday the UK had vaccinated 11% of our population compared with 2.3% in Germany and 1.8% in France. Outside the EU it is 8.5% in the USA and 52% in Israel, the current leader in vaccination. Well done Team Boris!  You are for the first time ahead of the curve!

But more to the delight of Boris will be the right old mess the EU has got itself into in the last few days. On Friday, under pressure from its populations regarding their low EU vaccination rate, the Commission panicked when Astra-Zeneka, the Anglo-Swedish makers of one of the vaccines, announced that it could not supply what it had promised. For several hours the EU triggered Article 16 of the Northern Ireland protocol which allows a complaining party to close borders if they perceive wrong doing by the other party. The threat to the UK was that, in retaliation, the EU might cut off supplies to the UK of the Pfizer vaccines which are made in Europe. Europe looked on in shock. The UK bided its time.

Sources suggest that, compared with the UK, the EU had been dilatory in ordering its own vaccines. In fact they were three months behind. It takes time to coordinate decision making of 27 different members and it seems they chose to demonstrate solidarity with the 27 members rather than the urgent need to deal with the rapidly spreading pandemic. Earlier last week it also discovered that Astra-Zeneka, the British-Swedish creator of one of the vaccines had told the EU that it could not meet the target of 100m doses for them this year. The company pointed out that the agreement was subject to a ‘best endeavours’ clause i.e that AZ would only ‘do its best to deliver’ rather than offer a firm guarantee. This is what triggered Article 16. Mr Macron then piled in stating that the A-Z vaccine was ineffective in the over 65 age group, misreading the German complaint that there was insufficient data regarding that group. The EU got it wrong. For six hours the Anglo-Irish Agreement and peace in that island, were at risk. I’m sure Boris couldn’t believe his luck!

Of course, your party James was quick to cash in. They saw their chance of making hay while the sun shines. Arlene Foster of the Democratic Unionist Party called the move ‘an aggressive act’. Mr Gove, playing for once in front of an open goal, refrained from criticising and instead said this was a great opportunity to ‘reset’ the Brexit protocol. In other words, the Brexit protocol which has been turning out to be - as predicted last year when Boris ‘betrayed’ the union by agreeing to put a border in the Irish Sea – a huge problem for the Northern Ireland business community. And meanwhile Mrs Von Der Leyen and the EU Commission are picking themselves up and dusting themselves off after their blunder. Imagine the joy in No.10!

The storm will blow over. Once this little spat is behind us, perspective will return. Brexit is not ‘done’. Thousands of UK firms are planning to set up in the EU because of the mountains off red tape faced by UK based companies wishing to keep dealing with Europe. In the process many UK workers will be sacked. And the  pandemic remains the elephant in the room. Yesterday our death rate rose to 105,000 and, though we may be just beyond the peak of new infections, the downward slope is very shallow. Many more deaths are on the way. One expert suggested a figure nearer 150,000 may be the eventual tally for the UK. 

That number of deaths – far more than the total civilian deaths in the nation in the Second World War (67,100) - merits a Commission of Inquiry, something that Boris is trying to delay. He knows that his performance in this area has been abysmal. To have an objective inquiry that will be able to match the long parade of his misstatements, hesitations, delays and ideological diversions with the precise data stream of this dreadful virus, will be enough to ruin any hope of his sunlit uplands.

So James, enjoy the haymaking while you can. Things return to normal next week! 

Kind Regards,

BH - Your Concerned Constituent