Off the front pages

The coronavisrus has pushed Brexit off the front pages for a while, but that doesn't mean nothing is happening.

THe first face to face meetings happened this week, and showed that both the UK and UK are miles apart. The EU still wants the same things, to have a level playing field and access to UK waters, the UK wants, well, stuff that pander to the xenophobic.

Lets be clear, if the UK wants, it can block any other country from fishing in UK waters, and fish them just themselves. But, as 80% of UK caught fish is exported, to the EU, so the thought that the EU would carry on importing UK fish in the event that EU ships are banned from fishing in UK waters is a tad foolish. Not only that, most of the fish processing industry is geared to supplying the EU too.

Reality and common or garden xenophobia will carry on meeting, and what the PM and Ministers say might be rhetoric, but it has an effect.

And the thought that the UK is thinking of reneging on the terms of the WA will alarm all countries the UK needs to negotiate a trade deal with.

And on trade deals, we see how a FTA can have a marginal impact on increasing trade. The possible one between the UK and US would increase the GDP of the UK by something like 0.14%, of £15 billion, after 15 years. And so a FTA with the EU would have a similar impact after a no deal or very hardest Brexit would have shrunk the economy by nearly 10%.

Meanwhile the UK population is giving Government a dress rehearsal on how they would react to the possibility of broken supply chains by panic-buying toilet rolls, liquid soap and hand sanitisers.

Brexit is going to be SO much fun.