Warning of 'humanitarian crisis' for shipping workers unable to disembark

Some 300 companies have signed a pledge to help hundreds of thousands of maritime workers stranded aboard freight ships around the world because of Covid-19 restrictions. The crisis has prevented crew changes on many vessels and the companies are calling on governments to recognise maritime personnel as key workers, following a UN resolution passed in December. Also today, we look at how some hairdressers in Belgium are breaking Covid-19 rules by giving haircuts in customers' homes. They say they need to work to survive.

Tunisian protesters march on parliament amid government reshuffle

Issued on: 26/01/2021 - 

Tunisia, mired in a political and economic crisis worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, has been rocked by a wave of social unrest a decade after the Arab Spring uprising. © Fethi Belaid, AFP

Text by: NEWS WIRES

Video by: Andrew HILLIAR

Tunisian riot police turned water cannon on protesters outside the heavily barricaded parliament on Tuesday, trying to quell the largest rally since demonstrations began this month over inequality and police abuses.

Hundreds of protesters had marched from the Ettadhamen district of the capital Tunis, where young people have clashed with police several nights this month, and were joined by hundreds more near the parliament.

Police blocked the march with barricades to prevent protesters approaching the parliament building where lawmakers were holding a tense debate on a disputed government reshuffle.

"The government that only uses police to protect itself from the people – it has no more legitimacy," said one protester, Salem Ben Saleh, who is unemployed.

Later, police also barred Avenue Habib Bourguiba, the broad tree-lined boulevard that is home to the Interior Ministry and where major protests have traditionally taken place, as demonstrators tried to gather there.

Protests flared earlier this month on the 10th anniversary of Tunisia's 2011 revolution that inspired that Arab Spring and introduced democracy in the North African country.

Political paralysis and economic decline have soured many Tunisians on the fruits of the uprising.

In parliament, Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi proposed a new cabinet, a move President Kais Saied had on Monday rejected as unconstitutional.

The political deadlock in Tunisia since elections in 2019 has stymied efforts to address festering economic problems, with both foreign lenders and the main labour union demanding reforms.

Last year, as the global coronavirus pandemic struck, Tunisia's economy shrank by more than 8%. The fiscal deficit rose above 12% of gross domestic product, ballooning public debt to more than 90% of GDP.

The nightly clashes between young people and police have been matched by growing daytime protests at which demonstrators have chanted slogans including "the people want the fall of the regime" – echoing Arab Spring uprisings.

Riots continue in Tunisia after wave of arrests

On Tuesday, with anger high over the death on Monday of a young man whose family said he had been hit by a tear gas canister, protesters chanted against the security forces.

In Sbeitla, the hometown of Haykel Rachdi who was buried on Tuesday, mourners later clashed with police, witnesses said.

As parliamentary debate on the reshuffle paused in the afternoon before a vote expected in the evening, some opposition lawmakers left parliament to join the protest outside.

If parliament endorses Mechichi's new government, it could put him on course for a major showdown with President Saied, complicating any government efforts to overhaul the economy.

"Mechichi has transformed this into a police state... No work, no development, no investment, just police against the people," said Imed, another protester who did not want to give his family name.

(REUTERS)

'Sick of Zoom': Teachers and students rally in France for more virus support

Issued on: 26/01/2021 

Text by: Benjamin DODMAN

Video by: Claire PACCALIN

French schoolteachers and university students staged nationwide strikes and protests on Tuesday as they joined forces to demand more government support amid the pandemic.

“No virus protocol, no school!” read posters carried by schoolteachers, demanding better virus protections at their schools, which have remained open since September amid concern over learning gaps and to ease the burden on working parents.

“Sick of Zoom!” chanted university students, frustrated that they've been barred from campuses since October.

Aside from virus fears, the common concern at Tuesday's protests in Paris, Marseille and other cities around France was economic.

Teachers unions, who are negotiating with the government for improved conditions, want higher salaries and for the government to hire more educators after years of cost cuts.

At a rally in the western city of Rennes, Axel Benoist, the head of the Snuep-FSU union, said teachers had lost "an average of 275 euros per month in purchasing power over the past decade".

Other protesters stressed the need to hire more supply teachers, noting that colleagues are seldom replaced when they fall sick.

The education ministry said about 12% of teachers nationwide took part in Tuesday's strike, though unions said the figure was higher.

'Lost generation'

Students, meanwhile, are seeking more government financial support and want to call attention to emotional troubles among young people cut off from friends, professors and job opportunities amid the pandemic.

With French universities in limbo amid the latest resurgence in Covid-19 infections, alarm bells are ringing over the social, psychological and academic consequences of months of lockdowns, curfews and online teaching for students holed up in cramped dwellings many can ill afford.

>> As students despair, France addresses plight of pandemic’s ‘lost generation’

Acknowledging their concerns last week, President Emmanuel Macron said students would be allowed to return to campus one day a week, provided lecture halls and classrooms don’t exceed 20% capacity.

Macron also said he would look to ensure all students have access to one-euro meals twice a day at university cafeterias, as well as psychological support free of charge.

While welcoming the measures, student unions want more financial support and a return to the rotating scheme that was in place ahead of the country’s second nationwide lockdown, with students alternating between online and classroom teaching.

UNEF, the country's largest student union, has called for a 1.5 billion euro ($1.8 billion) emergency plan to boost grants and help students pay for accommodation.

(FRANCE 24 with AP)

Isolated and depressed: Being a student in France in times of Covid-19

Issued on: 26/01/2021 -

18-year-old Ivo has never set foot in a lecture hall. Unlike high school students, or those on technical courses, he hasn't had any in-person tutorials since the second lockdown. © FRANCE 24

By:Camille PAUVAREL|Julien CHEHIDA|Noémie ROCHE|Ellen GAINSFORD
7 min

Students have been particularly hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and those here in France are no exception. Starved of social contact and with no in-person lessons for months, many are feeling isolated and frustrated. The crisis has also affected them financially and some are struggling to make ends meet. FRANCE 24's Noémie Roche and Julien Chehida went to meet several students, who are trying hard to remain positive despite the difficult circumstances.

Carrey Says Goodbye To ‘Worst First Lady’ Melania Trump In Brutal Cartoon: ‘Thx For Nothing’

Jim Carrey is bidding a not-so-fond farewell to Melania Trump as only he can.

© Provided by ET Canada Rich Fury/WireImage

For his latest piece of artwork, the Canadian comedian offers an unflattering cartoon portrait of the former First lady.

"Oh... and goodbye worst First Lady," he wrote on one side of the drawing.

RELATED: Jim Carrey Pens Essay Calling For ‘A World Without Trump’

He continued by hinting that she'd soon be Donald Trump's third ex-wife. "I hope the settlement can finance your life in the shallow end," he added, concluding, "Thx for nothing."

On the day of the insurrection at the Capitol, Carrey shared an image of then-President Trump (a.k.a. "Covfefe the Killer Clown") and blasted him for his attempts to "murder the truth and weaponize ignorance."

Added Carey: Today's defilement of the Capitol dome is the harvest of Republican negligence and outright sedition from the top down. The chronic symptoms of a corrupt President and Senate are now in full effect."

RELATED: Jim Carrey Shares New Illustration Of Donald Trump As ‘Covfefe, The Killer Clown’

He concluded by addressing new POTUS Joe Biden. "Sorry Joe," he wrote. "This clown made you a wartime president whether you like it or not."

Conor McGregor knockout picture has already become hilarious meme

The Dubliner was floored in the second-round of the Abu Dhabi showdown leading to the devastating loss

By Mark O'BrienNews Reporter 24 JAN 2021

Conor McGregor's knockout picture has already become a hilarious meme


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Conor McGregor suffered a shock defeat in the early hours of Sunday morning when he was knocked out for the first time in his career by Justin Poirier at UFC 257.

The Dubliner was floored in the second-round of the Abu Dhabi showdown leading to the devastating loss.

Pictures of the dazed Notorious lying on the canvass with mouth wide open and eyes were beamed around the world and it wasn't long before the internet did what the internet does by making hilarious memes.

Some of the cheeky digs even managed to mix the week's other hugely popular meme of Bernie Sanders wrapped up against the elements of the inauguration of US President Joe Biden.

Others went back to some classic Disney movies for memespiration.

And some fight fans didn't even need to embellish the picture, sticking to some witty captions instead.

The genius memes add insult to injury for McGregor, who was spotted on crutches following his stunning loss.

After the defeat McGregor opened up on the injury, claiming his entire leg was dead and that his calf resembled an American football such was the swelling.

McGregor and Poirier went back and forth as the Notorious battled back from a successful takedown to score some success with shoulder strikes in the clinch.

But the vicious calf kicks that followed from Poirier signalled the beginning of the end for the Dublin fighter as he was put on the back foot.

And pressed against the cage, Poirier was able to tee off on McGregor until a lovely left hook floored McGregor as the referee stepped in to end it.

At the post-fight press conference, McGregor also responded to Khabib Nurmagomedov's criticism of him after his defeat.

When asked by reporters in the post-fight interview about the Russian's message, McGregor hit back at Khabib.

He said: "My team has been the team since day one, I've not changed anything.

"It is what it is, respect the athletes - and that's the character of the man behind the mask.

"What does he want to do? Does he want to come back or not?

AFTER 6 DAYS

US President Joe Biden smashes Donald Trump's approval ratings
26 Jan, 2021

Joe Biden is scoring a much higher approval rating in early polls of his performance as US President than Donald Trump ever did.

A Hill-HarrisX poll conducted on January 21-22 found Biden had a 63 per cent approval rating, while only 37 per cent of respondents surveyed said they disapproved of the new President's performance so far.

However, there were still signs of polarisation, as Biden scored highly with Democrats and independents, while 70 per cent of Republican voters said they disapproved of his performance.

Biden scored highest on Covid-19 measures in the poll, with 69 per cent approval for his handling of the pandemic.

Morning Consult Political Intelligence tracking found that 56 per cent of voters approved of Biden's job performance in the first few days, while 34 per cent disapproved.

That approval rating is four percentage points higher than Trump's best-ever showing in Morning Consult and Politico polling in early March 2017.

It looks even stronger compared to their polling conducted at a similar point four years ago, when just 46 per cent approved of Trump's early work.

Bribes for vaccine

Meanwhile, a Beverly Hills doctor revealed the lengths some of America's elite are going to to get access to the coronavirus vaccine.

Dr Robert Huizenga told Variety that his practice had been offered more than US$10,000 ($13,805) by people, including some in the entertainment industry, who were desperate to get vaccinated.

"We've been offered bribes," Huizenga said. "We see people taking planes to every location. We've seen people try to transiently get into the healthcare profession or on staff at nursing homes, so they qualify for an early vaccine."

The US is recording more than 150,000 coronavirus cases a day and more than 400,000 people have died since the beginning of the pandemic.

Biden has increased his vaccination target to 1.5 million shots a day and hopes to reach 150 million vaccinations over the next 100 days.

Conviction unlikely

Meanwhile, an article of impeachment for Donald Trump was yesterday formally presented to the US Senate, but it seems unlikely to succeed.

At least 17 Republicans would need to vote in favour of finding Trump guilty in order for him to be convicted, and Biden told CNN he didn't think that would happen.

Trump has also given his first public update since leaving the Oval Office, announcing the establishment of his "Office of the Former President", which will manage his correspondence, public statements, appearances and official activities.

President Joe Biden orders end of privately-run federal prisons
26 Jan, 2021

President Joe Biden on Tuesday ordered the Department of Justice to end its reliance on private prisons and for government to acknowledge the role it has played in implementing discriminatory housing policies.

In remarks before signing the order, Biden said the US government needs to change "its whole approach" on the issue of racial equity. He added that the nation is less prosperous and secure because of the scourge of systemic racism.

"We must change now," the President said. "I know it's going to take time, but I know we can do it. And I firmly believe the nation is ready to change. But government has to change as well."

Biden rose to the presidency during a year of intense reckoning on institutional racism in the US. The moves announced on Tuesday reflect his efforts to follow through with campaign pledges to combat racial injustice.

Beyond calling on the Justice Department to curb the use of private prisons and address housing discrimination, the new orders will recommit the federal government to respect tribal sovereignty and disavow discrimination against the Asian American and Pacific Islander community over the coronavirus pandemic.

Biden directed the Department of Housing and Urban Development in a memorandum to take steps to promote equitable housing policy. The memorandum calls for HUD to examine the effects of Trump regulatory actions that may have undermined fair housing policies and laws.

Months before the November election, the Trump administration rolled back an Obama-era rule that required communities that wanted to receive HUD funding to document and report patterns of racial bias.

The order to end the reliance on privately-run prisons directs the attorney general not to renew Justice Department contracts with privately operated criminal detention facilities. The move will effectively revert the Justice Department to the same posture it held at the end of the Obama administration.

"This is a first step to stop corporations from profiting off of incarceration," Biden said.

The more than 14,000 federal inmates housed at privately-managed facilities represent a fraction of the nearly 152,000 federal inmates currently incarcerated.

The federal Bureau of Prisons had already opted not to renew some private prison contracts in recent months as the number of inmates dwindled and thousands were released to home confinement because of the coronavirus pandemic.

President Joe Biden speaks during an event on American manufacturing, in the White House complex in Washington. Photo / AP

GEO Group, a private company that operates federal prisons, called the Biden order "a solution in search of a problem".

"Given the steps the BOP had already announced, today's Executive Order merely represents a political statement, which could carry serious negative unintended consequences, including the loss of hundreds of jobs and negative economic impact for the communities where our facilities are located, which are already struggling economically due to the Covid pandemic," a GEO Group spokesperson said in a statement.

David Fathi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's National Prison Project, noted that the order does not end the federal government's reliance on privately-run immigration detention centers.

"The order signed today is an important first step toward acknowledging the harm that has been caused and taking actions to repair it, but President Biden has an obligation to do more, especially given his history and promises."

The memorandum highlighting xenophobia against Asian Americans is in large part a reaction to what White House officials say was offensive and dangerous rhetoric from the Trump administration. Trump, throughout the pandemic, repeatedly used xenophobic language in public comments when referring to the coronavirus.

This memorandum will direct Health and Human Services officials to consider issuing guidance describing best practices to advance cultural competency and sensitivity toward Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the federal government's Covid-19 response. It also directs the Department of Justice to partner with AAPI communities to prevent hate crimes and harassment.

The latest executive actions come after Biden signed an order Monday reversing a Trump-era Pentagon policy that largely barred transgender people from serving in the military. Last week, he signed an order reversing Trump's ban on travelers from several predominantly Muslim and African countries.


Biden last week also directed law enforcement and intelligence officials in his administration to study the threat of domestic violent extremism in the United States, an undertaking launched weeks after a mob of insurgents loyal to Trump, including some connected to white supremacist groups, stormed the US Capitol.

White House domestic policy adviser Susan Rice said Biden sees addressing equity issues as also good for the nation's bottom line. She cited a Citigroup study from last year that US gross domestic product lost $16 trillion over the last 20 years as a result of discriminatory practices in a range of areas, including in education and access to business loans. The same study finds the U.S. economy would be boosted by $5 trillion over the next five years if it addressed issues of discrimination in areas such as education and access to business loans.

White House Domestic Policy Adviser Susan Rice speaks during a press briefing at the White House. Photo / AP

"Building a more equitable economy is essential if Americans are going to compete and thrive in the 21st century," Rice added.

Biden's victory over Trump in several battleground states, including Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, was fueled by strong Black voter turnout.

Throughout his campaign and transition, Biden promised that his administration would keep issues of equity — as well as climate change, another issue he views as an existential crisis — in the shaping of all policy considerations.

Biden, who followed through on early promise to pick a woman to serve as vice-president, has also sought to spotlight the diversity of his Cabinet selections.

On Monday, the Senate confirmed Biden's pick for treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, who is the first woman to lead the department. Last week, the Senate confirmed Lloyd Austin as the nation's first Black defense secretary.

EU to force pharmaceutical companies to fulfill Covid-19 vaccine contracts


Issued on: 24/01/2021 - 14:32

Text by:NEWS WIRES|

Video by: Catherine CLIFFORD


The European Union will make pharmaceutical companies respect contracts they have signed for the supply of Covid-19 vaccines, European Council President Charles Michel said on Sunday.

Pfizer Inc last week said it was temporarily slowing supplies to Europe to make manufacturing changes that would boost output. On Friday, AstraZeneca also said that initial deliveries to the region will fall short because of a production glitch.

"We plan to make the pharmaceutical companies respect the contracts they have signed... by using the legal means at our disposal," Michel said on Europe 1 radio.it

Charles Michel says drug-makers will have to fulfill vaccine contracts

He did not mention possible sanctions but said that the EU would insist on transparency about the reasons for the delays.

He said that after Pfizer's first warnings about delays of several weeks, the EU had managed to reduce these delays by taking a tough stance.

"We banged our fist on the table and finally announced delays of several weeks turned into a slowdown of deliveries," he said.

(REUTERS)

UK doctors want review of Pfizer shot timetable

British doctors’ group wants to “urgently review” its decision to give people a second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine.

Associated Press London January 24, 2021


In a statement, the UK's association said there was “growing concern from the medical profession regarding the delay of the second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine". (Photo: Reuters)

A major British doctors’ group says the U.K. government should “urgently review” its decision to give people a second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine up to 12 weeks after the first, rather than the shorter gap recommended by the manufacturer and the World Health Organization.

The U.K., which has Europe’s deadliest coronavirus outbreak, adopted the policy in order to give as many people as possible a first dose of vaccine quickly. So far almost 5.9 million people in Britain have received a shot of either a vaccine made by U.S. drugmaker Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech or one developed by U.K.-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca and Oxford University.

AstraZeneca has said it believes a first dose of its vaccine offers protection after 12 weeks, but Pfizer says it has not tested the efficacy of its jab after such a long gap.

The British Medical Association on Saturday urged England’s chief medical officer to “urgently review the U.K.’s current position of second doses after 12 weeks.”

In a statement, the association said there was “growing concern from the medical profession regarding the delay of the second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine as Britain’s strategy has become increasingly isolated from many other countries.”

“No other nation has adopted the U.K.’s approach,” Dr. Chaand Nagpaul, chairman of the BMA council, told the BBC.

He said the WHO had recommended that the second Pfizer vaccine shot could be given up to six weeks after the first but only “in exceptional circumstances.”

“I do understand the trade-off and the rationale, but if that was the right thing to do then we would see other nations following suit,” Nagpaul said.

Yvonne Doyle, medical director of Public Health England, defended the decision as “a reasonable scientific balance on the basis of both supply and also protecting the most people.”

Researchers in Britain have begun collecting blood samples from newly vaccinated people in order to study how many antibodies they are producing at different intervals, from 3 weeks to 24 months, to get an answer to the question of what timing is best for the shots.

The doctors’ concerns came a day after government medical advisers said there was evidence that a new variant of the virus first identified in southeast England carries a greater risk of death than the original strain.

Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance said Friday “that there is evidence that there is an increased risk for those who have the new variant,” which is also more transmissible than the original virus. He said the new strain might be about 30% more deadly, but stressed that “the evidence is not yet strong” and more research is needed.

Research by British scientists advising the government said although initial analyses suggested that the strain did not cause more severe disease, several more recent ones suggest it might. However, the number of deaths is relatively small, and fatality rates are affected by many things, including the care that patients get and their age and health, beyond having COVID-19.

Britain has recorded 97,329 deaths among people who tested positive, the highest confirmed virus toll in Europe and the fifth-highest in the world.

The U.K. is in a lockdown to try to slow the latest surge of the virus, and the government says an end to the restrictions will not come soon. Pubs, restaurants, gyms, entertainment venues and many shops are closed, and people are required to stay largely at home.

The British government is considering tightening quarantine requirements for people arriving from abroad. Already travelers must self-isolate for 10 days, but enforcement is patchy. Authorities are considering requiring arrivals to stay in quarantine hotels, a practice adopted in other countries including Australia.

“We may need to go further to protect our borders,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Friday.

Rich donors will be the only winners in Boris Johnson's race to the bottom

By Peter Geoghegan

NEWS 24th January


Boris Johnson speaks during a virtual press conference inside 10 Downing Street. Photograph: Getty

BORIS Johnson does not like confrontation. As the prime minister’s former lover Petronella Wyatt recalled a couple of years ago, here is a man who will “do anything to avoid an argument”. Even if it means telling bare-faced lies.

Wyatt’s words were ringing in my ears when I watched Johnson present his Brexit deal at a press conference on Christmas Eve. While the prime minister was winning plaudits in the press for securing any sort of agreement at all with the European ­Union, I found myself constantly struck by the ­cognitive dissonance of what he was ­actually saying.

British exporters, Johnson declared, would “do even more business with our ­European friends” – by, eh, leaving the ­single market and customs union. Our ­fishermen would see a “prodigious” ­increase in catches. Post-Brexit Britain would “spread opportunity” and free trade in equal measure.

You don’t need to be a philosophy ­professor to see the logical inconsistency in all this. “Global Britain” and “levelling up” aren’t two sides of the same coin, they aren’t even the same currency.

READ MORE: Lord Ashcroft: Tory donor's firm lands £350m test and trace deal

So how would Johnson square the Brexit circle, I wondered as I watched his Yuletide address? How would he avoid making some people who had trusted him very angry? Barely a month later, we can start to see the answer. He isn’t even going to try.

In a contest between “the left behind” and “buccaneering Britain”, there will only be one winner. And it won’t be the former steel towns and pit villages.

Politics is essentially the art of reallocating scarce resources. You can have your cake or you can eat it. You can’t do both. The defining feature of Johnson’s character, of course, is a refusal to admit this. He will say whatever it takes to get what he want, and to avoid a row.

Already the reality of Johnson’s fluid ­relationship with the truth is coming home to roost. Scottish fishermen, mired in red tape in Britain, are sailing to Denmark to land their catch. Having given the Democratic Unionists his word that there would be no border in the Irish Sea, the prime minister has delivered just that.

Johnson is a buffoon, but he is not a fool. He knows that the bromides about free trade and economic redistribution are just that, empty words. What matters is what his government does. That’s why the moves Westminster has made since the turn of the year are so significant – and these point to where post-Brexit Britain is really headed.



This week the prime minister was reported to be holding talks with business leaders about “cutting red tape” and turning Britain outside the EU into “the Singapore of Europe”. By conjuring up Singapore, you can be sure that Johnson does not mean that in the future 80% of Britain’s housing will be publicly owned – although he is probably envious of the city-state’s political system, where the same party always wins.

Singapore for Johnson means one thing: deregulation. As a former member of the European Research Group told me in an interview for my latest book, Brexit, for hardline Eurosceptic Tories, was always about cutting regulations and standards.

As the transition came to an end in December, Johnson was promising that Britain would uphold the highest global standards. Indeed, the prime minister made a point of saying that there could be disputes with the EU on the horizon as Britain wanted to raise the bar in areas such as animal welfare.

What a difference a few weeks makes. Now British ministers are ­considering ­“reform” of workers’ protections ­enshrined in EU law, including the ­48-hour working week. Hands up who thinks this reform will mean stronger rights for workers?

Reports suggest that we could soon see changes to our statutory entitlements on rest breaks, overtime pay and the ­requirement on businesses to log daily working hours. That’s a curious ­definition of “levelling up”.

You can tell a lot about a politician by who he surrounds himself with. Among the sycophants and no-names that ­populate Johnson’s cabinet are some of the most fervent advocates for slashing workers’ rights.

Dominic Raab, Priti Patel, Kwasi Kwarteng and Liz Truss were co-authors of a 2012 anthology entitled Britannia Unchained that declared that government regulation had left the British “among the worst idlers in the world”. Now this quartet are foreign, home, business international trade secretary, respectively.

Kwarteng was only appointed earlier this month, in what could be read as a clear signal for the direction of Brexit Britain’s direction of travel. The new business secretary has previously ­written that any company’s first 12 staff should be treated as self-employed “with no ­questions” asked and that firms with up to three employees should be exempt from the minimum wage, maternity leave and unfair dismissal claims.


WORKERS’ rights are not the only area that Johnson seems keen to race to the bottom. Westminster has moved fast to dismantle environmental protections.

Pesticides are a case in point. When the EU introduced ban on neonicotinoids – which have proved deadly to bees and aquatic life – three years ago, Britain supported the move and said it would keep these standards after Brexit. But on January 8, just a week after the Brexit deal came into force, the Department for ­Environment, Food and Rural Affairs ­issued a statement approving the use of the pesticide in the UK.

Then there are the various crony ­capitalist projects that Johnson – and ­particularly chancellor Rishi Sunak – has given his imprimatur to. The most glaring is the establishment of a series of “free ports”.

The EU is phasing out these ­customs-free zones amid long-running concerns about money laundering and tax avoidance in them. (Curiously, this week the Scottish government announced that it too would be jumping on the free port bandwagon, albeit rebranded as “green ports”.)

READ MORE: SNP demand inquiry into 'rampant cronyism' at heart of Tory Government

ALL of this will be music to the ears of Brexit’s financial backers. While the vote to leave the EU in 2016 could not have been won without considerable working-class support, the money driving Brexit has long come from those with most to gain from turning the country into “Singapore on Thames”.

Hedge fund managers such as Jeremy Hosking, former Conservative party treasurer Peter Cruddas and Tory donors Michael Hintze, Crispin Odey and David Lilley all spent big on Brexit. A bonfire of regulation is overwhelmingly supported by the tiny number of super-rich donors who bankroll the Conservatives.

The irony in all this is that Johnson owes his “stonking” majority in Westminster to the former Labour voters in so-called “red wall” seats who will be ­hardest hit by a free market Brexit.

Having promised to level up, Johnson will deliver poorer living standards and less protection. But then again when did this prime minister ever care about ­ having lied to the people he claims to cherish?

Peter Geoghegan is investigations editor at openDemocracy. The paperback edition of his latest book Democracy for Sale: Dark Money and Dirty Politics was published earlier this month by Head of Zeus.

The bill for Boris Johnson’s Brexit is coming in and it’s punishingly steep

Ministers say it is just teething trouble. To many businesses it feels more like root canal surgery without the benefit of anesthetic

All those acquainted with Mr Johnson and his casual relationship with the truth will have taken that with a juggernaut of salt.’ Photograph: Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images

Andrew Rawnsley

 ‘Sun 24 Jan 2021 

You would have to possess a heart of stone not to weep with laughter at some of those who are now suddenly complaining about Brexit. It is a bit late for Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist party, those lusty sponsors of the great experiment with the UK’s prosperity, to be wailing that they have been betrayed. I smiled to see that Roger Daltrey, the Leave-supporting lead singer of the Who, has joined the chorus of rock stars furious that the post-Brexit visa rules will ruin their prospects of touring across the Channel. Mr Daltrey will have to sing Won’t Get Fooled Again to himself before moving on to Boris the Spider and I Can’t Explain.

It is particularly rending for the soul to witness the rightwing press discovering that the cause they so noisily championed is not the nirvana that they sold to their readers. They were cheering when Boris Johnson flourished the Brexit deal that he concluded on Christmas Eve and proclaimed: “This is a cakeist treaty.” The UK would be having the sweet stuff and eating it by gaining lots of shiny new benefits from being outside the EU while still enjoying the historical advantages of frictionless trade with its closest neighbours.

All those acquainted with Mr Johnson and his casual relationship with the truth will have taken that with a juggernaut of salt. Consider the prime minister’s specialist subject of cake. Anyone trying to take a fresh cream cake across the Channel now does so at the risk of having it impounded at customs because it is a dairy product. A Dutch TV report, which has since gone viral, shows border officials confiscating sandwiches from motorists arriving in the Netherlands from the UK. One driver agrees to surrender the meat in his sandwich, but pleads to be allowed to hang on to the bread. The frontier guard responds: “No, everything will be confiscated. Welcome to the Brexit, sir.”

Comedic tales of travellers being deprived of their snacks are the funnier side of an otherwise deadly serious story. The bill for Mr Johnson’s Brexit is coming in and that bill is a punishingly steep one. It is being paid by the fishing fleets in Scotland and the West Country that are tied up because they are unable to export their catch. It is being paid in a slump in activity at Welsh ports because the trade they used to handle is being diverted to France and Spain. It is being paid in billions of pounds worth of transactions disappearing from the City of London, which may not be much loved by all that many Britons but employs a million people, because the deal was so threadbare for the financial sector. It is being paid in car manufacturers shutting down some production because they can’t get parts across borders in time. It is being paid in tonnes of British meat exports rotting at European harbours. It is being paid by many UK businesses, especially the kind of smaller, exporting enterprises that the Tories always profess to love, which are being overwhelmed by the heavy burdens and high costs of the thin deal the prime minister rushed through parliament at the turn of the year.
British companies are being told by the British government that the way to survive is to lay off British workers and transfer their jobs to folk across the Channel

You will recall that it was one of the Brexiters’ signature promises that departure from the EU would be a liberating moment. A buccaneering free trade Britain would flourish as wealth creators were unshackled from the stifling regulatory chains of Brussels. What Brexit has actually done is impose a vast amount of cumbersome and costly new bureaucracy on exporters and importers. British companies have been put in a chokehold of regulations, customs declarations, conformity assessments, health and rules-of-origin certifications, VAT demands and inflated shipping charges. While some ministers talk about reducing worker protections in the name of “cutting red tape”, a move for which there is little demand even from employers, Brexit is ensnaring British businesses in writhing snakes of the stuff. I guess Jacob Rees-Mogg, he who thinks that fish unable to reach EU markets are “happier” knowing they are British, will claim that struggling British exporters should be patriotically proud to be throttled by red, white and blue tape.

Multinationals are not complaining so much because they are often wary of picking a fight with government and have resources, staff and facilities that make them better able to cope. The greatest burdens of Brexit are falling on smaller enterprises, collectively employing a lot of people, who trade with Europe. As my colleague Toby Helm reports in this newspaper, they are hurting badly. The post-Brexit world is so tough for many that the government’s own trade specialists are advising afflicted British entrepreneurs to relocate some of their operations out of the UK and to the EU. This has to be one of the greater absurdities of Brexit. British companies are being told by the British government that the way to survive is to lay off British workers and transfer their jobs to folk across the Channel.

Ministers like to insist that we’re experiencing nothing worse than “teething problems” as exporters and importers come to terms with the most radical change to the way we have traded with our neighbours since Margaret Thatcher pioneered the creation of the single market more than 30 years ago. For sure, snafus and bottlenecks at borders caused by faulty documentation may be smoothed out over time as companies become accustomed to dealing with so many complex new procedures. But a lot of these problems are not temporary rites of passage into a brave new world – these are permanent liabilities. A massive increase in border friction and all the expense that comes with it are baked-in consequences of Mr Johnson’s Brexit. The thicket of bureaucracy imposed on companies means enduring and added costs for their businesses. It does not feel like “teething problems” to them. It is more like root canal surgery performed without any benefit of anaesthetic. This was a predictable – and predicted – result of wrenching the UK out of the single market and the customs union. Thinktanks, some politicians, some business leaders and some newspapers, including this one, warned about the job-costing and investment-sapping consequences of erecting high new barriers to trade. But it is fair to say that this issue was never front and centre of the arguments that raged about Brexit. Evangelists for the adventure tended to dismiss the impacts on companies as mere minutiae compared with immigration levels or the meaning of sovereignty. Remainers struggled to find ways to make technical-sounding issues matter to the public. Among many voters and many politicians, the great benefits of being inside the single market were taken for granted right up until the moment when they vanished.

Some did understand that there would be a price to be paid. One of them was Boris Johnson. He knew enough about the importance of this issue to fib about it. On Christmas Eve, when he was hailing his agreement with the EU as a fantastic new chapter in our island story, he claimed that “there will be no non-tariff barriers to trade”.

This was self-evidently untrue even at the time that he said it. His government accepts that companies will collectively need to employ 50,000 additional customs agents in a post-Brexit world. Industry figures suggest that less than a quarter of that number had been trained by the time Britain left the single market.

The HMRC estimates that Brexit demands that British companies complete 215m additional, often highly complex, documents a year with a mirroring amount of extra paperwork also being generated by EU counter-parties. The cost of that alone on British businesses is thought to be around £7bn a year. If you make exporting and importing more difficult and more sluggish, at the same time as making cross-border transactions a great deal more costly, then it stands to reason that there will be less trade.

Faced with the heavy burdens imposed by Brexit, some companies will stop exporting to the EU because they can no longer find any profit in it. Other companies will move elements of their operations – and, in some cases, all of their business – out of the UK to inside the EU. Investment, jobs and tax revenues that would have benefited the UK will in future go to countries in the EU instead. This is already happening. Other companies will simply find that Brexit has left them unviable. Overwhelmed by the new costs, they will go to the wall. That will be especially so for those who were already struggling to survive because of the coronavirus crisis.

British business lost to European competitors. British entrepreneurs crushed. British jobs exported abroad. Welcome to the Brexit.

• Andrew Rawnsley is Chief Political Commentator of the Observer