A Poor Infographic on Brits in the EU

The other day, the infographic below was doing the rounds on Twitter. Note that the source of the data, not necessarily the way it's been presented, appears to be IPPR and that it is undated.

The total of 2.2 million presumably includes the 329k for Ireland which would make the EU about 1.87 million. This can be compared with IPPR’s 2006 figure of 1.5 million in the EU excluding Ireland, which I quoted in a post here in November 2011 about British second homes in Europe.

This is a poor piece of graphical presentation making the sort of naïve error which was criticised by Edward Tufte 30 years ago in his The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. The font size used for the numbering has been scaled to the area (and shape to some extent) of each country, so the 1m in Spain is the same size as the 6k in Poland. Obviously in the real Europe there are about 170 times as many Brits in Spain as in Poland, something which the presenter should have tried to address. He (or she) didn't explain the country shading blue to grey either

A New New Franc!

Posts here in the past have raised the possibility of France leaving the Eurozone or the euro’s collapse (eg in 2011 and most recently in 2012) but raising the subject has always seemed more “raving” than “droning”. So I was surprised to see the essay article below in the current issue of Le Figaro Magazine:

“THIS EVENING THE EURO IS DEAD…”
Speech by the President of the Republic

It was written by Philippe Villin, énarque, banker and journalist and, according to Wikipedia, a member of Le Siècle, so a man firmly embodied in the French elite. In his article Villin imagines the speech which François Hollande would give at 11pm on 7 July 2013 announcing this revolution:

Françaises, Français, chers concitoyens, l’euro est mort. A minuit, le nouveau nouveau franc, le NNF, sera notre nouvelle monnaie. …

And he goes on to explain the background to his decision to introduce the NNF* at parity with the euro. It is primarily due to the double problem of French economic competitiveness in the euro – with Germany internally and in US$ terms externally. A ‘euro of the south’ was ruled out as too weak for France and Italy and too strong for the others. France’s euro debts would be repaid in NNF.  Hollande ends with a passage reminiscent of Harold Wilson’s 1967 sterling devaluation “pound in your pocket” speech:

Demain matin, la vie sera normale: transports, téléphone, télévisions fonctionneront, les magasins seront ouverts … les vaches auront donne du lait, le soleil brillera selon Metéo France …**

There is a satirical element to the whole piece, which, incidentally, describes Villin as a staunch supporter of returning to the franc, for example its annotation as “PCC François Hollande” (pour copie conforme being the French equivalent of CC, once known in English as 'carbon copy').

I hope Villin's article gets translated and appears in the UK media.  The NNF may not impossible, but its announcement on 7 July 2013 seems highly unlikely.

* The last new franc (nouveau franc NF) was introduced in January 1960 by revaluation from 100 old francs.

** Tomorrow morning, life will be normal***: transport, telephones, television will work, the shops will open ... the cows will give milk, the sun will shine according to France Metéo …

*** In the presidential election in 2012, Hollande was sold as ‘Monsieur Normale’, in contrast with his predecessor.

Non-appearances can be deceptive, too!

The Royal British Legion is the UK’s leading charity in support of serving and former members of the armed forces and their families. It was founded in 1921 when Earl Haig became its first president. His direction of British forces in France from 1915 to 1918 continues to be a subject of controversy among historians. However, the Legion is famous now for its major fund-raising activity, the Poppy Appeal. British politicians rarely appear in public from late October to 11 November not wearing a poppy. So it was surprising when Paul Staines and Harry Cole reported in their Guido Fawkes column in 14 October’s Daily Star on Sunday that:

DURING his leader’s speech at the Tory Conference last week, David Cameron emotively led the hall in a standing ovation for our troops to “show how profoundly grateful we are for everything they do”. Yet this year was the first time ever that a Tory party leader has failed to put in an appearance at the Royal British Legion’s reception at the Conservative Party Conference. Downing Street tells Guido that while “the Prime Minister is very supportive of the Royal British Legion and the excellent work they do…unfortunately he is unable to attend more than a tiny number” of receptions at conference. An event for property developers Canary Wharf Group was one of the tiny number he did manage to attend. It was held at the same time as the Legion’s reception, in the room next door. Seems our wartime leader misplaced his gratitude.

However, immediately after his party’s Conference on 11 October the PM had announced in a speech at the Imperial War Museum (IWM) the government’s plans to mark the centenary of the start of the First World War in 2014, mentioning the Legion twice. A possible explanation for Cameron’s non-appearance at the Legion event in Birmingham may be a story in the Sunday Times (£) also on 14 October. This was an exposé of former senior military officers who were claiming to be able to lobby Whitehall on behalf of defence firms. It stated that:

The Royal British Legion began an investigation after Lieutenant-General Sir John Kiszely, its president, was named as one of six former commanders recorded by undercover reporters, who claimed they represented a South Korean arms firm looking for business. Sir John was quoted by The Sunday Times as saying that he could use his role at the charity to promote the company’s agenda with the Prime Minister and other figures at Remembrance Day events.  

… Sir John described how his role at the Legion exposed him to various senior figures. “It sounds totally grand: you’re standing there waiting for the Queen with nothing else to talk about to Philip Hammond than whatever,” he said. The Falklands veteran also claimed that the Festival of Remembrance for Britain’s war dead was a “tremendous networking opportunity”. Contacted by The Sunday Times after the sting, the Sir John said that he had always kept his commercial interests “entirely separate” from his role with the Legion and had never used access gained through it to discuss any business interests.

On 15 October, Kiszely resigned as Legion president. And possibly the Number 10 press team in the days before the story broke had been living up to their reputation for competence.

In his speech Cameron made the point that:

However frustrating and however difficult the debates in Europe, 100 years on we sort out our differences through dialogue and meetings around conference tables, not through the battles on the fields of Flanders or the frozen lakes of western Russia.

The Menin Road by Paul Nash

(next to the PM at the IWM on 11 October)

Libby Purves in The Times on 15 October, writing in support of the recent award of the Nobel Peace Prize to the EU, put it more pointedly:

Maybe our present justifiable disgruntlement with the EU (I see even Michael Gove is joining in) will actually be tempered a little by the coming year of remembrance of the 1914-1918 war. We will be made to see the horror of that period more clearly than we ever do through the fuzzy sentimentality of Downton or the poppy-wreath dignity of the Cenotaph.  

… The EU is, very often, a pain in the neck. But it is part of an attempt never to do it again: to create what Churchill called a “richer, freer, more contented European commonality”. OK, Churchill didn’t think Britain should be actually inside it (“We are linked but not compromised, interested and associated but not absorbed”) but he spoke for his own proud, bruised times. Whether or not Britain should stay within its sticky and often mismanaged embrace, I do not know. But looking across the Channel, and remembering worse times, it would be wrong to begrudge the EU its prize.

A post here earlier this year contained a quote from Cameron:

If your vision of Britain was that we should just withdraw [from the EU] and become a sort of greater Switzerland, I think that would be a complete denial of our national interests.

It will be interesting to see what line (if any) the WW1 centenary activities will take about the UK’s relationship with a historically belligerent Europe. I would be surprised if it were one to help UKIP.

With no particular place to go

So near and yet so far: Goering and German top brass regard the
White Cliffs of England from the French coast on 1 July 1940

Max Hastings could never fairly be accused of over-optimism. Writing in today’s Daily Mail he contrasts his family’s recent enjoyable day on a Devon beach with Europe’s being, as he sees it:

… in the early stages of what will probably prove its gravest and most frightening tumult of our lifetimes. Our political leaders have not mentioned this, not told us Europe is up the creek without a paddle, because half of them are in denial about what is going on, and not one has a sensible idea what to do about it.

Turning to where it leaves Britain, he concludes that:

I seldom pity politicians, but ours deserve some sympathy, as almost impotent spectators of unfolding disaster. Since we are not eurozone members, there is little a British Government can usefully do or say.  

… My own strong hunch — and I say this without any pleasure — is that within a decade Britain will find itself outside the European Union. … The bust-up could come quite swiftly if Chancellor Merkel persists with her determination to impose a Europe-wide financial transaction tax to fund the next stage towards eurozone integration. This, in turn, would devastate the City of London.  

… Though our separation from Europe looks increasingly plausible, I do not share the enthusiasm of those of UKIP’s persuasion, who see this as a glorious liberation. The Germans at the conference I attended in April warned repeatedly that we would find life alone, out in mid- Atlantic, remarkably chilly. On this they are probably right. In a world of giant economic blocs, and especially up against China, Britain looks ill-fitted to compete on its own. But what else can we do if a statist, over-regulated, undemocratic and unaccountable Europe remains bent on economic and political suicide in a mindless, obsessive pursuit of the euro-ideal?

An alternative to the metaphorical mid-Atlantic might be to move even closer to the US East Coast; in the extreme, as David Aaronovitch suggested at the end of 2011, “the nations of the United Kingdom become the 51st, 52nd, 53rd and 54th states of what might be known as the United States of America and the East Atlantic.” Though I doubt whether Hastings would find that prospect particularly attractive. In a previous Mail column “Turning our backs on Britain's fallen: How a new generation believes it was just U.S. troops that won World War Two thanks to Hollywood” (as much a précis as a header), he clearly approved of how on the anniversary of D-day:

François Hollande made a gesture of reconciliation with ‘Perfidious Albion’. He became the first ever French president to visit a British cemetery in Normandy.

He concluded that article:

We should learn to value our heritage, as French governments cherish theirs. The Continent today is threatened not by war, but by greater turmoil and dissension than it has known for half a century. Only by knowing and understanding its past history, and our part in it, can we hope to come to terms with its present and future.

A debate on the viability of a “mid-Atlantic” United Kingdom (with or without Scotland) is probably overdue. Are we trapped in the invidious position, primarily in population terms, of being too large to occupy a niche, but too small to be a player? Or are there ways in which the UK could make itself too big to ignore? Perhaps this would be by leveraging our time zone and language advantages. We could also adopt a ‘smart’ and selective policy for immigration which would allow entry to talented and skilled people from anywhere, but particularly Europe if the train wreck anticipated by Hastings actually happens. This could in the short to medium term help overcome the deficiencies of our educational system. The UK could also take advantage of its status as a (relatively) ‘safe haven’ and sell gilts to fund infrastructure such as very high speed broadband and develop the regions to compensate for the over-development of the South East.

20 JULY 2012 - An update to this post is here.