Why Britain is such a noisy neighbour

THE BRITISHG7EUCOPEUEUNATOUNGDP government is easily distracted. At the , it was sausages that knocked its concentration. Leaders gathered in Carbis Bay in June to discuss the pandemic and climate change. Instead they found Boris Johnson, their British host, embroiled in an argument with the about the export of chilled meats to Northern Ireland. At 26, the environmental jamboree in Glasgow in Scotland, it was fish. Mr Johnson argued with France over the fate of a few dozen fishing licences in the Channel Islands.Britain’s relationship with the has a habit of interfering with set-piece events. France threatened to ban British boats from its ports, as well as jam up freight heading to and from Britain with extra checks. In turn Britain threatened to sue France for breaching the terms of a trade deal between the and Britain, agreed on with a mixture of stress and haste at the end of 2020. Two allies, nuclear powers and partners on the Security Council with a combined larger than Japan’s, issued threats over a fishing industry worth only about 0.1% of it—though they managed to park the issue for a few days while the bigwigs were in town.