Chronic. Boris Johnson has cultivated this talent for telling lies on the European question to excellence for more than thirty years. It takes a fact loosely connected with reality, twists and amplifies it into a false story, but one that captures the imagination of the general public. When he was a journalist in Brussels, the current British Prime Minister thus stroked his Eurosceptic readers in the right direction by writing that the “Eurocrats” were going to impose an odor test on manure to be the same everywhere in the European Union (EU); that the Commission building was going to be destroyed and replaced by an immense tower, necessarily disproportionate; and that the Italians had asked to make condoms smaller… It was all absurd, but seemed vaguely believable, reinforcing the image of a Europe finicky and disconnected from reality.
And now, two days before Christmas, the Daily Telegraph, the daily newspaper for which the Prime Minister worked for decades, released a uniquely Johnsonian story. Now that the UK was “Released” European rules, shouted the newspaper, the pint-sized bottle of champagne was about to make a comeback. Winston Churchill himself was said to be crazy about it, claiming that 0.57 liters was exactly the volume he needed, “Enough for two at lunch or one at dinner”.
The point is that EU law requires the sale of wine or champagne in bottles that are multiples of 0.75 liters. But now, assured “A government source” to Daily Telegraph, this injustice will be rectified: “The pint bottles fell victim to the EU’s war on imperial measures. (…) Now that we [en] are out, we can get rid of rules like this. “ The news went around the world: it’s funny, simple, and on December 23, not much else was happening.
Except that hardly anyone called for such a reform. “No wine maker is working on this subject anywhere, annoyed, on Twitter, Daniel Lamberts, a wine importer based in Wales. It’s rubbish, isn’t it, a lie, an invention. “
The meager record of “Singapore-on-Thames”
The affair would only be a frivolous anecdote if it did not illustrate an unpleasant truth for the Brexiters: a year after the country’s official exit from the single market, they are struggling to find examples of its benefits. The economy did not collapse, but trade with the EU still fell by around 15%. Their dreams of a big bonfire of European regulations have flown away. The pioneers of Brexit spoke of reducing the supervision of working hours, deregulating finance, authorizing genetically modified organisms … To create a sort of “Singapore-on-Thames”, mocked opponents. None of this happened. The resignation, on December 19, of David Frost, the Minister for Brexit, supporter of this deregulatory line, reflects the defeat of the pioneers of Brexit.
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