The UK is once again faced with Macron’s fury, as Paris vows to impose severe sanctions and London prepares to retaliate.
This comes after a series of clashes between the British and French governments, concerning mainly certain provisions of the settlement agreed between the UK and the EU, and the current direction of Britain’s foreign policy adventures.
Britain is now emerging from both Brexit and the Coronavirus pandemic, with all the political and economic complications that came in the aftermath of these events, and now faces perhaps a far more uncertain future. The British Government has boasted of the bounties that come with their new Global Britain strategy, since breaking away from the EU early last year, but this strategy has so far translated into multiple major disputes with namely the French Government.
Fishing has been a key point of contention between the French and the British authorities.
Ever since Britain left the Bloc, a new system has been in place meaning that French fishing boats would need the necessary licence to access British waters.
The disputes arose after what is described as dozens of French fishing boats being refused access to both British and Jersey territiorial waters. British authorities have been granting more licences, but Gabriel Attal, a French Government spokesperson said that this, “still only accounts for 50%”, of what France believes it is entitled to.
“Now we need to speak the language of force”, said by France’s Europe minister Clement Beaune, who states that the forceful nature that France may employ may now be the only course of action that will get the British government to take the French demands seriously.
Some of the measures that France have threatened to implement from early November if their demands are not met include, “to ban all British seafood imports and to increase customs checks on lorries arriving from and leaving for the UK”.
With warnings from Paris of going as far as to cut electricity supplies to the island of Jersey if there is no resolution. The Prime minister’s official spokesperson said that, “we think that the threats outlined yesterday evening were disappointing, were disproportionate and were simply not what we expect from a close ally and partner”.
The environment secretary rejected the French accusation regarding licences, stating that officials had granted 98% of post-Brexit licence applications.
Neither side seem to be budging in the fishing dispute, with the environment secretary indicating that a “appropriate and colabirated response” is possible if France carries out its threats, and with further disputes seemingly unravelling much of the negotiated settlement with the EU, are British-French relations too far strained.
AUKUS – A British Foreign Policy Adventure
The AUKUS defensive pact was announced, between the UK, Australia and the United States, on the 15th of September to maintain security in the Indo-pacific region and address expansionist China.
This immediately caused a rift between the governments of the participating nations and the French government. This is due to one major factor of the new alliance, which is to equip Australia with nuclear submarines. This led to the cancellation of an Australian-French agreement worth ninety billion dollars to build French designed submarines.
The French foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian commented on these events as they unfolded, stating it was, “a stab in the back”.
French Secretary of State for European Affairs, Clément Beaune, questioned whether the participation of the UK in the pact was truly a move of ‘Global Britain’, but might in fact be, “a return to the American fold and a form of accepted vassalization.”
The British defence secretary in response said, “We didn’t go fishing for these opportunities, fundamentally the Australians made a decision they wanted a different capability”, whether that will mean much to the French is yet to be seen as relations between the two countries seem to be becoming ever more strained.
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