With regard to the Northern Ireland protocol and state aid the UK government is being disingenuous and misleading. Going to do this thread with regard to the legal texts, and in the case of state aid, other agreements. 1/ https://twitter.com/Telegraph/status/1303073415222513664

Let's start with the Northern Ireland protocol. This is one of the key paragraphs at issue. "unfettered" access for goods from Northern Ireland. The word is not defined in the treaty, so we'll need to go to the dictionary definition... 2/

Disctionary definition of "unfettered" - "not controlled or limited". So nothing under this protocol will control or limit Northern Ireland exports. For the UK government to be right, filling in paperwork would be a control, and not required by any other commitment. 3/

There are other reasons why there need to be controls on trade from Northern Ireland to Great Britain, primarily WTO rules, such that goods cannot come from the EU to the UK on better terms than from the US, without a preferential agreement, though N Ireland status is a WTO issue

Note that trade from GB to Northern Ireland is not unfettered. And tariffs are payable. This is another area the UK government appears to be trying to re-interpret, But the text is clear, tariffs are paid unless proven otherwise... 5/

Is there a contradiction to Article 4, which clearly states Northern Ireland is in UK customs territory. Certainly here there is ambiguity. But arguably the focus on UK trade deals makes clear the focus here. Northern Ireland is a unique territory with regard to obligations 6/

Indeed, much of this with regard to Northern Ireland is then underlined in Article 6 paragraph 2 - facilitating trade between Northern Ireland and Great Britain is about "best endeavours" not an absolute commitment 7/

Right, now to state aid, noting this also appears in the Northern Ireland protocol, but I am taking a narrower view of the meaning of this than some - it is only going to apply to a limited subset of trade from Northern Ireland. 8/

On state aid the issue is more simply that the UK is asking for controls less than those of the WTO, which in fact makes subsidies causing harm to the businesses of other countries illegal. 9/

Recall that the EU is giving tariff free access to UK goods, and maybe preferable access to services, compared to WTO. What if the UK were to damage EU industry by subsidising those tariff free goods. Hence the EU includes state aid provisions... 10/

Here's a key part of the UK text on state aid - we're proposing consultations on subsidies in line with EU text in the Canada and Japan text. Only, as you can probably guess, there's going to be a sting in this tale... 11/

Here's a paragraph the UK proposes text does not include. It comes from the EU-Japan text. It involves the requesting party telling the other party what they expect to happen - in other words the remedy. That is not open to dispute settlement. 12/

Now the original EU text went further, in expecting the UK to follow EU law. The EU were told by pretty much all concerned, including me, that there was no chance of this being acceptable. Reportedly they accepted this and explored alternatives. The UK is digging in. 13/

And this is why the EU is reported to be particularly unhappy with the UK's negotiating approach on state aid in particular - because while both sides original offer was unacceptable (not untypical) the EU has offered to change, the UK angrily refusing 14/ https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/sep/07/leaked-eu-cables-reveal-mistrust-of-uk-motives-in-brexit-talks

State aid is the boring minutiae of trade talks which only a few should study, because we're probably not going to wildly distort markets. It is fair to want reassurances. The UK is not providing them here or on the NI protocol. And threatening no-deal. That is the problem.15/end