Simon Fraser (@SimonFraser00) / X

Simon Fraser

6,010 posts

Simon Fraser

@SimonFraser00

Founding Partner @FlintGlobal. Chair @ChathamHouse. Former permanent secretary at UK Foreign Office and Business Dpt.

Joined November 2012

Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Nov 16, 2018
David Davis was a terrible #Brexit Secretary. He could hardly be bothered to go to Brussels & rapidly lost respect there. Preposterous for him now to suggest that EU deliberately delayed negotiations. They spent months waiting for him to engage..
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Sep 28, 2022
Once this crisis is stabilised we need to break the #Brexit omertà in British politics & openly accept that after six long years this mis-sold & mishandled project has resulted in political & economic chaos. That’s an essential first step towards repairing the damage.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Oct 18, 2020
It now seems more likely that #Brexit will lead to the break up of the United Kingdom than of the European Union.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
May 21, 2021
Had to go urgently to France last week. PCR test in UK to go there cost me £120. PCR test in France to return home cost me £0.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Sep 19, 2022
This is a shout out for the unsung men and women of the Foreign Office Protocol Department who will have cheerfully been working literally night and day to make today’s state funeral events run like clockwork. @FCDOGovUK
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Jul 22, 2022
You may blame the French for understaffing their passport controls at Dover. You cannot blame them for the fact that enhanced formal passport checks are now required at Dover.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Aug 24, 2022
Emily Maitlis @maitlis is right. Yes #Brexit is done, but #BBC and wider media reluctance, for whatever reasons, objectively to address and analyse its consequences, is damaging their credibility and our political culture.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Nov 13, 2020
So predictable.... Dysfunctional self-styled weirdos and misfits create a huge mess then walk away leaving boring losers like the civil servants they have serially abused to clear up after them.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Jan 14, 2019
One of many sad things about this destructive, humiliating #Brexit fiasco is that people with knowledge & experience clearly explained the technical & political complexities from the start. But we allowed zealots & opportunists to subvert inconvenient truth.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Oct 15, 2019
As we breathlessly pore over the hour by hour, deal or no deal, do or die, get it done, tactics of a possible phase one endgame, are we losing sight completely of what a lousy long term strategic choice #Brexit is for this country?
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Jul 6, 2020
I’d prefer it if our government talked more more about joining up with the world and less about beating the world.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Jul 25, 2018
I recall @DominicRaab with @michaelgove pressing me to agree in the first ever meeting of the @commonseuexit Select Cttee that #Brexit could be successfully done in 6 months. I note that almost 2 years on he is Minister in charge of stockpiling essential goods.
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Oct 6, 2021
If we have an “old broken economic model” in the UK of low wages, low skills, low growth and low productivity, presumably the party that has been in government for 29 of the last 42 years bears the main responsibility for that?
Simon Fraser
@SimonFraser00
Jan 29, 2022
It really doesn’t matter much whether minor criminal offences have been committed. It really does matter that we have a full and uninhibited report on the honesty, integrity, judgement and basic common sense of the people at the heart of running our country.