There is seeing the whole board, as President Bartlet told Sam Seaborn to do in a chess game in The West Wing, and then there is being so big picture that you have absolutely no grasp of detail.
Most public figures who speak on Brexit are in the latter camp. Pretty much no one has been able to describe the whole picture, including how different issues relate to each other and what moves the UK could make to get from here to a sensible departure from the European Union.
So it is refreshing that one City lawyer has taken it upon himself to set out an actual set of rules for how a deal between the UK and EU could work for financial services.
Barney Reynolds, a partner at Shearman & Sterling, launched his draft regulations last week. Unfortunately, it was at the same event organised by the think tank Politeia that Anne Marie Morris, the Brexit-supporting MP for Newton Abbot in Devon, referred to a “n***** in a woodpile”.
Mr Reynolds’ work was overshadowed, but it deserves a proper look. He makes the case for why a deal based on the UK’s rules being the same as those of the EU would work, based on the simple premise that this is the way the bloc already functions.
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Equivalence, as it is known, needs improvements, Mr Reynolds argues, including filling in some gaps in the existing patchwork of EU regulations. They include big areas like lending. The system also needs to be made more stable — at the moment the EU only has to give 30 days’ notice before pulling the plug on a trading deal based on equivalence. The termination terms could easily be made longer, such as up to a year.
Mr Reynolds’ most controversial idea is over how a dispute could be resolved. Theresa May has said no to the European Court of Justice, and that seems sensible once the UK has left the EU and loses the ability to appoint any of its judges. Mr Reynolds suggests instead a tribunal, which could sit in public or private, made up of someone from the UK, another from the EU and an independent party.
People might be suspicious of this kind of set up, but they occur fairly often in trade agreements. It is also a starting point — if anyone has a better idea, they should come forward.
Even Mr Reynolds’ draft rules do not see the whole board. They just cover financial services. Someone else with a zeal for details should hammer out similar guidelines for other areas, such as the pharmaceuticals industry, airlines and the European atomic energy community, Euratom.
That requires the services of experts, a class Michael Gove claimed this country has had enough of. But as President Bartlet knew, smart, informed people are the best kind to run the country. That is especially the case for the UK now at a time of Brexit.
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Plus ça change?
Unilever said Kraft Heinz's $143 billion bid in February was a “trigger” to pull up its Persil-whitened socks and do better for its shareholders.
So they will be looking forward to Thursday, when the household products giant reveals its half-year results. There will presumably be progress on its plan, announced in April, to divest its margarine business, as well as its effort to fatten up its profit margin.
Unlike in the past, when Unilever frustrated some investors by making noises about restructuring, while all the while keeping its Dove to Knorr kingdom intact, Paul Polman knows it is different this time.
Some analysts even think the Kraft spectre could come back, after the cooling-off period for any new bid ends next month.
If Unilever’s results still look business-as-usual this week, it should be clear to investors the company doesn’t plan to change much.
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Cyber warrior
There was a time when Lloyd’s of London preferred to stick its head in the sand rather than deal with problems. That nearly killed Lloyd’s in the 1990s when its system of unlimited liability sank hundreds of its names with ruinous insurance claims.
It is a difference place now. Inga Beale, its chief executive, keeps banging on about cyber threats because the fusty institution is struggling to get its head around this fast-changing and emerging threat.
So Ms Beale keeps pushing Lloyd’s members to better understand cyber so that they can write better policies for clients.
This is management that befits one of the world’s most sophisticated insurance hubs. Plaudits to her.
Hasta la vista, PPI
The Terminator has reportedly been hired to tell consumers that they have two years to make a claim for payment protection insurance mis-selling before their right to compensation is bazooka-ed.
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And why not hire Arnold Schwarzenegger for the job? He is a former governor of California, businessman and actor in UK ads for Compare the Market, with meerkats.
The Financial Conduct Authority, which has dreamt up the idea of the campaign and deadline, is tight-lipped on whether it has been on the phone with Arnie’s agent.
Some may wonder whether his reputed £1.5 million fee for the gig is money well spent, when it could have gone on actually writing to customers to alert them to the PPI deadline, or even paying them a bit more.
