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The quality of Johnson's deal is in the eye of the beholder. It delivers more on sovereignty, what he wanted, (time will tell if it's enough for the ERG) than on frictionless trade (what May put first). The EU was happy to accommodate either but only BJ's was politically possible
The best point @DPJHodges makes in his column this morning is that "for once, Britain saw it's prime minister take a step towards, not turn his back on, those who had elected him." There will be political dividends for delivering what he said he would
The challenge will be to now locate the potential economic wins from the modicum of divergence we can extract from this deal. Trade Twitter is free to say it's a shit deal if they want, but they also might point to places we can now gain with a freer hand
Ministers have been very coy about where they think we might now diverge and leverage what we are good at. The fear was that they had not thought about it or found any. Johnson's interview in the STel suggests he does have some ideas
Johnson's challenge will be for the govt to make some early divergence gains rather than have the ERG identify areas where it wants him to have a row with Brussels against his will. The story over the next year will surely be where and how we diverge and what they do about it
More generally, I try to be as good at what I do, primarily the politics, as anyone. I don't pretend to be an expert on trade technicalities. That's why you should read people like @pmdfoster and @DavidHenigUK who are brilliant at what they do
