As Anglo-French battles on the high seas go, it hasn’t exactly matched Trafalgar. A few dozen small boats on the French side, beseeching fishing rights around the Channel Islands.
And, for Britain, the blue hull of the trawler Cornelis Gert Jan, out of Dumfries, detained by gendarmes and escorted to Le Havre, accused of dipping its nets where it shouldn’t have.The political broadsides, by contrast, have been fierce.
The message has gone out from the No 10 flagship: England expects every minister to do their duty. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and Brexit minister Lord Frost have obliged, launching rhetorical salvoes over the Channel.But it is the fire coming in the opposite direction that is most furious.
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