1/ Ok, what just happened with USMCA: USMCA (NAFTA 2.0: EV Boogaloo) included a 'review' provision that said that by July 1st, Mexico, Canada and the US could either: a) Agree to extend it as is b) Keep it in place but begin up to 10 years of negotiations on a revised version Trump just chose b.

Between this and EU's Temu Tariff (3 euros on packages) also hitting GB->NI parcel transit, it's safe to say that NI is never on either the EU or UK radar unless/until various representatives and businesses in NI start screaming loud enough that the WF is still not working well enough. 1/

Essential reading from @sylviademars.me and Eleni Frantziou on just how divorced from the reality of EU law the UKSC's approach to direct effect in Dillon actually is: eulawanalysis.blogspot.com/2026/07/doub...

Jim O'Callaghan has already decided to do this in Ireland, but at least in the UK it's capped at 10 grand. There's no cap in Ireland, and no citizenship until you pay off your debt.

A quarter of terror attacks in Britain over the past decade have targeted Muslims, but some have gone largely unnoticed because of delays formally declaring them terrorism Most jihadist attacks, by contrast, have been declared within hours of taking place inews.co.uk/news/uk-terr...

Looking forward to seeing a good chunk of Farage's £5 million being redistributed to Philippe Sands in a defamation case. Farage has become so used to client journalism fawning over his every word that he thinks he can say whatever he wants about others...

Alternate version of the racist Moygashel banner has gone up at Loughside Park on the Shore Road, blaming Alliance, SF, PBP and the SDLP for "open borders". Not going to give the image publicity, but it's indicative of accelerating efforts to stoke hatred towards asylum seekers in NI. Get it down.

The care visa article row between Shabana Mahmood and Mike Tapp has got a real “last week of summer term” energy to it. The headteacher has resigned! No one knows which teacher has authority! The kids are hot and acting out!

A vital piece of journalism and a revelation that leaves me rigid with anger at this depraved cadre, with their lecturing about morality, values and "unique" commitment to law & order. I struggle to see how the current DUP leadership will ever detach themselves from public revulsion over these men:

If you want to get a perfect reflection of how little NI mattered to the Brexit campaign, versus how much it mattered to making Brexit a reality, this @ppfideas.bsky.social episode on the road to June 2016 makes one fleeting reference to NI. Blink and you miss it: open.spotify.com/episode/0CV0...

Powerful kiss of death energy here... Drink as soon as you hear "in my lifetime":

This is one of the dumbest and saddest things I've ever seen. We should not think of universities in this way, and if we do that'll destroy everything that is both useful and good about them. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Long standing gripe - the REF organising team have streamlined their own processes by saying that academics don't have to be returned, and that solves the baby issue, but a UoA as a whole still has to hit the full return so all this does is add resentments - new parents are being made into a burden.

From Article 2 evidence provided to NI Scrutiny Com in the Lords by the ECNI folks - flabbergasted at the phrasing of this question, which at best shows ignorance about the Brexit settlement and devolution, and at worst basically implies that legal differences are just NI being 'uppity' (!)

Even as Ireland gets harsher with people seeking asylum, anti-immigrant groups rail against new asylum law Academics and politicians say that’s because, for a small cohort, there’s an existential risk in admitting to their audience that the rules have hardened. www.dublininquirer.com/even-as-irel...

As the BBC axes The Law Show, one intermittent half hour programme on Radio 4 is apparently too much content devoted to making legal issues accessible to the public. One more smug assertion of Reithian Values and I'm going to scream, because its not as if UK public legal knowledge is at a high...

Your regular reminder that this jackboot has been imposed (agreed?) by the UK Parliament and the trade and goods elements of the deal are regularly voted on by majority in Stormont (last in December 2024). If this is subjugation, well, those dictators in Brussels totally flunked Gulag class.

The materiality of Brexit negotiations + interpretation live on Twitter. The rapid fire analysis of @katyhayward.bsky.social @sylviademars.me @stevepeers.bsky.social @colinmurray.bsky.social & The graphs from @simonusherwood.bsky.social @jonworth.eu The memes, solidarity & interdisciplinarity

Archives demonstrate that Jeffrey Donaldson frequently played the hard ball negotiator in public and the emollient fixer behind the scenes, but rather than focus on the victims, Jim Allister is spinning a tale of compromat and the betrayal of the Union. Mad scenes: www.irishnews.com/news/norther...

Doesn't even mention Ireland, NI and the chaos unleashed. So much of today's Brexiteer commentary in London newsrooms is pure "they learned nothing, and forgot nothing"...

The cry went up from thousands that "this isn't us" after the race riots, but days later masked men are forcing people out of another estate. And if we shrug and continue to live in a society that lets this happen, well then it's no surprise how the world will view NI: share.google/AE98ss3HdT9t...

Looking forward to binge consuming constitutional law scholarship at the ICON·S conference at UCD in Dublin next week. If you are going, please message to let me know, as I'm bound to miss folk in the 2000+ attendees, inexplicably indexed by first name... www.icon-society.org/wp-content/u...

Much of the reporting of Eleanor Donaldson's case suggests that she might well be "free to go". But she has been found to have aided sexual offences in a trial by facts. Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, she'll be subject to registration requirements for five years: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

For the day that's in it, here's a chance to revisit what a youthful @rogermasterman.bsky.social and I thought would be the pitfalls that lay ahead for the UK in the immediate aftermath of the Brexit vote. We told you it was going to be a bumpy decade... ukconstitutionallaw.org/2016/07/04/r...

Even to listen to the case against Donaldson was a defiling experience. There are legal reasons why we cannot report some of the evidence, but even if that wasn't so, we wouldn't be reporting it for editorial reasons. It's simply too graphic & too obscene.

Today, of all days, it might have been wise for the DUP not to equate itself with Jeffrey Donaldson's victims. "We were so very wronged too" is not a good look: share.google/FjHxAHJHMrtc...

hope the victims in this case are comforted by the verdict and know that women all over ni support them

This will get lost in today's national news, but the finding that Jeffrey Donaldson is guilty on all counts, only after decades of multiple people having concerns, speaks to how powerful abusers can use their status in a small society like NI to deflect attention: www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cw...

The UK has become so inured to prime ministerial resignations that Radio 4 will no longer break into Start the Week to let you know that it's happening... Audible Shrug.

That moment in updating a UK constitutional law textbook when I'm tempted to just find and replace every reference to "Starmer" with "Burnham" in the whole text... Labour's "one click" change is eventually coming to pass, but does it run any deeper for governing? share.google/6UvLqRWGcIJh...

Replace the rum with Irish Whiskey and you can have a Lough Neagh...

What's that you say? You want the Offer and Acceptance + Authority of Statute case that lets you teach the foundations of contract law and public law in the UK simultaneously? First year law students, "Sovereign Citizens" HAVE YOU COVERED (obligatory all caps): www.rollonfriday.com/news-content...

Andy Burnham has argued for public control of water and energy, but what kind of public ownership can meet the challenges of environment and climate breakdown? In a blog for the @ukcla.bsky.social, I explore a case study of Labour's post-war nationalisation of electricity. [1/3]

This is fascinating. The BBC’s own scrutiny of its flagship TV News discusses its clear bias towards selective reporting of crimes committed by immigrants & asylum seekers and no one from the News team will defend it. What is going on behind the scenes? www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

When Al Cairns is given a platform to decry ongoing Troubles-era investigations he avoids any focus on the repeated settlements and formal apologies which continue to be made in collusion cases. These inconvenient cases are written out of all "lawfare" complaints: www.irishnews.com/news/norther...

New report out today with @cbarnard.bsky.social on how the UK tried - and largely failed - to take back control of regulation after Brexit. Thanks to the Constitution Society and Federal Trust for publishing. consoc.org.uk/publications...

If only there was something that governments could do around addressing systemic injustices. I worry that I've advanced deep into the Orange zone in this chart, given how the UK Govt perceives this as a conveyor belt...

The EWCA's Ammori decision marks a dismal low in the courts' scrutiny of national security issues. In a new post on @verfassungsblog.de, @alangreene.bsky.social, @daniellalock.bsky.social and I examine the depressing tricks by which rights protections disappear: verfassungsblog.de/palestine-ac...

The problem with this point is not that it's wrong, it's that it was known from the outset that the Conservative Govt had given the NI legacy body insufficient resources. It was set up to fail, and its leadership is flagging this now to deflect mounting criticism: www.irishnews.com/news/norther...

Possibly the only thing elevating this WC

The Guardian's concerns about the UK paying to enable French use of water cannon would give you whiplash. It's hard to to get worked up about French practice when every other para is a reminder this happens in NI. Policing by consent? That's for other people: www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

More from me on Dillon, this time (in a first for me) in the Solicitors' Journal. I've heard it called a curate's egg of a judgment, but I fear this mess of a decision would turn the stomach of even the hardiest of curates: www.solicitorsjournal.com/sjarticle/di...

"The military should be able to kill people with no effective investigation because they are the good guys, and the state had better protect them, or else" is an utterly chilling message from Al Cairns. This is a blueprint for authoritarianism, sold as "it's only NI". share.google/15LttgHP1oZw...

Shocking speech by Chris Philp at Policy Exchange today. Debate about border control, immigration enforcement and appeal rights is one thing. Scapegoating - of immigration categories and of immigration advocates - is altogether more sinister.

What is Al Carns's theory of how prosecuting soldiers who murdered civilians in Northern Ireland helps republicans achieve a united Ireland

A) This a properly brilliant piece of investigative journalism by BBC & @hopenot.bsky.social Huge kudos to all involved for doing the job the UK police & CPS failed to do: naming the alleged spymaster & clearly showing Kremlin’s role. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

There are a lot of politicians who have stoked up tensions in recent summers in NI. A lot of "hearing the concerns" of Loyalist communities. It's quite something to see Gavin Robinson, within a week of riots by Loyalist youths, using them to try to block increases to the age of criminality by PoC.

All eyes to the Court of Appeal in London at 11am for the hand down of a special five judge decision (in light of the importance of the issues at stake) on the lawfulness of the UK Govt's Palestine Action ban: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...

Also, laying the blame so fully on Musk - who is absolutely a dangerous and contemptible racist creep - is very convenient for the UK's newspapers, news channels and politicians who've either spread the self-same racist myths, 24/7, for decades, or have entirely abandoned any pushback against them.

What English politicians are trying so hard to ignore, NI lives, at a visceral level, every day. A week of shouting about returner arrangements and border controls amid riots. I wish we could get away without thinking about Brexit.