US Shutdown Halted. Business to Lobby Against Brexit. Milton Pothole

Pothole on the A10

Republican and Democrat leaders have come to an agreement to stop the government shutdown with Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell saying his party intended to consider legislation  "that would address DACA (the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), border security and related issues, as well as disaster relief". The funding will continue till the 8th February. The hope is that a permanent deal can be arranged by then to guarantee the remainder of government funding for the 2017/2018 financial year. DACA currently covers 700,000 'dreamers', children of illegal immigrants who have grown up in the US, know no other home, who are at risk of deportation if DACA is revoked.

Carolyn Fairbairn, the CBI Director General, called for an urgent "Jobs first" Brexit deal to be negotiated. The opinion of a significant number of business leaders is that the benefits of membership of the customs union currently exceed the likelihood of profits from future trade deals. Things may change, the thought is, but currently this is not the time to leave the EU. As Fairbairn put it:

"Looking at this hard choice around customs union or not, the value of our frictionless trade within the European Union is worth more than having the potentially unknown value of trade deals in other parts of the world."

Because not all members of the CBI agree with this, the CBI itself has to stay neutral on the issue. The government is still working on the basis that we will be leaving the single market and the customs union after EU exit day.

Potholes seem to be breeding again and the traffic news today was of a rather unusual hold up - a traffic jam away from Cambridge on the A10 by Milton. It was apparently caused by a pothole right in the carriageway. Curious, I grabbed my camera and walked up the A10 and along the traffic queue towards its nemesis. I eventually reached the front of the queue. A police car was pparked in the centre of the lane to prevent traffic hitting the hole. Possibly a meter and a half long, 50 cm wide and 15 cm deep at the edges, the hole was ideally placed to catch left hand wheels and cause damage or cause swerving into oncoming traffic, causing accidents. The PC came over saying that she couldn't in all conscience have driven away from the hole. Took my pictures and made my way back for breakfast.