wdtpw

You've talked a fair bit below about the changing attitudes of the UK citizens, and the fact that Leave / Remain are currently still important categories (and will be depending on the recovery).

But I can't help but wonder if you could expand a little about people's attitudes:

a) Do you see any evidence of a change in attitude in the way people of the EU view us? And, if so, in which direction?

b) Whenever I mention Boris lying to my Tory friends, they generally respond "all politicians lie." To me, this seems like a quite nihilistic way of viewing politics - as if to give up all hope that it can be honourable or better.

As a comparison, I notice a lot of Trump supporters saying the same when confronted by Trump's lying. They also seem to be disengaged in a larger sense - many still think Trump won the election for example and distrust the mainstream media.

For myself, I find it hard to keep up what I think ought to be anger at the way standards appear to be slipping. I feel almost numb to it all now. Like I might go "oh, a dodgy contract awarded to a friend of a Tory MP. Put it on the pile with the others." Or "oh, an ethics advisor has resigned. Well that seems to be a thing these days."

I don't know how much you want to get into the rights and wrongs of policy here, but I'm actually as much interested in the results lying and slease (or a perception of lying and slease) has on people's engagement.

I.e. Do you see any sort of wider trend happening in society, where significant groups simply disengage and become cynical about it all? Or where people stop engaging in politics as a force for good and start to think about what they can get out of it?

Or, I guess, do you see any significant groups in society getting more passionate and engaged?

Also:

c) What do you think of Dominic Cumming's critique (in the past and more recently), that the UK state is basically dysfunctional? If so, can it / will it be improved?

It's not often that someone comes back to an AMA a day or two later and responds to questions. Thank you for returning to the AMA, and doubly thank you for the in-depth answer!