It was music to the ears of federalists and fiscal hawks: with English spoken in the corridors of Brussels, the EU would become more streamlined and more efficient.
But what's already happening is that the self-government momentum is still mostly in one direction, notwithstanding the government's recent rejection of a local government committee report recommending more fiscal devolution to English cities.
Criminal proceedings and fiscal and maritime legislation follow English common law, but judicial precedent is not binding.
Navarro's centrist conservatism was shaped by the Miami of her youth, where Republicans mostly spoke English with accents, and anti-Castroism and fiscal conservatism were compatible with a flexible approach to social issues and immigration politics.
There is huge variation in demand for greater tax and spending powers across the UK, from Scotland where a majority of voters favour enhanced fiscal autonomy, to most of the English regions, where there is little appetite for any change.
A new paper* (no paywall here) looks at the "cyclicality" of fiscal policy in emerging markets—in plain English, how the government varies spending and taxation during the business cycle.
Examples in English include "butcher-bird" (for most European species), "jacky hangman" (common fiscal) and "nine killer" (great grey shrike).
English setbacks in the Scottish war, combined with perceived extortionate royal fiscal policies, set the background for the writing of the Ordinances in which the administrative prerogatives of the king were largely appropriated by a baronial council.
That ethos was a continuation of a long-standing English utopian tradition: the dream of a free culture, in both a fiscal and psychological sense.
Two distinguished non-English economists, Paul Krugman and Paul de Grauwe have warned about the dangers of having currency union without fiscal union.
