The most telling chart from the Treasury's Brexit report

What is the EU? Not all that long ago, we all knew the answer. These days, what constitutes Europe has disintegrated so dramatically that the beginnings and ends of Europe are extremely fuzzy. Consider the following chart from the Treasury’s Brexit report.

Look at where the UK is. Inside the European Union, outside the fiscal compact, outside the euro, outside the countries obliged to join the euro. And not all that far away from Norway and Iceland, which are technically outside the EU.

If I were a Leave campaigner I would make much of this chart. Not only does it show, quite viscerally, that the UK is clearly outside the centre of gravity in Europe, one might also quite reasonably ask how dramatic it would be if the UK were simply one ring further away from that euro core, sitting alongside Iceland and Norway.

Then again, the Remain camp might point out that the UK is already so semi-detached from Europe that, well, why make all the fuss?