Government approves Santos Barossa pipeline and sea dumping

The Australia Institute Media Release   Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek’s Department has approved a…

If The Jackboots Actually Fit …

By Jane Salmon   If The Jackboots Actually Fit … Why Does Labor Keep…

Distinctions Without Difference: The Security Council on Gaza…

The UN Security Council presents one of the great contradictions of power…

How the supermarkets lost their way in Oz

By Callen Sorensen Karklis   Many Australians are heard saying that they’re feeling the…

Purgatorial Torments: Assange and the UK High Court

What is it about British justice that has a certain rankness to…

Why A Punch In The Face May Be…

Now I'm not one who believes in violence as a solution to…

Does God condone genocide?

By Bert Hetebry Stan Grant points out in his book The Queen is…

As Yemen enters tenth year of war, militarisation…

Oxfam Australia Media Release   As Yemen enters its tenth year of war, its…

«
»
Facebook

Soft Brexits and Hard Realities: The Tory Revolt

It was meant to be an away day at Chequers in total hermetic isolation, an effort on the part of UK Prime Minister Theresa May to sketch some common ground in a cabinet that has struggled to agree on much regarding the imminent departure of Britain from the European Union. The clock is ticking, for many ominously, with the departure date slated for March 29, 2019.

The initial signs seemed good: a consensus had, initially, been reached by all brands of Brexiter. Chief Brexit minister David Davis and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson had, in principle, come on board, though there were mutterings of dissatisfaction at the PM’s new plan. At least for a time, collective cabinet responsibility had been satisfied.

The plan focused on, in the words of the Chequers statement, a proposal establishing “a free trade area for goods. This would avoid friction at the border, protect jobs and livelihoods, and ensure both sides meet their commitment to Northern Ireland and Ireland through the overall future relationship.” Such a vision free of friction would entail maintaining “a common rulebook for all goods including agri-food” with a stress on harmonising UK laws with those of the EU. Parliament have the ultimate say on their passage. “Regulatory flexibility” would govern the issue of services; “strong reciprocal commitments related to open and free trade” would characterise UK-EU relations.

The issue of the role played by EU courts, always trouble for the fanatical leavers, would continue to play a part in so far as UK courts would heed “the common rulebook.” A joint institutional framework would ensure consistent interpretation and application of such rules, but “the supremacy of UK courts” would be assured.

As for the issue most worrying to the market types amongst the Tories, the proposal suggested “a new Facilitated Customs Arrangement that would remove the need for customs checks and controls between the UK and the EU as if a combined customs territory.” This would leave Britain to have its own seat at the World Trade Organisation and strike trade deals with other states, another cherry for the harsh Brexiters.

The populist element was also considered: free movement, a central EU principle, would end, but the UK would seek a principle of ensuring that UK and EU citizens would still be permitted to visit, work and live in respective jurisdictions with ease. Large annual payments to the EU, those so heavily stigmatised during the 2016 referendum campaign, would also end, though this would not terminate specific contributions to areas of “joint action”.

It did not take long for the ruptures within government ranks to begin. After the discomforting unity came the blood-filled flood; first three resignations, all associated with the “hard” variety of Brexit lore. The most prominent of them was Davis himself who had shown various, and variable colourings of competence during his time in that newly created position in the aftermath of the 2016 referendum. He had been marginalised of late, the Prime Minister evidently feeling that the issue was simply too important to leave to him. More to the point, he had threatened some five times to resign since November 2017, making him seem like a purveyor of empty threats.

With Davis’ exit went deputy Steve Baker and junior Brexit minister Suella Braverman. “The general direction of policy,” came a liberated Davis in his letter of resignation, “will leave us in at best a weak negotiating position, and possibly an inescapable one.”  Parliamentary control, he opined, would be “illusory rather than real”. The “common rule book” policy would effectively hand “control of large swathes of our economy to the EU and is certainly not returning control of our laws in any real sense.”

On Monday, just minutes before May’s address to members of parliament, Downing Street announced that Johnson was also making a dash for it. His resignation letter was certainly heavy with opportunistic John Bull flavour; Britain, he charged, risked heading “for the status of a colony”. The PM, he accused, was “sending our vanguard into battle with the white flags fluttering above them” in preparations for a “semi-Brexit”. “It now seems that the opening bid of our negotiations involves accepting that we are not actually going to be able to make our own laws.”

There is not much sincerity all around. Individuals like Environment Minister Michael Gove are backing May for the moment, thinking that a streak of sound pragmatism runs through this flawed plan. But anyone having Gove’s backing is bound to feel the sheath of a blade, if not the blade itself, at some point.

Those remaining on May’s rocked ship have become apocalyptic in a different way, suddenly seeing the EU as less problematic than their opponents opposite the Parliamentary chamber. “If we don’t pull together,” went a Cabinet minister to The Guardian, “we risk the election of Jeremy Corbyn as prime minister.” Never mind Europe, went this particular line of reasoning: Labour might just walk in.

Within British politics, May’s Friday product does not seem to be flying well, though it had taken off in a fashion. Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, taking the Scottish angle on this, suggested that the plan had started to unravel early, though it had a kernel of good sense. “It simply underlines the fact that the UK is leaving the EU (which I wish it wasn’t) the only workable solution is to stay in single market and customs union.”

Then comes the most obvious point that would render this whole exercise drily spent and academic: Will the EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier and his crew have a bar of it? There is, superficially, too much of the Swiss solution to this, too much of the “give me your market” but spare me the regulatory trade-off. Having expressed his dislike for such a solution in the past, it is clear that May is facing the toughest of sells. The EU apparatchiks still wish to make an example of Britain, a form of deterrence against others who wish to take the exiting step in the name of reclaiming sovereignty.

But there is something striking about the latest chapter in the ever-ballooning Brexit script. The Chequers statement is a product of a person who has not only survived, but shredded the hard Brexit base within her cabinet. With Davis and Johnson gone into the dangerous ether of political disruption, the issue is whether the positions will firm up or loosen. Till then, and even after, few sane individuals will want May’s job.

 

Like what we do at The AIMN?

You’ll like it even more knowing that your donation will help us to keep up the good fight.

Chuck in a few bucks and see just how far it goes!

Your contribution to help with the running costs of this site will be gratefully accepted.

You can donate through PayPal or credit card via the button below, or donate via bank transfer: BSB: 062500; A/c no: 10495969

Donate Button

7 comments

Login here Register here
  1. Andrew Smith

    Good article, and what a pickle the British have found themselves in, at the expense of youth, working age and EU citizens in the U.K.

    However, this should never have got out of the starting gates…. Cameron’s own head of the Downing Street Policy Unit, Sir Craig Oliver, described the successful Brexit vote as a ‘right wing coup’, but quite coy as to how Cameron agreed to go down a cul de sac on holding a (binding?) referendum in the first place?

  2. Stephen G B

    I voted not to join the EEC in 1975, I believe that it was wrong then and still do today. I hope for a hard Brexit, not to cause a problem for those Brits working in Europe, or those Europeans working in Britain, but because the EEC is not far off calling anyway.

    There is absolutely no reason for any European country not to agree on the exchange of goods and services to suit each country.

    The EEC has a common currency (the EURO) but this common currency is in effect a millstone around the ankle of a number of EEC Member countries such as Greece and Italy, they will never get back prosperity unless they regain control over their own currency. They will come to that conclusion as soon as they see that Britain leaving will not be the catalyst for the ‘sky falling’ and the end of the EEC is not the end of time.

  3. W CH

    Very good Dr Binoy. I think another benefit of leaving the EU is that Britain will no longer need to chip in for EU bailouts, Italy for one is nearing insolvency

  4. Harry

    Agree Stephen, the UK should exit the EU, a worthwhile project that has been subverted by unelected banksters. EU nations have effectively downgraded their status to that of non-sovereign states with limited flexibility to run their economy. At least a few countries such as the U.K. Have retained their own currency so they could in theory operate their economy with much more independence than they do. They could inject much more government spending into their economy instead of pursuing unnecessary and mindless austerity.

  5. Harry

    There is nothing to stop European nations co-operating on trade, borders, environmental issues etc etc but monetary union has been very damaging to much of EU citizens.

  6. paul walter

    Here is the next part of the horrors inflicted on the British people since Thatcher.

    Blair going down on Bush, followed by Cameron, the upper crust twit and his austerity post Meltdown, then Cameron’s imbecilic gamble, Brexit, Post-referendum cruelties involving the EC and May, all a slo-mo train wreck.

    And still the idiots keep voting them back in.

  7. New England Cocky

    May’s Brexit, the change you have when nothing really happens …. sounds a little like NLP policies … or rather continued lack of policies to benefit Australian voters instead of foreign owned bankers.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

The maximum upload file size: 2 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, text, archive, code, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop file here

Return to home page