Brexit - general discussion thread

Great Debates
221

The death penalty is an interesting example, though, because of course the US Constituion does ban “cruel and unusual punishment”, and it’s the Supreme Court that ultimate decides whether or when the death penalty is a cruel or unusual punishment. So the power to ban the death penalty does in fact reside with federal institutions; they merely haven’t exercised it (yet).

Whereas in Europe, the prohibition on the death penalty is an explicity treaty obligation, freely undertaken by states which sign and ratify the European Convention on Human Rights. As it happens, in recent years accession to the ECHR has become a condition of membership of the EU, but this wasn’t always so. The UK signed and ratified the ECHR, and abolished the death penalty, at a time when this was not a requirement for EU membership, and it did this of its own choice.

True, it couldn’t now reintroduce the death penalty without violating its obligations as an EU member, but that is the result of an amendment to the EU treaties which, again, the UK signed and ratified of its own volition. It could have refused to agree to that amendment - any member state could have.

222

That’s obviously a sign of oppression by Brussels elites.

Anything less than 100% of the decisions going in favour of Britain is a clear sign the EU is broken. :wink:

223

Well, that at least has the advantage of being a bright-line rule…

224

Nitpick 1: The EU guidelines that you mention were published in March this year. It’s true that there were leaks two or three days before publication about some of what would be in them, but if your statement implies that we know about the guidelines because of the leaks, no; we know about them because they were published. You’ll find them here:https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2018/03/23/european-council-art-50-guidelines-on-the-framework-for-the-future-eu-uk-relationship-23-march-2018/. They were always to be published. It was the UK side that was obsessive about “keeping our cards close to our chest” and “not showing our hand”.

Nitpick 2: While those guidelines do refer to Gibraltar, the guarantee to Spain actually predates them: it was in guidelines published nearly a year previously, in April 2017, in these terms:

But, the main point; what Spain has been promised is that the future relationship agreement, to be negotiated after the UK leaves, won’t apply to Gibraltar, except with Spanish (and UK) agreement. Both of these sets of guidelines deal with that future relationship agreement. But the text which has just been settled and which is about to be approved (or not) is not the future relationship agreement; it’s the withdrawal agreement.

As I understand it, what Spain is now seeking is that the Withdrawal Agreement should reiterate the guarantee that it has already been given, and that still stands. This wouldn’t change the guarantee; it would give it greater legal force (in addition to the political force that, as you rightly point out, it already has) and would secure UK acceptance of the position, since the UK will be a party to any Withdrawal Agreement.

225

This is all just dysfunctional political theatre. Brexit is a farce, a national humiliation which will dominate politics for years to come.

The time has already run out for any constructive action.

The ERG has realised that any challenge to Mrs May’s leadership of the Conservatives will weaken their cause, and hugely damage the party.

A general election would be a mess. Neither Labour nor the Conservatives could articulate a sensible manifesto, nor campaign effectively. The most likely outcome is a hung Parliament.

The EU is not going to offer a materially better or even different deal on the withdrawal terms.

Parliament, whether there is a general election or not, will not vote for a no deal Brexit. The EU will grant an extension to the Article 50 period beyond the end of March. No PM will take us out of the EU without a deal without Parliament’s explicit agreement. There will not be no deal.

No competent PM will grant a second referendum before the end of the Article 50 period. No matter what the question and no matter the pattern of votes cast, it could only make the situation in Parliament much worse.

All other things being equal, Parliament and Government would procrastinate. However, it occurs to me that there is a very effective backstop. If withdrawal is delayed into April, then every hour that passes will put more and more pressure on the Government and Parliament to just sign May’s withdrawal agreement. Since if it is not signed in early April, then both Labour and the Conservative parties would both have to set out their manifestos for the European elections at the end of May. Neither Labour nor the Conservatives could articulate any sort of policy for another European election. It would be carnage. The Liberals and UKIP would both be resurgent. Chaos would ensue.

No, Mrs May’s withdrawal agreement will be passed, no matter how many times Parliament votes against it first.

The UK will leave the EU in spring next year. With a humiliating deal which literally no one likes. Exhausted, embittered, hopelessly divided, with it’s politics ruined. All to get through the easy first stage of the process, completely unready to face the really tough negotiations - on the future relationship with the EU, and the future relationships with the rest of the world.

It aint’t gonna be pretty!

Best start stockpiling essentials. Mainly popcorn - it’s going to be a long and thrilling ride.

There could only be a relatively good outcome if say five million people openly and sincerely admit their stupidlity and error in voting to leave in 2016. That won’t happen. Without it, it’s just more tears and sorrow, for ever.

226

Highly unlikely the EU27 would agree to extend the Article 50 exit date to the extent of letting us continue electing MEPs. There will be no EP elections in the UK, unless and until we clearly abandon Brexit, but that would be a whole new set of discussions.

That apart, I don’t disagree with the general thrust of your analysis.

227

My point was more that no UK Government would want to ask for an extension past 26 May so the EU shouldn’t have to take a view. Conversely, our friends in the EU, bureaucrats and politicians alike, don’t want to harm us if they can avoid it.

It’s not impossible that as we run up to the end of March, Parliament won’t take a decision and the UK Government will collapse with no party being able to deliver a majority in the Commons for anything. In the absence of a Government, I can’t see the EU throwing us out, since by definition it means that around 30 million people would leave the EU against their will just because their elected representatives have abdicated their responsibility. There’s only eight weeks between 29 March and 26 May (NB haven’t checked the relevant dates) - not a lot of time for a general election (which need not even resolve the issue).

You can easily picture Donald Tusk or Emmanuel Macron, for example, spending the time making sincerely sympathetic noises as they politely ask after our plan, are we staying or going, do we wan’t to do a deal or not, are there any responsible adults available to talk to (do we have any sort of clue at all…)?

In the absence of a functioning Government, could the UK even hold EU elections? Do the electoral bodies just do things without being prompted? Surely someone somewhere needs to give a formal instruction?

In that situation, I can’t see the EU taking a deliberate step to throw us out. If only because on balance it means that we were actually coming around to the conclusion that we don’t want to leave.

Of course, the 27 aren’t going to be happy with us if we do decide to stay after all. There is no good outcome now for anybody.

228

There’s consequences sure, but cancelling the whole thing is the least worst option. It’s virtually impossible to predict two weeks ahead what’s going to happen right now. Call me naive but I’m hoping - if not hopeful - for a second vote.

229

The Brexit vote was held because the government could not decide what to do about its relationship with the EU. Clearly if the Withdrawal Ageement is rejected, that leaves three alternatives: Write another WA, Exit without an agreement or Stay in.

It would be appropriate to go back to the country and ask again what the people want.

Alternatively they could just say 'thanks for the advice about the EU, as a representative democracy and observing supremacy of Parliament to make decisions on behalf of the people. We have decided that the least damaging option is to Stay In. The government would have to defend itself over the perception that Referendum had a constitutional significance. Sadly that mistaken populist perception has been promoted relentlessly by the Brexit faction and is has gotten us into this sorry mess.

Do we really think that there are going to be mass protests on the streets against a government that has decided that this is in the best interests of the British people when is becoming clear that Exiting with no agreement and the uncertain Limbo that is the WA are both really bad options?

At some point the public are going to lose patience with all these Brexit arguments and want to get back to normal politics. Most voters simply do not understand why it is difficult and why there is so much drama. They were given a simple question and persuaded that the outcome would also be simple. They were deceived.

While the Conservatives seem unable to decide what to do amongst themselves, will Labour announce a policy change and get behind a Peoples Vote?

230

You present a rose-tinted, albeit widespread, view of the EU’s origins and early history. I’m not going to go through every bit of it, but just as an example, the main reason de Gaulle blocked the UK’s entry was that Britain would object to the nascent Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), a protectionist/subsidy policy which heavily favoured the French farmers, a constituency that any French leader needed to keep on side. France had been subsidising its agriculture heavily in the post WW2 years. The bill was getting unaffordable, and the CAP offered a solution – subsidies from other countries. De Gaulle didn’t want the Brits messing it up.

Only once the CAP was finalised was consideration given to admitting the UK to the community.

231

They wouldn’t be throwing us out. We have already told them we are walking out, and have written that into our law as well as committing ourselves in EU law under Article 50. It follows automatically that our MEPs lose their jobs on March 29, and we hold no further elections to the EP; and I don’t doubt that that too is explicitly enshrined in assorted legal documents. It was certainly made clear from the moment the Article 50 notification was made.

What would take an explicit act of will on both sides would be to halt or reverse the process. And I see no way in which that’s going to include full participation in EU decision-making, including EP elections, while we sort ourselves out. Even on the off-chance that the outcome is “Sorry, will you take us back”, I’d expect the associated new agreements to include some special arrangement about sending MEPs, since there isn’t time for it to happen and allow us to hold elections in May as though nothing had happened.

232

An interesting take by Yanis Varoufakis:

And Varoufakis on BBC Newsnight yesterday.

233

But that is how negotiations go when side is significantly weaker then the other. It was pure hubris for the UK to assume that things would be different for them.

Ask the developing world what happens when you enter into talks with the EU or the US or China. It isn’t a negotiation, it is merely an agreement on how much damage the developing nation can take without imploding.

234

Putting the brakes on the current withdrawal timeline would be the most sensible move, even if the plan was simply to negotiate an orderly withdrawal on a less frantic timescale. But no one in Parliament - of any party - has the political courage to do this.

Yes. And the Daily Mail and Murdoch press would be calling for them 24/7.

And the public overall will never understand that this was the problem. People like simple solutions and when those aren’t available they blame the people telling them there aren’t any simple solutions and elect people who tell them there are, even though those people are lying unprincipled weasels.

Not while Corbyn’s in charge.

EXACTLY. The Leave campaign’s constant refrain of “the EU are being so mean to us by not giving us what we want even though they have no reason to do so and we have zero leverage” is stupid and tiresome. The EU have actually been fairly levelheaded about this - they could be far more punitive but they’re not going to just give us what we want for no reason either. Meanwhile the UK has been disorganised, ill-prepared and in general bloody stupid about its approach to the negotiations.

May triggered Article 50 in a desperate attempt to gain some power by engaging in a game of chicken with the EU and hoping they’d turn aside first. Unfortunately this is like someone on a Vespa playing chicken with a lorry - the lorry might decide to turn off first but better odds are on the Vespa driver becoming one with the lorry’s grill.

Frankly I think the EU pity us, and I can’t blame them.

235

Ah yes, the CAP. No French politician dare mess with the Farmers. The country, for some reason, has far too many small farmers, but they are well organised into unions and they are quick to take direct action and are not adverse to taking on the riot police. Many small farms are barely sustainable without a subsidy.

The CAP was an issue for years. It was up to 74% of the EU budget in the 1980s. Surpluses stored to keep the prices high. Butter mountains, milk lakes, which seemed absurd at the time and created much Euro-scepticism in the UK. Thatcher negotiated very hard with the EU and got a rebate on the UK contributions. Pity the current Conservative party under Cameron were not able to pull off the same feat.

The UK has far fewer farms and farmers than France. The EU farming subsidies went to the big landowners in the UK while in France they were distributed amongst many thousands of small farmers. That issue has not gone away in France. They were protesting quite recently. There are many landowners in the UK who are going to miss those EU payments after Brexit, especially the wealthiest. Another post Brexit challenge for the UK government is how it should replace these subsidies. There will be some howls of protest in the countryside if they are out of pocket.

236

The Daily Mail has changed editors and changed its stance on Brexit. It will be interesting to see if this goes as a far as getting behind the Peoples Vote campaign. It could happen.

237

Could a second referendum be worded:

*VOTE FOR ONE:

  1. Approve and implement the Brexit agreement negotiated by Her Majesty’s Government
  2. Disapprove the Brexit agreement negotiated by Her Majesty’s Government, rescind Great Britain’s Article 50 notification, and make every effort to return to Great Britain’s earlier relationship with the EU*
238

No, because you are saying the only two options are:

  1. May’s deal
  2. No Brexit.

Few would agree that those are the only options.

Off the top of my head, there’s also:

  • The Norway option, or ‘Norway plus’
  • Screw Northern Ireland, and go for the Canada option
  • A no-deal Brexit, and negotiate afterwards
  • Somehow get an extension of article 50 and go back to the drawing board

There are probably several other options, of varying degrees of realism and practicality.

But here won’t be another referendum because

a) Parliament won’t support it
b) There’s no time to hold one
c) There’s no way to frame simple, clear questions that everyone would agree on

Re-holding the previous referendum of Brexit or no Brexit is even less likely than anything else.

239

And (d), or perhaps just the reason for (a), no MP could be confident that the people won’t vote for catastrophe. Public opinion has barely moved since 2016.

As Yanis Varoufakis demonstrates, even people with fancy degrees who have seen the outcomes of the Greek and British referenda still believe that little countries’ citizens can vote to tell other, bigger countries’ citizens what they must do.

240

Perhaps a referendum with two questions:

  1. Should the UK ratify the Withdrawal Agreement?
  2. If the Withdrawal Agreement is not ratified, do you wish the UK to Leave the European Union or Remain (cancel Article 50)?

The EU has already made noises it’s willing to extend A50 in certain circumstances and would accept its cancellation if the UK Remained.