This has been quite an important week for post-Brexit politics, in that there has been the clearest indication yet of the approach of the anticipated future Labour government, and certainly the most extensive media coverage of it, perhaps because that prospect is becoming closer. At the same time, there’s been the clearest indication yet of how Labour’s policy will differ, to an extent, from the present Tory government and differ, considerably, from the probable position of a post-election-loss Tory Party.
Labour’s ‘new’ post-Brexit stance
It is the latest stage in what has already been a long, slow process, which I’ve discussed many times in the past on this blog, most recently in June of this year. This means that, in some respects, there is little that is new. Keir Starmer has been talking since July 2022 – although it seemed to have to be dragged out of him – about seeking to improve the terms of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA), including a security pact and a veterinary agreement. And in January of this year Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy made what I argued was a significant speech, which included plans for closer and more harmonious relations with the EU.
However, Labour are now making relations with the EU a more central part of their electoral offer, and doing so more loudly and slightly more confidently, perhaps emboldened by the clear polling evidence that so many voters regard Brexit as having been a failure. Indeed the pollster Professor Sir John Curtice argues that Labour aren’t so much being bolder as “playing catch-up” with public opinion.
This began to be signaled by Starmer’s visit to meet Europol officials in The Hague last week to discuss enhanced cross-border intelligence cooperation, during which he announced Labour’s plans to strike a deal with the EU over irregular migration. Then, last weekend, he and David Lammy used a conference in Montreal to re-iterate that in government Labour would seek to re-set relations with the EU as their “number one” foreign policy goal. This isn’t just about the TCA, and would include participation in structured, formal strategic dialogue, presumably along the lines already offered by the EU but rebuffed by Rishi Sunak (£).
During the Montreal visit, Starmer also gave a major interview to the Financial Times, which, tellingly, was widely reported by other media outlets, including the BBC main news bulletins, pledging “to seek a major rewrite of Britain’s Brexit deal” as part of the TCA review in 2026. Subsequently, footage emerged, though it was hardly surprising, of him emphasising that, under Labour, there would be no desire to diverge from EU environmental, food and employment standards. Then, also widely reported, including in the French media, was Starmer’s trip, along with Lammy and Rachel Reeves, to Paris, where he held what seems to have been a positive meeting with Emmanuel Macron.
In last week’s post I suggested that a Labour government might be able to fashion “a more coherent strategy, to the extent that it might pursue closer ties with the EU across all policy areas” and, even in the short period since then, it now seems clear that this is what they will offer. As such, again as I pointed out last week, it offers a contrast to the ad hoc and inconsistent Brexit ‘pragmatism’ of Rishi Sunak, constantly hamstrung by his own lack of vision as well as the leaden, lumpen, dead weight of his Brexit Ultra MPs, and the ever-present Conservative terror of a Farageist revival.
It’s worth adding that, for all that Starmer has repeatedly endorsed the hard Brexit red lines of not re-joining the EU or the single market, he has at least implicitly rejected the Tories’ doctrinaire opposition to (almost) any role for the ECJ. That in itself opens up some space for creating closer relationships with the EU, as it is often what precludes them (for example in relation to security and commercial database sharing). That is a contrast both with one of Theresa May’s original Lancaster House ‘red lines’ and with Boris Johnson’s adolescent ‘sovereignty first’ approach to the TCA negotiations.
Moreover, it is clear from his FT interview that Starmer has set his own red line against the ‘Brexit 2.0’ of derogating from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which so many Brexit Ultras are agitating for and which, possibly, and I would think probably, will be adopted as Conservative policy after the next election. For that matter, given Sunak’s embrace this week of the anti-Net Zero agenda of the Tory right, it’s not inconceivable that, alongside promises of a fresh push to post-Brexit regulatory divergence, it will be their policy before the election. Some may regard Starmer’s stance as a small mercy, but I think it is rather more than that: Brexit itself is bad enough, but Brexit 2.0 on top of it would be even worse.
The Brexiters’ reactions
As this new, or newly communicated, approach from Labour began to emerge, the Brexiters’ knives were sharpened, if sharpness is a quality that can be applied to what, in both senses of the word, are such dull blades. Some of their reaction had a slightly surprising tinge. We’re well-used to them predicting the imminent collapse of the EU, but, in the Telegraph, both Associate Editor Camilla Tominey (£) and columnist Nigel Farage (£) were making the slightly different argument that, according to Tominey, only “poor deluded souls ‘remain’ under the illusion that the EU is some sort of friendly and progressive family of nations” whilst, according to Farage, “it is not the cuddly place Remainers think it is”. As evidence, both of them referred to the rise of the AfD in Germany, the illiberal regimes in Poland and Hungary, and the possibility of a Le Pen presidency in France. Why would “idiot remainers”, as Farage charmingly put it, want closer ties?
It was a strange line to take. There may be some remainers who are starry-eyed about the EU, but there are at least as many Brexiters who are constantly astonished that the EU is ‘mean’ and ‘unfriendly’ for reserving the rights and benefits of membership to its own members, something which most remainers see as self-evident. And even those with the mildest of liberal sensibilities hardly need instruction from Farage, of all people, about the dangers of neo-fascist and populist regimes. Beyond that, the very fact that individual members of the EU follow their own political paths gives the lie to the Brexiter claim that membership precludes national sovereignty.
But there is an even more fundamental issue, and it lies at the heart of the fallacy of Brexit. Brexiters used to say ‘we’re leaving the EU, not leaving Europe’, a slogan which, unusually, is simultaneously a truism, nonsense, and an important insight. The important insight is that, whether or not the UK is a member of the EU, the EU and its member states are there, right next door to us. Indeed, even if the EU didn’t exist at all, the nations of Europe would be there, right next door to us. Those irreducible geo-political facts mean that, whether in terms of trade, defence, irregular migration or anything else, the UK necessarily has a significant relationship with those countries.
So the issue is how, and how best, to relate to them. Brexiters have never even tried to give a reason why being absent from the institutions that link them is a better way of relating (as opposed to their claims about the supposed benefits domestically, or in terms of relating to non-EU countries and bodies). And they most certainly haven’t given any reason why, having decided to leave those institutions, a relationship of distance and antagonism is better than one of close cooperation.
Otherwise, most of the reactions from Tories, and Brexiters generally, to Labour’s approach have been fairly predictable. Early out of the trap, like an unusually well-conditioned Pavlovian dog hearing the distant ringing of a bell, David Frost dribbled (£) that “Britain is now in serious danger of losing Brexit” because “Labour wants to take us back closer to the EU”. It didn’t make much sense as a critique, though. Frost, like many Brexiters, gives as his central ‘philosophical’ argument that democratically elected UK governments should be free to pursue whatever policies they judge to be in the UK’s best interests. So if such a government decides being closer to the EU is in the national interest, then, even in Frost’s own terms, it doesn’t mean ‘losing’ Brexit but enacting it.
A few days later, Frost came up with the even more predictable line (£) of “Brexit betrayal”. If possible, this made even less sense than his previous effort, if only because, in insisting that the EU would not countenance an improvement to the TCA he negotiated, he not only negated his claim that it was already a wonderful deal – since he implicitly conceded that, were the EU minded to agree, a better deal is possible – he also negated the very claim that a ‘betrayal’ was in prospect.
In fact, this was a recurring contradiction in the Brexiters’ reaction, such as the Mail’s report on Starmer’s meeting with Macron. On the one hand, the prospects of the EU agreeing any re-negotiation were dismissed – strangely, the Brexiters have now abandoned all their claims about Britain ‘holding all the cards’ or ‘them needing us more than we need them’ – whilst, on the other hand, the non-outcome of this non-negotiation was presented as something to fear.
That aside, Frost’s second article was revealing in being laced with disparagement of the present Tory government for “paving the way” to Labour’s supposed betrayal, a good indicator of how the Tories will conduct their election defeat post-mortem. Frost will undoubtedly be a leading player in the autopsy, which seems almost certain to conclude that Sunak failed to be a ‘true’ Conservative and Brexiter. This will, again almost certainly, presage a lurch to the ‘National Conservative’ right. Liz Truss’s attempt this week to exhume the corpse of her disastrous ‘true Brexit’ premiership (£) can also be seen as the beginning of the same dismal process, as discussed by Josh Self, the increasingly excellent political commentator who succeeded Ian Dunt as Editor of politics.co.uk.
Political dad dancing
The meta-issue in all this, shown by the reaction of Frost and numerous other Brexiters, is the endless betrayalist narrative that permeates Brexit. But its very endlessness shows its absurdity. Just how many times can Brexit be betrayed? And if it has already been betrayed then what does it matter what Labour now do? Similarly, having warned us in October 2019, and in December 2020, and in November 2022 that we were getting ‘Brexit in Name Only’, it is hard to imagine why anyone would feel greatly stirred by Nigel Farage’s latest hand-wringing about how “two years into a Labour government it will [be] Brexit in Name Only”.
In fact, generally, although the Brexiters’ attack on Labour’s plans will undoubtedly continue to resonate with hardcore Leave voters, it’s hard to see it having wider cut-through. Things have moved on from the ‘will of the people’ days, especially given how many voters, including leave voters, have become disillusioned with Brexit, and the way that Sunak’s government has already, in a limited way, accepted the deficiencies of the Johnson Brexit. In this sense, if Labour are still 'playing catch-up' with public opinion, the Tories are simply ignoring it.
For that matter, not only has there been little regulatory divergence from the EU under the Tories – because for the most part it is totally impractical, either politically or economically – but, also, there is considerable public support for things staying that way, including amongst leave voters, in line with Labour’s policy. Similarly, whilst Starmer’s mention of not diverging on environmental, food and employment standards got the predictable ‘betrayal’ treatment on this morning’s Mail front page, a commitment to at least non-regression of environmental and labour standards is part of the TCA that Johnson agreed.
However, the only songs the Brexiters have are the old ones. For example, in his moonlighting role as a GB News presenter, Jacob Rees-Mogg’s squeaky diatribe against Labour focused primarily on the possibility of re-negotiating the Brexit deal leading to the UK “shadowing” the EU through “alignment”. But it seemed embarrassingly dated, the political equivalent of dad dancing, given the numerous ways that this is happening under the Tories, for reasons very well-understood by Rees-Mogg himself (£), as illustrated by his support for the idea of the UK unilaterally adopting EU regulations and conformity assessment marking, so as to avoid the ‘red tape’ of divergence or duplication.
Rees-Mogg also deployed an altogether more cynical, and probably more electorally potent, criticism in suggesting that the public had thought that all the arguments about Brexit were over. This was the standard response from the Conservatives, with a government spokesperson telling the BBC that Starmer "wants to take Britain back to square one on Brexit, reopening the arguments of the past all over again". It is a response that eschews any discussion about the merits of a closer relationship with the EU but instead plays upon the perhaps widespread desire amongst the electorate to simply not hear anything more about Brexit. Yet, apart from being cynical, it is also dishonest, since it is the Brexiters who constantly try to drag the debate back to the toxicity of 2016, not least with the accusation that any steps to a closer the relationship are 'betraying Brexit'.
By contrast, Labour’s policy is plainly an attempt to avoid ‘reopening the old arguments’ at all costs, hence Starmer’s insistence that there is no case to re-join the EU or the single market. That attempt attracts the hostility of Brexiters, who argue that his real agenda is rejoining, and that seeking a closer relationship is a route to this. But, ironically, it attracts as much hostility from re-joiners, who argue that his real agenda ought to be rejoining, and that seeking a closer relationship doesn’t offer any route to this.
Towards ‘de-Brexitification’?
My reading is slightly different. I think what Labour are doing, sensibly, is to try to ‘de-Brexitify’ the entire question of UK-EU relations, and to approach them as a policy issue that may be very different in detail, but no different in kind, from the way the UK conducts its relations with other friendly powers. Contrary to the Brexiters’ criticisms, that doesn’t entail reversing Brexit, but contrary to the re-joiners’ criticisms it does not preclude doing so, and is a necessary step to doing so.
If successful, normalizing relations, and not framing them constantly in terms of the now dead question of whether to leave the EU, would be a good thing in itself, undoing some of the damage of Brexit, as well as providing at least one of the preconditions for a viable case for joining the EU to be made (another being an active campaign movement for doing so). To put that another way, whilst Brexiters are wrong to think that Starmer’s insistence that ‘there is no case to re-join’ conceals a current intention to do just that, it really shouldn’t be difficult for re-joiners to envisage that, at some time down the line, he will say that circumstances have changed and that there is now such a case.
It may well be that Labour, at least in public statements, are pinning far too much on the TCA review, which is designed as a technical stock-taking exercise rather than a vehicle for re-negotiation. This week, the UK in a Changing Europe (UKICE) research centre produced an excellent report on this, explaining that, as things stand, the EU is likely to approach the review from just such a ‘minimalist’ perspective, and that if a Labour government wants to make the scope more ‘maximalist’, then the onus will be on it to persuade the EU that this is worthwhile, which won’t be easy. Moreover, even if that persuasion is successful in setting a maximalist agenda, then pursuing it to a successful conclusion will take a long time to negotiate. Peter Foster and Andy Bounds of the Financial Times provided a similarly cautious analysis (£).
However, an interesting Twitter (or X, or perhaps ex-Twitter) thread by Mujtaba Rahman, the well-connected and insightful Europe MD of the Eurasia Group, offered a perhaps more subtle, and rather more optimistic, perspective. Amongst other things, he argues that the importance of changing the tone of the UK-EU relationship shouldn’t be underestimated. That’s not, as is sometimes dismissively suggested, for the naïve reason of thinking that a more ‘friendly’ atmosphere will make much concrete difference, but because Labour look set to bring what Rahman characterizes as a “more consistent, more serious and more forward-leaning engagement” than the UK government has shown since 2016. That, along with greater realism than the Tories have shown, could create new incentives for the EU to engage with the UK.
Domestically, Rahman suggests that Labour ruling out all forms of re-joining gives them “political cover” to make non-trivial improvements. It’s true, as the UKICE report points out, that even the maximalist version of the TCA review would not greatly shift the economic dial, but the report also provides a list of the substantive improvements that could result. Of course, they aren’t going to ‘make Brexit work’, but it simply isn’t true, despite what most re-joiner critics of Labour insist, that Starmer’s red lines preclude any progress of any value at all. Indeed, that’s demonstrated by the UKICE point that the maximalist version of the TCA review would require protracted negotiation. That would hardly be so if the possible changes were as trivial as those critics claim.
Rahman also points out that the positions of both Labour and the EU are in flux, with many possible outcomes. One indication of this was the publication this week of a Franco-German plan, reported by The Times (£) as being “designed with Labour in mind”, although better understood as part of a far broader EU discussion about enlargement, for new forms of tiered ‘associate membership’ of the EU, within which the UK might find a place. It’s not an altogether new idea, although the context is, and a shadow minister was quick to disown any interest in it, which is unsurprising as it goes much further than Labour are willing to go this side of the election. But it does point to the way that, as Ian Dunt of the i put it, “a new kind of European future” could emerge for Britain.
The domestic choice
Whether or not that is so, the domestic politics of Brexit are becoming clearer, at least in terms of what the alternative to the Tories’ approach consists of. It is a Labour, or perhaps Labour-led, government which won’t offer (and, arguably, couldn’t deliver, at least in its first term) a reversal of hard Brexit, but will develop as close and as harmonious a relationship as the EU will agree to short of that. That isn’t just about the TCA review, but the entirety of the ongoing relationship.
That opens some clear water between the parties, though it is of slender breadth. As Rafael Behr eloquently put it in the Guardian, “the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition are both shopping for European policy in the narrow aisle between economic grasp of the problem and political fear of the remedy”. The difference, though, is slightly greater than it seems, and greater than Behr perhaps allows, not so much in itself as in the direction and speed of travel it points to. Just as it is now widely understood, even by most Brexiters, that Brexit is a process, not an event, the same holds for ‘de-Brexitificaton’ and even ‘de-Brexiting’, if they are to happen.
The problem, of course, as Behr concludes, is that “time is already running out”. More accurately, the problem is the tension between two different timescales. The more time that passes since the 2016 referendum, the more the toxicity of Brexit recedes, the more its sensitivity as a political issue reduces, the more the generation of politicians which was obsessed with getting it passes, and the more the electoral demographic that most supported it is replaced by that which was most opposed to it. On the other hand, the more time that goes by without being a member of at least the single market, the more the economic damage racks up as, without also being a member of the EU, does the geo-political damage.
Within that framing, the first timescale isn’t much affected by who is in power, but would be slightly accelerated by a Labour government if only because that would marginalize Tory Brexiter politicians. The second timescale could be slightly shortened by a Labour government, and the interim damage slightly reduced, or possibly considerably reduced compared with what a Tory government might decide to do if elected.
It may not seem like much of a choice, but it is a choice, and this week made it clearer than ever that it will be the one facing us at the next election. The outcome will make some difference to post-Brexit policy in the following years, but could make a huge difference to the choices available in the election after that.
Note: I have re-enabled comments on this blog, for an experimental period, under a strict comments policy.
Showing posts with label Labour. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Labour. Show all posts
Friday, 22 September 2023
Friday, 26 June 2020
Four years on, we need a whole new Brexit debate
It is now four years since the Referendum result which convulsed British politics and set the country on a path whose destination remains unknown. In this post I’m not going to review what has happened during those years but instead will suggest that we now need a whole new Brexit debate. No doubt many, probably most, people are heartily sick of hearing about Brexit, so that idea will seem perverse if not downright masochistic. But such a debate is now possible, necessary, and, arguably, inevitable.
Back in October 2018, the leading law and policy commentator David Allen Green made an intriguing and typically elegant argument. It was that – notwithstanding remainers’ disputes about its legitimacy – the 2016 Referendum had created a mandate for Britain to leave the EU. This could only be discharged by doing so, but once Britain had left it would, indeed, have been fully discharged and would (or should) have no further purchase. Then, it would be possible for debate to shift to what kind of relationship Britain should have with the EU.
The Referendum mandate has been discharged in full
On 31 January 2020 we arrived at that point. It is no more, or less, than a truism to say that Britain is no longer a member of the EU. Yet it seems fair to say that political debate has not fully caught up with that fact (perhaps because, almost immediately afterwards, all attention shifted to coronavirus). For example, just a few days ago an opinion poll showed that a clear majority – 56% - would vote to remain in the EU if another referendum were held now. That is an important result, in that it suggests that Brexit is not what the majority want, but it is also strictly speaking a meaningless one. There could be no such referendum because there is no such thing as ‘remaining’ any more. Likewise, there is no such thing as ‘leaving’ any more. Both of those policies ceased to be possible at the end of January. The only thing that could meaningfully be asked is whether to ‘stay out’ or ‘re-join’ – a very different question (and one which would not necessarily yield the same result).
By the same token, as per Green’s original argument, the fact of Britain having left the EU means that it is no longer meaningful for the 2016 Referendum to be invoked as an argument for how the ongoing process of ‘doing Brexit’ should be undertaken. I’d actually go further than that, because since that referendum didn’t specify a form of Brexit it never had any relevance to how Brexit was done. But, even without accepting that, there is now certainly no basis on which ‘the 17.4 million’ have any more say in what happens than the rest of the population or on which that number can be invoked in discussions about what happens.
That includes the question of whether to extend the Transition Period. Recently, the pro-Brexit Bruges Group tweeted, correctly, that it now seems clear that there will be no extension but went on to say, incorrectly, that this will be “a victory for Brexit voters”. That cannot be so, since Brexit voters voted for one thing only, and it has now been done. There can be no further victories or further demands based upon that original vote.
17.4 million is no longer a relevant number
This matters, hugely, because it means that the ‘will of the people’ and the sanctification of the 17.4 million which since 2016 have been used as a cudgel not just to stifle but to stigmatize as undemocratic any debate about Brexit has now gone from being entirely bogus to being entirely redundant. There’s no doubt that, for particular example, the vote to trigger Article 50 was only supported in such numbers, or even passed at all, because of the force with which that cudgel was wielded. But it is now possible, and right, and necessary, to debate and question every single way in which Brexit is being enacted without any reference at all to the Referendum result.
This includes, of course, the terms of any deal which may be done with the EU as well as the possibility of no deal being done at all. It also includes challenging decisions such as refusing to participate in the EU scheme to revive tourism in the wake of the coronavirus or in the EU’s fast track vaccine scheme. Or the idea of setting up a supposed global rival to the Erasmus scheme (mirroring the now failed approach to the Galileo project). Or refusing to create any formal institutional framework for foreign policy cooperation. On all of these, and many other, Brexit issues there is, or should be, an entirely new debate framed not in terms of the referendum result but in terms of what, given that Britain has left, its relationship with the EU should be like.
What about the election?
A potential objection to this argument is that the present scenario is different to that envisaged by Green in that, prior to leaving the EU, a General Election was held. Since the Conservatives won, this gives them a mandate, separate to that of the Referendum, as to how to undertake the Brexit process. Their manifesto stated that this would mean leaving the single market and customs union, ending “the role of the European Court of Justice”, and not extending the implementation period (sic) beyond the end of December 2020. Therefore, all of these are settled matters.
Against that there are several counter-arguments. Unlike a referendum on a single question, a General Election victory does not imply voters endorsed every line of the winning party’s manifesto. In a first past the post system it doesn’t mean majority support. And in a democratic system it certainly doesn’t imply that the enactment of their policies can no longer be discussed and debated. This includes recognizing that changing circumstances mean that governments necessarily do things that run counter to party manifestos, which in this case might mean, in particular, that the force majeure of coronavirus entails a revision of the transition extension policy. On the other hand, if the manifesto is taken to be a rigid and immutable set of commitments, then there is no mandate for no deal, because it makes no mention of that possibility and, instead, states unequivocally that “we will negotiate a trade deal next year”.
Beyond all that, as I discussed at the time, the election campaign was remarkable for the lack of discussion of any detail at all of how Brexit would be done, including and especially any discussion of what the future relationship with the EU would be like. Indeed, the whole message from the Conservatives was that Brexit would simply be “done” by the end of January, obscuring the entire issue of the future terms negotiations. Even the manifesto line quoted above about the ECJ carries no precise meaning as regards, for example, participation in various EU projects. So all the myriad of details about things like, for example, Erasmus lie outside of any mandate that may be claimed from the election. And this goes wider than such details in that it is also legitimate to question the entire tenor in which the government is conducting its relations with the EU.
A new set of issues
In short, it is now entirely reasonable for a new debate to be held, and an ongoing one, too, as circumstances change because of coronavirus or because of emerging global issues such as the evolving/ deteriorating UK-China relationship or the outcome of the US Presidential election. It is entirely reasonable to discuss the clear evidence of the rising costs of Brexit to date (all the more so given the costs of coronavirus). It is entirely reasonable for voters and politicians to demand of the government that it approaches the EU in a positive and cooperative manner rather than with the truculence that has prevailed so far. And it is entirely reasonable to expect that approach to be pragmatic rather than dogmatic.
When Green made his argument, I suggested that, whatever its logic, one flaw in it was that it was highly unlikely that the Brexiters would drop the idea that the Referendum mandated their preferred form(s) of Brexit. And it is, indeed, far too much to expect this ERG-dominated, continuity Vote Leave government to do so, or to heed any of these entirely reasonable requests.
Yet, on the other hand, it could be argued that Boris Johnson has a duty to do so. As Dan Hodges recently pointed out in The Mail, Johnson won the election by pledging to end the culture war of Brexit, not to continue it. The statesmanlike thing to do after all the divisions of the last few years would be to seek to heal rather than inflame them, the more so given that Brexit now only has minority support.
Labour has a key role to play
If – and, really, it’s not in doubt - such hopes are a pipe dream, then it is still the case that the Labour Party (and others of course, but Labour is the official opposition) can and should be vocal in insisting on this new debate about how to create pragmatic and amicable relations with the EU. It is disappointing and, I think, misguided that Keir Starmer has not called for an extension to the Transition Period (though for a counter-argument, see Professor Tim Bale’s article in the New Statesman). It may well come back to haunt Labour to have been – through silence – complicit in non-extension.
But whether or not that proves true, it will be an even more serious error if he does not start to articulate a new approach to the EU. It is not enough just to ‘hold the government to account’. It’s also necessary, as Andrew Rawnsley argued in last Sunday’s Observer, to show what Labour would do differently. Of course there are many aspects to that, but one would be to show how it champions a better and – Starmer’s calling card – ‘more adult’ approach to the EU. It would be entirely consistent with the growing critique of the government for lacking basic competence (£). Yes, Brexit is happening, but it doesn’t have to be done in this scorched earth fashion which is so reckless of British national interests and international reputation, and which threatens to rip up the cultural fabric and the union itself.
The key to that is, precisely, the recognition that the Referendum mandate has now been discharged. Johnson would no doubt respond to Labour by trying to reprise the ‘will of the people’ line, but it will have less and less traction. And, just from a tactical point of view, those amongst whom it will have traction are voters who are almost certainly already a lost cause for Labour. Whereas, by contrast, there is a large and probably growing constituency of voters, which transcends the leaver-remain distinction, who are appalled at the prospect of no deal and, probably, are out of sympathy with the relentless pathological hatred of all things European that the ERG exhibit.
It is now open to Starmer to find a new kind of ‘centre ground’ encompassing erstwhile leavers and remainers who would welcome a fresh approach, and more specifically a competent approach. At the very least, given that the most important foreign policy question of the moment is relations with the EU it simply can’t be treated as a taboo subject by Labour. With the Referendum mandate now discharged, Brexit should be treated as a political issue just like any other rather than as a culture war shibboleth.
A new approach is needed with or without a deal
This will be true even if, as some well-informed reports this week suggest to be the case (£), a trade deal with the EU is becoming slightly more likely (though, on my reading of Michel Barnier’s comments this week and given those of David Sassoli and David Frost this seems optimistic). On the one hand, it would require intense scrutiny for the damage it is likely to do to manufacturing industry and perhaps particularly to services trade and the wider implications of that for investment generally. On the other hand, any such deal is unlikely to resolve all the many non-trade issues, and even on trade there are likely to be many future, or ongoing, matters to settle. Also in doubt is the extent to which new customs facilities and regulatory systems (for example for chemicals) will be up and running in time.
For what seems to be in prospect if there’s a deal is, all but inevitably given the time frames, precisely the kind of rushed, can-kicking bodge that happened in January, with numerous, complex, loose ends left to be resolved or disputed later. Moreover, the measures currently being touted as the basis for a deal, whereby a zero tariff regime is adjusted (only) if and when the UK diverges from level playing field provisions, are predicated on a constructive and trusting partnership (£).
So even with such a deal, and certainly in the absence of one, there will be many more years in which the relationship will be under negotiation and, in any case, that relationship will itself evolve, if only through the ongoing operation of the Joint Committee overseeing the Withdrawal Agreement. Even though it has been restricted by what has happened over the last four years, there is still a spectrum of possibilities of what that relationship might evolve into over the coming years, ranging from the minimalist, hostile one to which the ERG is dragging us through to an extensive, cooperative one perhaps along the lines of an Association Agreement.
And to re-emphasize, the issue is as much about the tone as the institutional form of the relationship. With the referendum mandate done and dusted why should we accept that future relations with the EU be conducted in the unremittingly negative, suspicious, accusatory manner of the Vote Leave campaign? They won the right to leave, not to permanently poison and pollute UK-EU relations.
Reframing the debate
To put all this a different way, under the influence of Tory Eurosceptics, UKIP, and their media supporters the entire debate about Britain’s relationship with the EU has for at least 30 years been dominated by a single question: stay or leave? That is a testament to the indefatigability of the Brexiters but also, it should be admitted, due to the supine attitude of pro-EU politicians. They rarely, if ever, made a positive case for membership and when they did it was almost invariably in entirely transactional terms. But all that is past history now and, in particular, that single question has been asked and answered. It can no longer serve as the frame through which UK-EU relations are viewed and it mustn’t be allowed to.
The challenge of ensuring that doesn’t just lie with politicians. It also lies with journalists, academics, business and civic society leaders and perhaps especially grass roots organizations and activists. Those who used to be remainers, when remaining was a possibility, mobilized to a remarkable extent after the Referendum was lost and very nearly pulled off a reversal of the result. In the aftermath of that first, emotionally crushing, loss four years ago (my feelings at the time were recorded on a different blog site, if of interest) and the perhaps even more exhausting tension of last year’s long drawn out battles and hopes it’s not surprising that they are drained and demoralized.
Some continue to revisit the rights and wrongs of the 2016 vote and to re-litigate the Referendum. Others have retreated from the fray, seeing any chance to salvage anything as having gone. Still others have flipped to campaigning to re-join the EU. These three responses are all understandable but they are also all unrealistic. The first is hopeless – and actually panders to Brexiters’ attempts to keep the focus on the Referendum result. The second has too little hope. The third has too much. Rejoining the EU may happen, but if so it is years, very likely decades, away.
But there are still things to argue for, and to do so is both worthwhile in itself and necessary if the ground is to be laid for rejoining in the future or even simply creating an amicable partnership. That has at least three aspects. The first lies at the political level of attempting to influence the evolving shape and tenor of UK-EU relations, as discussed above. The second is to nurture all those remaining ties – be they cultural, academic, familial, or whatever – which will persist despite the wreckage of Brexit. It’s still possible to remind our counterparts in the EU that, despite the noisy voices of the Brexiters, plenty of British people never wanted this and are still their friends and allies. And, third, it means re-engaging in the domestic debate in this new post-referendum mandate world.
In that regard, whereas Johnson’s huge election victory in December seemed like a terminal moment – and was, as regards any hope of stopping Brexit – only a few months later things look different. To a remarkable extent for a new government with a large majority it already feels tired and crisis-ridden. That’s largely because of coronavirus, of course, but also because the virus has only speeded up and made more visible its underlying weakness and ineptitude (as per my last post). The Cummings affair wrecked its dominance of the polls. It almost weekly gets into unnecessary tangles that lead to U-turns and, despite its majority, routinely faces backbench rebellions on everything from Huawei to food standards to Sunday trading. Having reshuffled his cabinet in February, only three months after winning, and losing his Chancellor in the process, it’s reported that Johnson is going to do so again in September.
The point isn’t that government is about to fall. It’s that it isn’t the hegemon it seemed to be in December. It doesn’t control the terms of debate, including debate about Europe. A different debate is now, for the first time since 2016, at least possible. And, since January, the lashing, quasi-fascist whip of the ‘will of the people’ has lost all of its force as their will has now been done. The question is no longer ‘leave’ or ‘remain’ and indeed in that sense is no longer even about Brexit, but about Britain’s relationship with Europe. Which actually makes a different debate not just possible but, sooner or later, inevitable.
Back in October 2018, the leading law and policy commentator David Allen Green made an intriguing and typically elegant argument. It was that – notwithstanding remainers’ disputes about its legitimacy – the 2016 Referendum had created a mandate for Britain to leave the EU. This could only be discharged by doing so, but once Britain had left it would, indeed, have been fully discharged and would (or should) have no further purchase. Then, it would be possible for debate to shift to what kind of relationship Britain should have with the EU.
The Referendum mandate has been discharged in full
On 31 January 2020 we arrived at that point. It is no more, or less, than a truism to say that Britain is no longer a member of the EU. Yet it seems fair to say that political debate has not fully caught up with that fact (perhaps because, almost immediately afterwards, all attention shifted to coronavirus). For example, just a few days ago an opinion poll showed that a clear majority – 56% - would vote to remain in the EU if another referendum were held now. That is an important result, in that it suggests that Brexit is not what the majority want, but it is also strictly speaking a meaningless one. There could be no such referendum because there is no such thing as ‘remaining’ any more. Likewise, there is no such thing as ‘leaving’ any more. Both of those policies ceased to be possible at the end of January. The only thing that could meaningfully be asked is whether to ‘stay out’ or ‘re-join’ – a very different question (and one which would not necessarily yield the same result).
By the same token, as per Green’s original argument, the fact of Britain having left the EU means that it is no longer meaningful for the 2016 Referendum to be invoked as an argument for how the ongoing process of ‘doing Brexit’ should be undertaken. I’d actually go further than that, because since that referendum didn’t specify a form of Brexit it never had any relevance to how Brexit was done. But, even without accepting that, there is now certainly no basis on which ‘the 17.4 million’ have any more say in what happens than the rest of the population or on which that number can be invoked in discussions about what happens.
That includes the question of whether to extend the Transition Period. Recently, the pro-Brexit Bruges Group tweeted, correctly, that it now seems clear that there will be no extension but went on to say, incorrectly, that this will be “a victory for Brexit voters”. That cannot be so, since Brexit voters voted for one thing only, and it has now been done. There can be no further victories or further demands based upon that original vote.
17.4 million is no longer a relevant number
This matters, hugely, because it means that the ‘will of the people’ and the sanctification of the 17.4 million which since 2016 have been used as a cudgel not just to stifle but to stigmatize as undemocratic any debate about Brexit has now gone from being entirely bogus to being entirely redundant. There’s no doubt that, for particular example, the vote to trigger Article 50 was only supported in such numbers, or even passed at all, because of the force with which that cudgel was wielded. But it is now possible, and right, and necessary, to debate and question every single way in which Brexit is being enacted without any reference at all to the Referendum result.
This includes, of course, the terms of any deal which may be done with the EU as well as the possibility of no deal being done at all. It also includes challenging decisions such as refusing to participate in the EU scheme to revive tourism in the wake of the coronavirus or in the EU’s fast track vaccine scheme. Or the idea of setting up a supposed global rival to the Erasmus scheme (mirroring the now failed approach to the Galileo project). Or refusing to create any formal institutional framework for foreign policy cooperation. On all of these, and many other, Brexit issues there is, or should be, an entirely new debate framed not in terms of the referendum result but in terms of what, given that Britain has left, its relationship with the EU should be like.
What about the election?
A potential objection to this argument is that the present scenario is different to that envisaged by Green in that, prior to leaving the EU, a General Election was held. Since the Conservatives won, this gives them a mandate, separate to that of the Referendum, as to how to undertake the Brexit process. Their manifesto stated that this would mean leaving the single market and customs union, ending “the role of the European Court of Justice”, and not extending the implementation period (sic) beyond the end of December 2020. Therefore, all of these are settled matters.
Against that there are several counter-arguments. Unlike a referendum on a single question, a General Election victory does not imply voters endorsed every line of the winning party’s manifesto. In a first past the post system it doesn’t mean majority support. And in a democratic system it certainly doesn’t imply that the enactment of their policies can no longer be discussed and debated. This includes recognizing that changing circumstances mean that governments necessarily do things that run counter to party manifestos, which in this case might mean, in particular, that the force majeure of coronavirus entails a revision of the transition extension policy. On the other hand, if the manifesto is taken to be a rigid and immutable set of commitments, then there is no mandate for no deal, because it makes no mention of that possibility and, instead, states unequivocally that “we will negotiate a trade deal next year”.
Beyond all that, as I discussed at the time, the election campaign was remarkable for the lack of discussion of any detail at all of how Brexit would be done, including and especially any discussion of what the future relationship with the EU would be like. Indeed, the whole message from the Conservatives was that Brexit would simply be “done” by the end of January, obscuring the entire issue of the future terms negotiations. Even the manifesto line quoted above about the ECJ carries no precise meaning as regards, for example, participation in various EU projects. So all the myriad of details about things like, for example, Erasmus lie outside of any mandate that may be claimed from the election. And this goes wider than such details in that it is also legitimate to question the entire tenor in which the government is conducting its relations with the EU.
A new set of issues
In short, it is now entirely reasonable for a new debate to be held, and an ongoing one, too, as circumstances change because of coronavirus or because of emerging global issues such as the evolving/ deteriorating UK-China relationship or the outcome of the US Presidential election. It is entirely reasonable to discuss the clear evidence of the rising costs of Brexit to date (all the more so given the costs of coronavirus). It is entirely reasonable for voters and politicians to demand of the government that it approaches the EU in a positive and cooperative manner rather than with the truculence that has prevailed so far. And it is entirely reasonable to expect that approach to be pragmatic rather than dogmatic.
When Green made his argument, I suggested that, whatever its logic, one flaw in it was that it was highly unlikely that the Brexiters would drop the idea that the Referendum mandated their preferred form(s) of Brexit. And it is, indeed, far too much to expect this ERG-dominated, continuity Vote Leave government to do so, or to heed any of these entirely reasonable requests.
Yet, on the other hand, it could be argued that Boris Johnson has a duty to do so. As Dan Hodges recently pointed out in The Mail, Johnson won the election by pledging to end the culture war of Brexit, not to continue it. The statesmanlike thing to do after all the divisions of the last few years would be to seek to heal rather than inflame them, the more so given that Brexit now only has minority support.
Labour has a key role to play
If – and, really, it’s not in doubt - such hopes are a pipe dream, then it is still the case that the Labour Party (and others of course, but Labour is the official opposition) can and should be vocal in insisting on this new debate about how to create pragmatic and amicable relations with the EU. It is disappointing and, I think, misguided that Keir Starmer has not called for an extension to the Transition Period (though for a counter-argument, see Professor Tim Bale’s article in the New Statesman). It may well come back to haunt Labour to have been – through silence – complicit in non-extension.
But whether or not that proves true, it will be an even more serious error if he does not start to articulate a new approach to the EU. It is not enough just to ‘hold the government to account’. It’s also necessary, as Andrew Rawnsley argued in last Sunday’s Observer, to show what Labour would do differently. Of course there are many aspects to that, but one would be to show how it champions a better and – Starmer’s calling card – ‘more adult’ approach to the EU. It would be entirely consistent with the growing critique of the government for lacking basic competence (£). Yes, Brexit is happening, but it doesn’t have to be done in this scorched earth fashion which is so reckless of British national interests and international reputation, and which threatens to rip up the cultural fabric and the union itself.
The key to that is, precisely, the recognition that the Referendum mandate has now been discharged. Johnson would no doubt respond to Labour by trying to reprise the ‘will of the people’ line, but it will have less and less traction. And, just from a tactical point of view, those amongst whom it will have traction are voters who are almost certainly already a lost cause for Labour. Whereas, by contrast, there is a large and probably growing constituency of voters, which transcends the leaver-remain distinction, who are appalled at the prospect of no deal and, probably, are out of sympathy with the relentless pathological hatred of all things European that the ERG exhibit.
It is now open to Starmer to find a new kind of ‘centre ground’ encompassing erstwhile leavers and remainers who would welcome a fresh approach, and more specifically a competent approach. At the very least, given that the most important foreign policy question of the moment is relations with the EU it simply can’t be treated as a taboo subject by Labour. With the Referendum mandate now discharged, Brexit should be treated as a political issue just like any other rather than as a culture war shibboleth.
A new approach is needed with or without a deal
This will be true even if, as some well-informed reports this week suggest to be the case (£), a trade deal with the EU is becoming slightly more likely (though, on my reading of Michel Barnier’s comments this week and given those of David Sassoli and David Frost this seems optimistic). On the one hand, it would require intense scrutiny for the damage it is likely to do to manufacturing industry and perhaps particularly to services trade and the wider implications of that for investment generally. On the other hand, any such deal is unlikely to resolve all the many non-trade issues, and even on trade there are likely to be many future, or ongoing, matters to settle. Also in doubt is the extent to which new customs facilities and regulatory systems (for example for chemicals) will be up and running in time.
For what seems to be in prospect if there’s a deal is, all but inevitably given the time frames, precisely the kind of rushed, can-kicking bodge that happened in January, with numerous, complex, loose ends left to be resolved or disputed later. Moreover, the measures currently being touted as the basis for a deal, whereby a zero tariff regime is adjusted (only) if and when the UK diverges from level playing field provisions, are predicated on a constructive and trusting partnership (£).
So even with such a deal, and certainly in the absence of one, there will be many more years in which the relationship will be under negotiation and, in any case, that relationship will itself evolve, if only through the ongoing operation of the Joint Committee overseeing the Withdrawal Agreement. Even though it has been restricted by what has happened over the last four years, there is still a spectrum of possibilities of what that relationship might evolve into over the coming years, ranging from the minimalist, hostile one to which the ERG is dragging us through to an extensive, cooperative one perhaps along the lines of an Association Agreement.
And to re-emphasize, the issue is as much about the tone as the institutional form of the relationship. With the referendum mandate done and dusted why should we accept that future relations with the EU be conducted in the unremittingly negative, suspicious, accusatory manner of the Vote Leave campaign? They won the right to leave, not to permanently poison and pollute UK-EU relations.
Reframing the debate
To put all this a different way, under the influence of Tory Eurosceptics, UKIP, and their media supporters the entire debate about Britain’s relationship with the EU has for at least 30 years been dominated by a single question: stay or leave? That is a testament to the indefatigability of the Brexiters but also, it should be admitted, due to the supine attitude of pro-EU politicians. They rarely, if ever, made a positive case for membership and when they did it was almost invariably in entirely transactional terms. But all that is past history now and, in particular, that single question has been asked and answered. It can no longer serve as the frame through which UK-EU relations are viewed and it mustn’t be allowed to.
The challenge of ensuring that doesn’t just lie with politicians. It also lies with journalists, academics, business and civic society leaders and perhaps especially grass roots organizations and activists. Those who used to be remainers, when remaining was a possibility, mobilized to a remarkable extent after the Referendum was lost and very nearly pulled off a reversal of the result. In the aftermath of that first, emotionally crushing, loss four years ago (my feelings at the time were recorded on a different blog site, if of interest) and the perhaps even more exhausting tension of last year’s long drawn out battles and hopes it’s not surprising that they are drained and demoralized.
Some continue to revisit the rights and wrongs of the 2016 vote and to re-litigate the Referendum. Others have retreated from the fray, seeing any chance to salvage anything as having gone. Still others have flipped to campaigning to re-join the EU. These three responses are all understandable but they are also all unrealistic. The first is hopeless – and actually panders to Brexiters’ attempts to keep the focus on the Referendum result. The second has too little hope. The third has too much. Rejoining the EU may happen, but if so it is years, very likely decades, away.
But there are still things to argue for, and to do so is both worthwhile in itself and necessary if the ground is to be laid for rejoining in the future or even simply creating an amicable partnership. That has at least three aspects. The first lies at the political level of attempting to influence the evolving shape and tenor of UK-EU relations, as discussed above. The second is to nurture all those remaining ties – be they cultural, academic, familial, or whatever – which will persist despite the wreckage of Brexit. It’s still possible to remind our counterparts in the EU that, despite the noisy voices of the Brexiters, plenty of British people never wanted this and are still their friends and allies. And, third, it means re-engaging in the domestic debate in this new post-referendum mandate world.
In that regard, whereas Johnson’s huge election victory in December seemed like a terminal moment – and was, as regards any hope of stopping Brexit – only a few months later things look different. To a remarkable extent for a new government with a large majority it already feels tired and crisis-ridden. That’s largely because of coronavirus, of course, but also because the virus has only speeded up and made more visible its underlying weakness and ineptitude (as per my last post). The Cummings affair wrecked its dominance of the polls. It almost weekly gets into unnecessary tangles that lead to U-turns and, despite its majority, routinely faces backbench rebellions on everything from Huawei to food standards to Sunday trading. Having reshuffled his cabinet in February, only three months after winning, and losing his Chancellor in the process, it’s reported that Johnson is going to do so again in September.
The point isn’t that government is about to fall. It’s that it isn’t the hegemon it seemed to be in December. It doesn’t control the terms of debate, including debate about Europe. A different debate is now, for the first time since 2016, at least possible. And, since January, the lashing, quasi-fascist whip of the ‘will of the people’ has lost all of its force as their will has now been done. The question is no longer ‘leave’ or ‘remain’ and indeed in that sense is no longer even about Brexit, but about Britain’s relationship with Europe. Which actually makes a different debate not just possible but, sooner or later, inevitable.
Friday, 13 July 2018
This White Paper should be put out of its misery
The
new Brexit
White Paper has now been published, filling out the three page summary of
the Chequers proposal and, in doing so, has both confirmed and amplified the
obvious flaws of that proposal, discussed
in a previous post.
As commentators including Chris Giles, Economics Editor of the Financial Times and Piet Eeckhout, Professor of EU Law at University College London quickly pointed out, the White Paper is cakeism or cherry-picking writ large. Or, as Ian Dunt more colourfully put it in a detailed and damning assessment, “they have a cake, they have eaten it, some of it is still magically on the plate, and the rest is being vomited up on the floor”. I don’t think he meant it in a good way, either.
The central problems, as pre-figured by Chequers, are the idea of separating the single market in goods from that in services, an ambiguous role for the ECJ, a customs arrangement that is pure hokum, and the rejection of freedom of movement of people. But beneath that there are a myriad of ways, relating to trade and non-trade matters, where the proposal is to continue to participate in EU institutions – for example those relating to aviation safety, medicines and policing – as if Britain were still a member state.
There is even a proposal that – as pointed out by Ed Conway, Economics Editor of Sky News - the EU would re-write its existing and future trade agreements with other countries so as to count UK components as if they were of EU origin. Not so much ‘I’ll have my cake and eat it’ as ‘I’ll have my cake, eat it, and eat yours as well’.
The government is clearly aware that what is being proposed is completely at odds with what being a third country to the EU means, and say as much (p.7). Specifically, the idea is that the agreement “should reflect the UK’s and the EU’s deep history, close ties, and unique starting point”. This I think lies at the absolute heart of the problems of the White Paper and, indeed, the government’s entire approach to Brexit since the Referendum. It is based on the notion that there is a kind of alumnus status which is different both to membership and to non-membership.
It is a fantasy. No such status exists, and the EU have been clear both before and since the vote that it can’t exist. Either Britain wants to leave, or it doesn’t: it can’t both leave and not leave in what some have called ‘Schrodinger’s Brexit’. At the very best, the White Paper is the basis – far too late in the day – to begin a negotiation. Yet some are suggesting that, far from being negotiable, it should all be accepted by the EU because it is as far as the government can go given the domestic political constraints imposed by the Ultras.
But that is to view matters entirely through the prism of Tory party infighting. That’s unrealistic. Although as a continuing member Britain was able to extract numerous special concessions in part because other countries recognized those domestic issues, it has far less traction coming from a departing member. For the EU-27, Britain’s political problems are its own and are recognized only to the extent that the EU will (and are) making polite noises about the proposal rather than rejecting it immediately. But reject it they surely will. And if the response to that is to say that ‘no deal’ would be bad for everyone, consider that it is Britain, not the EU-27, which is drawing up plans to stockpile food, medical supplies and portable generators.
As for that Tory infighting, it is becoming more intense. The Brexit Ultras are back in their comfort zone of protest and victimhood – there is a real spring in their step now that they can drop any pretence of having to take any responsibility for this mess. A few weeks ago they were decrying the Tory ‘rebels’ for having the temerity to seek amendments that would ‘bind the Prime Minister’s hands in the negotiations’. To do so, they fulminated, was to sabotage the will of the people. Now, suddenly, tabling amendments to Brexit legislation is back in fashion with them.
In this context, Labour’s stance becomes more important – and the extent to which Labour MPs back it. For the time being, the official position remains as absurd as the government’s, albeit in a different way. No single market, but something ‘as good as it’, and a customs union. But, listening to Emily Thornberry at this week’s PMQs, it does not seem that Labour even understand the difference between a single market and a customs union anyway. And whilst they are, rightly, talking about the damaging effect of the government’s (lack of a) plan for services they are committed to leaving the single market for goods as well as services. So in some respects, the Labour position on Brexit is now slightly ‘harder’ than the government’s. But it hardly matters, as neither is remotely realistic. What does matter is that the parliamentary arithmetic is now so peculiar that it’s possible that no one Brexit policy would command a majority. That makes a General Election or another Referendum more likely.
As all this grinds on, it’s impossible not to be struck by the sheer pointlessness of it all. What is being gained? An independent trade policy? That is effectively precluded by the White Paper but even if it were not it is no prize at all in economic terms. If it is supposed to be a symbol of sovereignty, it’s illusory (all trade agreements entail diminished sovereignty in the Brexiter sense). Is it sovereignty to exit all the EU agencies just to rejoin them and pay with no say? Was it the will of the people, when these agencies were scarcely mentioned in the Referendum? As for freedom from the ECJ, virtually everyone I talked to before the vote who was concerned with this issue confused the ECJ with the ECHR.
Of course, in the new political correctness of Brexit we are not allowed to suggest that the people did not know what they were voting for, for fear of being labelled elitist by some billionaire, ex-public schoolboy, or tax exile (or all three). But it’s plainly true that they did not, and for that matter that they could not. That is easily demonstrated by the fact that it is only now, over two years after the result, that the government has produced any detailed plan for what leaving means.
It’s no good Brexiters saying that people voted for a different plan: there was no plan at all on offer at the time. And it’s no good them saying that all would be well if their hard Brexit plan had been followed. This is exactly what May’s government has tried to do and, finding it unworkable in practice, it has morphed into the hopeless effort that was produced yesterday. Hopeless because it certainly won’t be accepted by the EU, is already not accepted by the Brexiters, and probably won’t be accepted by Parliament. If it were a horse, then it would be put out of its misery as an act of kindness.
But, then, the same could be said of Brexit itself.
As commentators including Chris Giles, Economics Editor of the Financial Times and Piet Eeckhout, Professor of EU Law at University College London quickly pointed out, the White Paper is cakeism or cherry-picking writ large. Or, as Ian Dunt more colourfully put it in a detailed and damning assessment, “they have a cake, they have eaten it, some of it is still magically on the plate, and the rest is being vomited up on the floor”. I don’t think he meant it in a good way, either.
The central problems, as pre-figured by Chequers, are the idea of separating the single market in goods from that in services, an ambiguous role for the ECJ, a customs arrangement that is pure hokum, and the rejection of freedom of movement of people. But beneath that there are a myriad of ways, relating to trade and non-trade matters, where the proposal is to continue to participate in EU institutions – for example those relating to aviation safety, medicines and policing – as if Britain were still a member state.
There is even a proposal that – as pointed out by Ed Conway, Economics Editor of Sky News - the EU would re-write its existing and future trade agreements with other countries so as to count UK components as if they were of EU origin. Not so much ‘I’ll have my cake and eat it’ as ‘I’ll have my cake, eat it, and eat yours as well’.
The government is clearly aware that what is being proposed is completely at odds with what being a third country to the EU means, and say as much (p.7). Specifically, the idea is that the agreement “should reflect the UK’s and the EU’s deep history, close ties, and unique starting point”. This I think lies at the absolute heart of the problems of the White Paper and, indeed, the government’s entire approach to Brexit since the Referendum. It is based on the notion that there is a kind of alumnus status which is different both to membership and to non-membership.
It is a fantasy. No such status exists, and the EU have been clear both before and since the vote that it can’t exist. Either Britain wants to leave, or it doesn’t: it can’t both leave and not leave in what some have called ‘Schrodinger’s Brexit’. At the very best, the White Paper is the basis – far too late in the day – to begin a negotiation. Yet some are suggesting that, far from being negotiable, it should all be accepted by the EU because it is as far as the government can go given the domestic political constraints imposed by the Ultras.
But that is to view matters entirely through the prism of Tory party infighting. That’s unrealistic. Although as a continuing member Britain was able to extract numerous special concessions in part because other countries recognized those domestic issues, it has far less traction coming from a departing member. For the EU-27, Britain’s political problems are its own and are recognized only to the extent that the EU will (and are) making polite noises about the proposal rather than rejecting it immediately. But reject it they surely will. And if the response to that is to say that ‘no deal’ would be bad for everyone, consider that it is Britain, not the EU-27, which is drawing up plans to stockpile food, medical supplies and portable generators.
As for that Tory infighting, it is becoming more intense. The Brexit Ultras are back in their comfort zone of protest and victimhood – there is a real spring in their step now that they can drop any pretence of having to take any responsibility for this mess. A few weeks ago they were decrying the Tory ‘rebels’ for having the temerity to seek amendments that would ‘bind the Prime Minister’s hands in the negotiations’. To do so, they fulminated, was to sabotage the will of the people. Now, suddenly, tabling amendments to Brexit legislation is back in fashion with them.
In this context, Labour’s stance becomes more important – and the extent to which Labour MPs back it. For the time being, the official position remains as absurd as the government’s, albeit in a different way. No single market, but something ‘as good as it’, and a customs union. But, listening to Emily Thornberry at this week’s PMQs, it does not seem that Labour even understand the difference between a single market and a customs union anyway. And whilst they are, rightly, talking about the damaging effect of the government’s (lack of a) plan for services they are committed to leaving the single market for goods as well as services. So in some respects, the Labour position on Brexit is now slightly ‘harder’ than the government’s. But it hardly matters, as neither is remotely realistic. What does matter is that the parliamentary arithmetic is now so peculiar that it’s possible that no one Brexit policy would command a majority. That makes a General Election or another Referendum more likely.
As all this grinds on, it’s impossible not to be struck by the sheer pointlessness of it all. What is being gained? An independent trade policy? That is effectively precluded by the White Paper but even if it were not it is no prize at all in economic terms. If it is supposed to be a symbol of sovereignty, it’s illusory (all trade agreements entail diminished sovereignty in the Brexiter sense). Is it sovereignty to exit all the EU agencies just to rejoin them and pay with no say? Was it the will of the people, when these agencies were scarcely mentioned in the Referendum? As for freedom from the ECJ, virtually everyone I talked to before the vote who was concerned with this issue confused the ECJ with the ECHR.
Of course, in the new political correctness of Brexit we are not allowed to suggest that the people did not know what they were voting for, for fear of being labelled elitist by some billionaire, ex-public schoolboy, or tax exile (or all three). But it’s plainly true that they did not, and for that matter that they could not. That is easily demonstrated by the fact that it is only now, over two years after the result, that the government has produced any detailed plan for what leaving means.
It’s no good Brexiters saying that people voted for a different plan: there was no plan at all on offer at the time. And it’s no good them saying that all would be well if their hard Brexit plan had been followed. This is exactly what May’s government has tried to do and, finding it unworkable in practice, it has morphed into the hopeless effort that was produced yesterday. Hopeless because it certainly won’t be accepted by the EU, is already not accepted by the Brexiters, and probably won’t be accepted by Parliament. If it were a horse, then it would be put out of its misery as an act of kindness.
But, then, the same could be said of Brexit itself.
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