The EU and the UK government have just agreed to muddle on in their negotiations. Nothing is truly decided until everything is decided, but they have adopted a position document (see here) that details what they want the next steps to look like and what they will do in case of disagreement.
There is a lot of fudge in the document so as to hide the true nature of the agreement. For instance, to keep the headline figure of the financial settlement down, the parties have agreed that there is “continued participation of the UK in the program of the current Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) until their closure” which means commitments are dragged across any Brexit date.
The key bit that to me signals the possible end to the whole Brexit project are two crucial passages about Northern Ireland:
49. The United Kingdom remains committed to protecting North-South cooperation and to its guarantee of avoiding a hard border. Any future arrangements must be compatible with these overarching requirements. The United Kingdom’s intention is to achieve these objectives through the overall EU-UK relationship. Should this not be possible, the United Kingdom will propose specific solutions to address the unique circumstances of the island of Ireland. In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.50. In the absence of agreed solutions, as set out in the previous paragraph, the United Kingdom will ensure that no new regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, unless, consistent with the 1998 Agreement, the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly agree that distinct arrangements are appropriate for Northern Ireland. In all circumstances, the United Kingdom will continue to ensure the same unfettered access for Northern Ireland’s businesses to the whole of the United Kingdom internal market.
Now, please do correct me if you think I am misreading this, but this sounds as if the default position in the further negotiations is ‘No Brexit’: if there is no final agreement, then there will be no Brexit for Northern Ireland, and no Brexit between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom either. This default position requires that in the future too, Northern Ireland will remain aligned to the rules in the rest of Ireland, ie the rules of the EU. North-South cooperation is in many spheres, so we’re talking here about immigration, finance, trade, standards, the lot.
There is some fudge in how to interpret these paragraphs. You might think that the ‘unfetterred access for … business’ qualification allows migration barriers but this is both not a workable distinction (if any truck can drive straight through as before, everything in that truck also drives through), nor would it preclude Northern Ireland to become the EU gateway to Britain, ie the place where those wanting to work in the rest of the UK come first. Also, ‘no new regulatory barriers’ is a very broad phrase that seem to rule out identity checks and tariffs.
I basically see the whole document as a total victory for the EU negotiators. They could not have asked for more: the UK accepts the supremacy of the European Court of Justice when it comes to the rights of EU citizens in the UK at the date of Brexit (afterwards new rules have to be mutually agreed); the financial settlement seems completely written by Brussels with minimal fig-leaves for the UK; and the Northern-Ireland paragraph contains the seeds of the end of Brexit.
Phase two in the Brexit negotiations is going to be easy for the EU now that the default is an absence of Brexit. The UK will have to come up with a proposal that is acceptable to all EU members and that keeps the Northern Ireland partners happy too. “Good luck with that”, one then thinks! The odds of ‘No Brexit after all’ have risen. Those who want a hard Brexit have a new barrier in front of them.
The old EU two step. We won’t negotiate the whole package until you’ve agreed to what we want in the “first stage” of the negotiations.
yep, its worked like a charm. And, in this case, it probably represents what the UK now wants.
Many thanks to the DUP for keeping UK in the Single Market!
well done Paul you get the Sinclair Davidson award on writing on a topic which is shown to be completely wrong within hours.
to be fair it can happen to any of us.
care to elucidate? The European newspapers I just saw call it just as I do. As one Eu civil servant reported ‘we’re 10-0 ahead at half-time’. Quite.
I’d guess that, how the obvious issues re free movement of people from Ireland (theEU) to Northern Ireland ( the UK ) are handled, might be the litmus test on this?
There is an agreement Paul.
Lokk on-line ot on TV whatever. It is on the Teeve as I write.
As I said unlucky.
eh yes, the ‘agreement’ is what the post is about….
You are sounding like Sinkers but I will be generous. Perhaps it could be argued you are sounding like Simon Wren-Lewis in his last article on this topic.
Paul isn’t sounding like Sinkers and doesn’t sound like Sinkers.
Paul another take on this ,from the Times, is that the UK itself is not really a ‘single market ‘ these days :
It ”is hard to see a way around this quandary. If the UK is to leave the single market or customs union, more checks will be necessary on both sides. However, to fixate on the border is to miss the more intriguing trend here. Northern Ireland is not the only part of the UK becoming less like the rest of the country. Having spent much of post-war history centralising power, eliminating local taxes and nationalising local welfare systems into the national welfare state, the UK has spent most of the past couple of decades devolving power back to the regions
The NHS has been split back into four. The education system in Scotland continues to diverge. Prescription charges have been abolished everywhere but England. Right to buy has been shelved in Scotland, even as it is extended in England. The point is that the UK single market is far from monolithic. Indeed, since devolution, it has frayed more than ever before…”
Penny for your thoughts.
yes, devolution has occurred in the UK, but its still more centralised than Germany or Spain, so one should not exaggerate and it is somewhat irrelevant to the Brexit issue. In some policy areas there seems to be more centralisation. One can see it as a search for what is best done centrally versus what is best done locally.
“I basically see the whole document as a total victory for the EU negotiators. They could not have asked for more: the UK accepts the supremacy of the European Court of Justice when it comes to the rights of EU citizens in the UK at the date of Brexit (afterwards new rules have to be mutually agreed); the financial settlement seems completely written by Brussels with minimal fig-leaves for the UK; and the Northern-Ireland paragraph contains the seeds of the end of Brexit.
Phase two in the Brexit negotiations is going to be easy for the EU now that the default is an absence of Brexit. The UK will have to come up with a proposal that is acceptable to all EU members and that keeps the Northern Ireland partners happy too. “Good luck with that”, one then thinks! The odds of ‘No Brexit after all’ have risen. Those who want a hard Brexit have a new barrier in front of them.”
2-and-a-half months later and the UK political class seems to have woken up to this reality and is complaining about it now that the EU negotiators have put this deal in legal terms. The complaints are hilarious, because in the end they have already agreed to this. ‘No Brexit after all’ is looking ever more likely.
The problem will be that it is politically expedient for the UK politicians to step back from Brexit only at the very last moment, when it gets maximum internal leverage for pulling back. That uncertainty is not in the UK’s economic interest though. I wonder if London and UK business is organised enough to push the government harder so that it moves quicker. My guess would be not.