The Brexit Pantomime!

by Louise Mclean

From 1st January to 31st December we have been going through a transition phase of leaving the European Union, continuing to abide by all their rules and regulations until that final date, when we are supposed to have agreed a trade deal. Since at least March 2020, the UK Brexit negotiators have been talking to the EU, looking for an agreement.  Here we are, nine months' later and that trade deal has not yet been signed.

For the last few months and at least since the end of June 2020, when the deal was supposed to be agreed, four main sticking points have remained.  These are the 'level playing field' (to continue being bound by EU law), sharing our fishing waters with other European countries, disputes being adjudicated by the European Court of Justice and the issue of State Aid, which may give our country the competitive edge over European states.

Michel Barnier, the chief EU negotiator, has been over to London numerous times and probably thousands of hours of discussions have taken place.  Lord David Frost, Britain's Brexit negotiator has been over to Brussels and now Boris Johnson, our Prime Minister seems to have taken over.

'Oh no you won't!'  'Oh yes we will!'  On and on it goes.  The British Press has been telling us repeatedly for at least two months that the outcome will be a No Deal Brexit.  Then we hear Boris is absolutely dead set on having a deal.  After that we are told that Boris will cave in to the EU's demands and we will have Brexit in Name Only (BRINO).  Then again we hear that Boris will leave with no deal.  

Recently we read that there may even be an extension past 31st December for the transition period. Every day there is chopping and changing and it is enough to drive the public mad with frustration.  After all, we have been waiting for four and a half years already!

Boris Johnson was elected on 12th December 2019 with his promise to 'Get Brexit Done'.  Here we are over a year later, and there is no sign whatsoever that this has been finalised.  Brexiteers are urging Boris to walk away with No Deal.  If he did this, the EU would come running and everything could be sorted out afterwards.  

The sheer number of deadlines that Boris Johnson proclaimed, which have come and gone, is truly astonishing!  The 30th June was the first important one, Then came 31st July, 15th September, 15th October, 15th November and 30th November!  Now we hear that a deal will be secured in 10 days and Parliament may have to sit on Christmas Eve!  

If we had a decisive leader like Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister, we would have been out a long time ago.

Unfortunately by constantly changing his mind and by running over to Brussels recently just when he was looking strong, Boris makes it patently clear that he wants a deal, which then makes it easier for the EU to eventually make him back down on his 'red lines', which are the above four areas of contention.

Today Monsieur Barnier has said there are now only two main issues to be agreed and that is sharing our territorial fishing waters and basically stopping us becoming more competitive than EU markets. Does that mean the other two areas have already been agreed?  We do not know.

Recently member states have started to intervene in the negotiations making their own demands and the situation seems extremely difficult, if not impossible.  The fact is that the issue at stake is that Britain is supposed to become a sovereign country making her own laws, which is what we voted for on 23rd June 2016, so the whole thing has become absurd, in that it doesn't matter what EU states want, when we are trying to break free of their control.

We were told repeatedly in the past that our two hundred mile fishing waters were not important and yet right now this has become one of the main sticking points, as countries such as France and Holland take our fish on a regular basis. Today we learn that Monsieur Barnier has threatened us with economic trade sanctions if we lock out European fishermen from our waters!  Only yesterday we were reading that Boris Johnson planned to bring in the Royal Navy to stop foreign fishermen!

It does not seem possible that a trade deal will be agreed in seventeen days by 31st December, since our Parliament must approve it, the EU 27 member states must also rubber stamp it and it must be debated in the European Parliament.  A further extension is therefore likely, something that will infuriate all Brexiteers, as there has been plenty of time this year to come to an agreement.

The whole thing is becoming ridiculous.  The EU is waiting for us to back down and we are waiting for them to do likewise.  Boris Johnson does not seem to realise that the EU is intransigent and will never back down, unless......we left with No Deal.  Only then would they perhaps compromise.  In the meantime, Brexiteers are getting thoroughly fed up with this never ending pantomime!

EU's Impossible Demands

by Louise Mclean

On 25th February the EU agreed its 46 page mandate with member states for negotiating a trade deal with Britain, with talks starting in Brussels on 2nd March.

One has to wonder where Michel Barnier has been these past six months, as it seems he has failed to notice the massive tug of war between the People and Parliament to get the Brexit we voted for in June 2016. As has been pointed out, we have left the EU and should now be treated as a third country, not as a member state.

His mandate has the effrontery to ask for all the things that we had rejected, almost as though Barnier was deaf or deficient in understanding, despite Boris Johnson and his chief negotiator, David Frost, making it clear that Britain wants to 'take back control'.

In exchange for a trade deal with the EU, demands are being made to continue following EU laws and directives, for European fisherman to have the same access to our fishing waters as before and for the European Court of Justice to oversee any legal disputes.

Brussels has recently stated that although it has agreed a Canada-style trade deal, we must align closely to EU rules because we are geographically closer than Canada.  For this you can read that Brussels is terrified of Britain becoming a serious competitor on their doorstep, which is precisely what will happen once we have totally broken free.

The mandate states that we can only have zero tariff trade with the EU, if there is regulatory alignment or a 'level playing field' and maintain current standards on climate change, tax and state aid.  Remaining aligned to EU rules would be as though we had not left the European Union and we would certainly not be taking back control of our laws! 

A new demand at the behest of France, says we must have the same standards for food production, as their fear is our foods might become competitively cheaper. This may prevent us from importing foods from America, which has different safety and processing standards from Europe. Unfortunately this could be problematic, as currently, according to the Daily Telegraph, 80% of our food exports go to European markets.

The EU is also concerned that Britain may not implement a Customs Border for Northern Ireland, which had been agreed in the Withdrawal Agreement.

It looks as though swords will be crossed in the forthcoming negotiations being held in Brussels and London alternately.  These issues must be overwhelming resolved before 1st July 2020, when a decision must be made about the possibility of extending the transition date at the end of the year, when we are fully out.  Let us hope that yet another extension does not happen and if the EU continues its dogmatic stance, we will just have to trade on WTO terms.

Boris Johnson is to present his own mandate to the EU tomorrow and let us hope he does not back down and agree any of these impossible demands.