Brexit: Never did so few deceive so many
Brexit negotiations are reaching some sort of destination, and it is a farcical one. To be sure, government attempts to sugar-coat bad decisions and agreements have never been a novel practice, but any amount of sweetening of this Brexit agreement won’t make it easier to swallow, and most likely can only result in collective nausea.
Let’s face it: There is no agreement that Prime Minister Theresa May would be able to present to the British Parliament that would have a majority supporting it.
May and her government might entice their Northern Irish DUP friends yet again with millions of pounds of increased budget, or hand a rebel MP a knighthood to gain her or his support, but nothing will change the fundamental reality that realistically there is no Brexit agreement that leaves the UK better off than staying within the EU.
May and her government may get through another vote, even another day, but their survival is looking increasingly unlikely.
Nevertheless, she has left the entire country crippled and struggling to make sense of a deliberately vague agreement in a situation where clarity and direction are essential.
The tragic irony of the entire sorry saga of Brexit is that it was never a national project designed for the sake of a more successful and prosperous UK, but simply a pathetic attempt to rescue the Conservative Party from the jaws of its everlasting, decades-long internal dispute over the issue of British membership of the EU. By all accounts, the Tories are now more divided than ever on this issue and almost at breaking point, with both factions seeking to block the agreement with the EU and replace their leader.
The easy route for a critic of the signed agreement is to argue that, had there been a more competent prime minister than May, and more capable negotiators than those who reached the deal with Brussels, results would have been more favorable to British interests. True as that might be, it avoids the real issue, which is that realistically there is no Brexit deal that leaves the country, its economy and society better off.
It is crystal clear that there is no better alternative for Britain than to remain in the EU, as the entire Brexit debacle has been nothing more than an exercise in delaying tactics and damage limitation. There has not been a single positive outcome for either side in the leave versus remain dispute.
Instead, the painful process of leaving the EU has put the future of the UK under severe strain.
And this is even before the future relations between the UK and EU have been resolved. Despite the progress made in reaching a Brexit agreement, much of it is about delaying reaching an agreement on the most fundamental aspects of the relations between the two.
First, a transition period will be introduced, which will stretch until Dec. 31, 2020. Throughout it, for all intents and purposes, the UK will be required to abide by all EU rules but will lose membership of its institutions, or in other words forfeit any shred of influence on those institutions and decisions that it will have to abide by. Moreover, acknowledging that two years might not be enough time to adjust to the new “splendid isolation” of Britain, the agreement allows for extending the transition period indefinitely.
Admittedly, constructive ambiguity is not necessarily the worst of diplomacy’s traits. However, the withdrawal agreement is accompanied by an even more nebulous “political declaration,” which is another admission of both sides’ inability to resolve their differences in a manner that will gain support either in the British Parliament or among the 27 EU members.
What is on offer right now is neither Brexiting nor remaining, but putting off for a later date most of the most contentious issues. This is a recipe for instability on both sides of the English Channel (or La Manche, for the sake of British-European balance).
The political declaration on the future relationship between the EU and the UK after Brexit is mere waffle. It says nothing. It takes the debate on the relationship right back to where it all started.
The EU insists, rightly so, that future negotiations on the nature of relations between the two must not compromise the four freedoms of goods, services, capital and people, but at the same time both sides concur that nothing will be agreed that threatens the sovereignty of the UK. So it’s back to the future — but with the UK in an even more inferior bargaining position.
How can all this not serve as a wake-up call for Westminster and the rest of Britain to stop the Brexit train by way of a meaningful vote in Parliament, or even a second referendum, and begin the journey back to the heart of the EU, where Europe needs it, and where the UK belongs?