An outlaw government?
A controversial new law that would give ministers the power to override key parts of the divorce deal signed with the EU cleared its first parliamentary hurdle this week, despite a Tory rebellion. MPs backed the Internal Market Bill by 340 votes to 263. The legislation – which Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis conceded last week would breach international law “in a very specific and limited way” – had been attacked by all five living former PMs, along with a number of Tory grandees, including Norman Lamont and Michael Howard.
Boris Johnson defended the bill in the Commons, saying the powers it conferred were a vital insurance policy designed to protect the integrity of the UK in the event of a no-deal
Brexit. He accused the EU of having put a “revolver on the [negotiating] table” by threatening unreasonable customs checks on goods passing between Britain and Northern Ireland. However, the Prime Minister later hinted that he was prepared to compromise with rebels, telling them that he would address their concerns about the disputed clauses before detailed debates on the bill next week.
What the editorials said
It’s “déjà vu all over again”, said The Independent. While the “arithmetic in the Commons” may have changed as a result of Tory purges and last year’s election, we’re back to the days of parliamentary wrangling, votes, splits and threats. Many of the combatants are the same, although some of them – such as Ken Clarke, Ed Vaizey and Philip Hammond – are now fighting from the Lords, rather than the Commons. What we haven’t seen before, said The Observer, is a PM coming under fire from quite such a line-up of former party leaders and previous occupants of No. 10. “It’s an extraordinary indictment of his incompetence.”
The threat to override parts of the Withdrawal Agreement Johnson signed in January is certainly a “high-stakes move”, said The Daily Telegraph. It was designed to “concentrate EU minds on the need to strike an agreement”, but it seems to have had the opposite effect. EU diplomats have threatened to discontinue trade negotiations if the Government doesn’t withdraw the offending clauses of its new bill by the end of the month. Brexit is reaching its endgame, said Le Monde. Whether Johnson’s latest move is indeed a negotiating gambit, or a deliberate attempt to collapse the talks, this row is “trashing the reputation of the United Kingdom”.
What the commentators said
It was Johnson’s desperation for a deal last year that got him into this mess, said John Rentoul in The Independent. He eventually secured an agreement that he could get through Parliament, but the price, which he did his best to obscure, was agreeing to a possible de facto border in the Irish Sea. Once his election victory was in the bag, he tasked his Brexit team with finding a way to “get around” this commitment. But the only solution they’ve managed to come up with is to legislate to renounce it. Ripping up treaties is clearly a terrible idea for any country that respects the rule of law, said Matthew Parris in The Times. Many MPs are now hoping to amend the Internal Market Bill in some way to blunt the force of its contentious provisions, but they should just throw it out on principle. It’s “an abomination”.
If any party has acted in bad faith during this process, it’s the EU, said Daniel Hannan in The Sunday Telegraph. The Withdrawal Agreement was signed on the understanding that both sides would push towards signing and implementing a trade deal this year – a deal that would obviate the need for a backstop and for all but light-touch controls between Britain and Northern Ireland. But Brussels has since done its best to frustrate the talks, using “Northern Ireland as leverage in its demands for control of British fisheries and technical standards”. The chief EU negotiator Michel Barnier once insisted that the only option available for the UK was a Canada-style trade agreement, but the moment Johnson accepted that offer, “it was snatched away”. The UK should abandon these negotiations and go its own way.
I don’t know which is more irksome, said Anne McElvoy the London Evening Standard: the “smug myopia of EU institutions” or our Government’s “implausible promises and heedless risk-taking”. With a bit of goodwill and sensible compromise, there’s surely no reason why the two sides couldn’t reach an agreement by the end of next month. It’s certainly very much in the UK’s interests to avoid a no-deal Brexit, and even more so to avoid an ugly breakdown of relations with our neighbours. “We can change our trade orientation, but not our geography.”
What next?
MPs are set to vote next week on an amendment put forward by Bob Neill, the chair of the Justice Select Committee, that would force the Government to seek MPs’ approval before triggering the bill’s controversial clauses. The bill could then face a bigger revolt in the House of Lords, potentially holding it up for months.
Ministers have denied that a new freight management system won’t be ready when the EU transition period ends. One industry body had expressed concerns that only a beta – or test – version would be available on 1 January. But the Government insists the digital system, regarded as vital for preventing delays at ports, is fully operational.