The forgotten arguments since Boris's hollow Brexit bus.

To make a decision on Brexit MPs have the unenviable task of weighing two incompatible realities:

• Leaving the EU gives back to the UK electorate the right to hire and fire those that govern them.

• Leaving the EU will cause years and years of economic disruption on a scale that we have not seen since the 1920s.

Below: Tony Benn puts the democratic case for leaving the EU

More on the EU:

• Brexit could take 10 years and might not happen at all
• Will the UK ever leave the EU? 
• The European Union IN or OUT

Is Labour's call for a full-blown Customs Union the UK's last chance to avoid a No Deal Brexit?

Business leaders must have been squirming on the golf course yesteday as the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn gave Theresa May's government a lesson in what's best for the UK economy.

So why isn't the Conservative Party trying harder to help business?  After all, it's they that claim to care about business and finance and by failing to embrace a nationwide Customs Union, rule out a No Deal Brexit, or at the very least, consider a second referendum on the final deal. The Conservatives are, as it were, biting the hand that feeds them.

The answer, however,  is not as simple as it might seem. The problem the government faces, is that, because it has no overall majority in Parliament, its ability to compromise on any EU deal is difficult, not only by the need to maintain the support of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), but also a much larger group of hard-line Conservative Brexiteers who favour a clean break from the EU, or No Deal.

The DUP's position is confusing, but, in a nutshell, the DUP is adamant that they will not accept a deal that treats Northern Ireland differently to other UK countries. It follows that, without a UK-wide Customs Union, or a No Deal Brexit, the DUP, along with 100s of others in Parliament, find it impossible to vote for May's deal, a deal which centres on the so called Irish Backstop.  For those who find the notion of a Backstop difficult, all it really is is a political mechanism designed to make special arrangements through a natonwide Customs Union that keep the EU border between Northern Ireland open to trade and people.  If the Backstop were permanant the DUP would, because it's nationwide, accept this, however, to Conservative Brexiteers, an Irish Backstop that leaves the EU in control of when the border between the EU and the UK can be lifted, is unacceptable and feels to them like being half-in Europe.  

 

Given the history of Northern Ireland and an appreciation of the DUP's stated position to preserve the Union and remain inextricably linked to the UK, the DUP's attitude to the Irish Backstop shouldn't have been a massive surprise to the May Government.  Preserving the integrity of the United Kingdom is a purpose the DUP share with the Conservative Party, which, alongside supporting the owners of property, wealth and the monarchy, have developed to protect the Union of countries which now make up the UK. This, of course, is why the DUP has the word Unionist in it's name, why the Tories have the official label of The Conservative and Unionist Party and why the DUP insists on being welded to the UK

So, despite the perception of the Conservative Party as the natural party of business, the Theresa May government appears to be marching the UK towards an economically suicidal No Deal Brexit and, in the process, risk damaging the business community they exist to protect.

It follows that remaining half-in the EU via a Customs Union, whether that be a Custom's Union negotiated separately with the EU, or one part of a permanent Irish Backstop, is, by far, the best comprise for UK business.  Some will say that, if we have access to the Single Market through a Custom's Union, then we may as well, in economic terms at least, have voted Remain? I understand that, and have written about it on this blog, but the point I'm trying to make here is that, if the Conservative Party remains the champion of business and truly believes in the integrity of the United Kingdom, then they must now work with Labour and the majority in Parliament, to jettison a No Deal and put in place Customs Union so that the UK can, at last, wriggle free of this appalling political impasse.

Brexit could take 10 years and might not happen at all. (Written the day after the 2016 IN-OUT EU referendum 

OUT means OUT

I argued to stay in the EU because I thought that leaving would damage workers rights and reasoned that trying to wriggle free of over 40 years enmeshed in European Union law would be a fiasco. 

The UK people have decided, albeit by a slender margin, that they want their Parliament and the British Courts to make the laws that govern them and a popular majority now expect the Government to face up to the fact that those who voted to leave the European Union didn't do so expecting the Conservative Party to contrive to remain part of the E.U. through membership of the Single Market. OUT, I think, should mean OUT.

The reality the country now faces is that being part of an Economic Customs Union, or Single Market effectively means (as near as makes no difference) the UK remaining within the E.U. This is incompatible with the wishes of those who wanted the UK to leave the E.U and believe that it is the British Parliament and not unelected EU bureaucrats that should EU making the laws that governs them.

Written the day after the Referendum: Brexit could take 10 years and might not happen at all

Will Britain genuinely EXIT the EU?

Nobel Prize winner Richard Thaler says that voting for Brexit was more about how people feel than thinking hard and long about the economic consequences of leaving the European Union (EU).

“Most voters aren’t really thinking about it in a very analytical way… the people behind the leave campaign are voting with their guts. There’s no spreadsheet. This is much like a divorce without a pre-nup. You’re voting to leave, and we’ll take care of all the financial details later,” Richard Thaler: Read the full interview MarketWatch.com 

After fifteen months fruitlessly arguing about how much UK citizens will have to pay to leave the EU, the Government risks appearing indecisive and weak.  This itself makes it increasingly unlikely that Theresa May will be able to deliver the Single Market solution business leaders say they need. 

The problem Theresa May faces, day-in-day-out, is that remaining part of the Single Market is incompatible with the reasons why Brexiteers, both within and outside the Conservative Party, voted to leave the EU.  Bexiteers consistently argue, that to be an independent soveriegn nation, the UK must have control of its borders, with the laws that govern them made in Britain and not Brussels.  Alongside this, if the UK wants to remain part of the EU Single Market, there's the additional headache of which law applies to business activity: trade agreements, contract law, health and safety and so on.  Ultimately, if we agree to be part of the EU Single Market it's hard to imagine Brussels doing a deal with the UK Government without British business having to obey the European Court of Justice (EUJ). Add to that the embarrassing fact that no one yet seems to know how much the British people will have to pay to get out of the EU, and it's easy to sympathise with Theresa May's who's life must be unbearable.  

The reality the UK government faces is that being part of EU Single Market means (as near as makes no difference) remaining in the EU. 

 
Brexit is a living nightmare, it was always going to be and looking into the haggard faces of ministers commuting to-and-fro the EU, it looks as if they've had enough too. I just can't see the UK being able to agree to the EU Divorce Settlement as proposed (£60bn) and, even if that is ever agreed the Government will have to sit down with EU officials yet again to try and work out the size of fee the UK will have to pay (just as Norway had to) to retain access to tariff-free EU markets.

While politicians will keep talking behind the scenes, all this time-wasting is becoming all too much for the government who, I believe is planning for a full-blown EU exit.

Since the EU referendum in June 2016, the pound has fallen dramatically, public services are being squeezed and at the same time as the country's national debt is heading for the stratosphere. In normal circumstances interest rates would have the rise to control the supply of money, prop up the pound and help prevent import costs spiralling out of control.  So why is the Bank of England (BOE) ignoring the Government's inflation target of 2%?  

While the BOE has a responsibility to keep prices in check, it appears to be deliberately letting inflation rip.  It's this change of economic policy that I believe demonstrates that the Government's end game is for the UK to leave the EU lock stock and barrel. No Single Market, no European Court of Justice.   

 

It's certainly remains a possibity that if the EU apply enough pressure, Theresa May will renege on the referendum result and remain wedded to the EU via the Single Market.

Some will say this all-out strategy is just a clever negotiating position designed to regain leverage when attempting to do a deal with their fastidious European counterparts.  It's possible, but I doubt that the BOE would be rebalancing the UK economy in the dramatic way it is unless the Government had already decided to grasp the nettle, pull out and let the EU to get on with developing the European Superstate the UK has been resisting for fifty odd years.

So, if I'm right, that the Government is preparing the UK for a manufacturing revival and a much lower pound, it shouldn't be too long before a full Brexit is announced.  Whether that will work in our favour is another point and all that I'm saying is, at this rather pathetic stage in the Government's negotiations, it appears to me that the BOE are moving the UK towards the economic circumstances that Brexit could actually mean Brexit. 

So who are the winners and losers as the Goverment devalues the pound in readiness for life without the EU?  In the long run it will be those working for export businesses and their owners who will benefit most, as will citizens from other coutries who will take advantage of cheaper goods and services courtesy of a more favourable UK exchange rate.  But who will pay?  In the medium term, say in three to five years, it will be the general public that pays the price of Brexit in the form of higher prices in the shops and particularly those that spend  larger proportion of their income on essentials, such as food, oil and white goods imported mainly from Europe, China and the USA.  As ever, it's the working people that pays the biggest price of economic disruption and the in-the-know business folk, because they can move their money more easily than people can shift their labour, who win.

Can we dare be optimistic?  Well, maybe we can, but only in the very long run.  After twenty years of adjustment as the UK unravels fifty years of manufacturing malaise, the economy may re-emerge with a thriving export market. It's possible, therefore, that the next generation could do very well out of Brexit and who knows, the UK might even restore some national pride and export it's own motor cars again?  In the meantime, however, the average man and woman will have to endure rising prices in the shops, caused in part by increased import tarriffs and in part by rising labour costs after free movement of labour ends post Brexit.  

 

So, buckle up people, there's no magic money tree (unless your bankrupt bank) and as always, it's working people that take up the slack as our corporate saviours reorganise themselves to cope with lofe outside a tarrif free EU Single Market.

More on the EU: Brexit could take 10 years and might not happen at all

Nick Clegg questions Government purges

Nick Clegg fears for the UK government is "hand-picking" officials while losing experts. On the other hand it was experts that told us that the Euro would be a success, the banks are solvent and farmers that stuffing cattle full of growth hormones and DDT was safe?


The bottom line is that you can always find a lawyer and an "expert" that will support a point of view. Either there are no answers, or the system is corrupt? Discuss



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