Reports have it that Theresa May has conceded all that Ireland demanded of her this morning. According to the Guardian:
According to sources, MEPs were told by the chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, that Theresa May had conceded after days of intense talks that the province would be treated as a special case with “continued regulatory alignment” between the north and south of the island after Brexit.
A draft of the text of a 15-page joint agreement between the European commission and the British government is said to include a commitment in paragraph 48 that “in the absence of agreed solutions the UK will ensure that there continues to be continued regulatory alignment” with the internal market and customs union.
Please don't get me wrong: I am delighted if that is the case. But let's be under no illusions here. May has conceded to those she has to appease in the next day or two to get trade talks started, but there's no way that this issue is resolved. The issues her concession raises are enormous. These are my tweets in response to the news:
Banter apart, these are the issues:
- Unless this is an agreement for the whole of the UK then we now have internal borders in this country;
- I think the Scots are bound to ask for the same deal now: why wouldn't they?
- And I am sure the City will.
- What is more, I am up for putting money into Jolyon Maugham's Good Law Project to fund a human right's application to say I want the deal Northern Ireland is getting.
And then there is the politics:
- The DUP will go mad when they appreciate that this has to mean internal borders with Northern Ireland if the rest of the UK does not have alignment;
- The Tory right wing will go ballistic because this concedes the end of the Union, in effect;
- And the business lobby will be saying they're either upping sticks for Northern Ireland now, or will be demanding the same deal for the rest of the UK.
All of which suggests, as I said this morning, that May has solved nothing at all. She's just won a tiny bit more time.
But in that case Labour has also to get nearer to the point where it says where it stands. It has to say:
- Does it support this deal?
- If so, where does it think the border is?
- Or will it stick with the customs union and single market?
- And if so will it vote for or against this agreement, and why?
As I previously predicted, Ireland is now where the Union, with with Europe and within the UK, can be saved or broken. Nothing has changed. Thats still true. But the fault lines are now more stark than ever and the battle to come more obvious.
And there is still a solution, of course: we could go the Norwegian route. Candidly almost nothing else works now. But I can't see May delivering it without Labour support, and is that what they want to do? And if so, why?
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Brexit does not mean Brexit? That could work.
I’m possibly missing the point, but there is also a “border” between Holyhead and Dublin. What will happen there? I’ve seen nothing shedding light in that. But maybe it’s not a problem…
Yes. but Stranraer would be the same now as Holyhead and Fishguard – as an EU border
Richard
it has been an interesting morning and the Irish see it as a senior hurling match; so far so good but nothing is ever over till the final whistle.
The latest Survation poll has Labour gaining 55 seats if there were a GE tomorrow. I’m not sure the DUP would pull the plug and even the right wing nutters may try to cling to power. I suspect that it will be portrayed as a victory or a necessary tactical concession.
Obviously no Brexit at all would be the best solution but Norway is probably the second best option
Scotland is demanding a deal already https://www.buzzfeed.com/jamieross/the-snp-is-demanding-the-same-brexit-concessions-as?utm_term=.aeVnMOEeE#.ql91eQgYg
Agree with all that
Crown Dependencies and BOTs – anybody want to outline the probable post BREXIT border arrangements with UK, EU and the rest of the world?
For the,?
Who knows?
All want to stay in
Unsurprisingly
it is the start of the End.
Both Scotland and London would like the same as NI
So where does this leave the UK
Either Brexit stops or we have Freedealing with Europe, region by region.
I foresee a major political scandal within the next 24 hours.
May is finished.
Brexit is certainly going to be holed below the water.
No one with two brain cells wants a hard Brexit, so it’s going to be ditched, pronto,before I deck the halls, even.
My wife’s Irish. I’ll fair miss her…
Would appear that Arlene has stamped her foot on this one, for the moment.
Time to rattle some skeletons perhaps?
We’ve arrived at the much-predicted crunch: a Hard Brexit is an existential threat to the UK, while No Hard Brexit is an existential threat to the Tory Party. Which way will they go: party or state? It’s ludicrous that 60-something million people have no idea what their future will look like because a handful of incompetent, indecisive politicians haven’t managed to arrive a concensus on how to interpret the “will of the people” as expressed on the Referendum’s binary choice which was so simplistic as to be unfit for purpose. Only in the UK!
No, more than in the UK
But still utterly bizarre
And deeply worrying
As I understand it a ‘free’ border with reciprocal regulations in Ireland will, under – never mind EU regulations but also WTO regulations – necessitate the same regulations at Dover/ Calais.
France and Ireland are, unsurprisingly regarded as the same EU border.
So the PM’s proposal is in fact a soft – almost no – Brexit everywhere.
Good point
I hope that this is the straw that may finally break the camel’s back.
Min you – some straw!!
There conundrum continues to be: where is the customs border going to be?
The DUP have used their leverage at a UK level to demand that the border is not between NI and GB. And also to demand that the border is not between NI and RoI.
The only other option is that the hard border is between the Republic of Ireland and the ‘mainland’ EU.
If the DUP get their way, then they would be dictating to RoI what Irish foreign policy would be vis-a-vis membership of the EU.
The Irish, and the EU for that matter, will not stand for that.
An historically decisive moment perhaps? Inadvertantly or otherwise.