There is a humourous article in the German newspaper Welt (HERE), humourous that is if you're not British. You can see what others think of us after Brexit when looking through their eyes. The writer, Von Eva Lapido, thinks that the truth is we don't actually want to leave the EU at all and as evidence for this she says after the referendum there was almost a stunned silence among the political class. And instead of a debate about what we wanted all we heard was Brexit means Brexit from Mrs May.
She asked where were the earth movers to start building the lorry parks for the inland customs checks and the new border posts around our coastline? Where were the classes for small and medium sized exporters to help them understand how to complete customs formalities for shipments to the EU? There was apparently no planning being done for any of this.
Article 50 was invoked triggering a very short two year time period. What did Mrs May do then? She called an election, losing her majority in the process and wasting nearly two months.
And after fourteen months of silence we begin the negotiations. The PM promptly goes on an extended holiday, returning only to make a comment about the chimes of Big Ben. Position papers are published belatedly showing what we want to achieve from the negotiations, and lo and behold it looks almost exactly like what we have at the moment!
Frictionless trade, invisible borders, continued cooperation in virtually everything. As the writer notes it reads more like an accession request than a proposal to leave, which was exactly my own thoughts (HERE) and she finishes by saying Britain either has to stay in the union or get a government that actually does some work rather than avoid reality.
Joking apart, I wonder if the other side has noted our strategy? Cameron tried negotiating from inside the bloc to get to a certain position giving us better control of immigration and got some concessions but obviously not enough. Now Mrs May and David Davis are trying to get to a point not a million miles from where Cameron wanted to take us but from outside, or at least the threat of being outside the bloc. We want keep all the advantages but without immigration, or paying in to the budget or with ECJ jurisdiction. I think we might have to accept some immigration, some financial contribution and some ECJ jurisdiction. In other words we are just trying to renegotiate Cameron's deal but pushing a bit harder by threatening to leave.
Will it work? Don't hold your breath. We just do not look serious. That's because we aren't.
I am beginning to think she might be right. We will keep pushing a hard Brexit, trying to keep everything we like and getting rid of everything we don't, until it is obvious we will not get it and then revoking Article 50 just before the cliff edge.
