It's been obvious for a long time, since last August at least, when the government began to release position papers, that we are trying to negotiate all the benefits of EU membership without actually being a member, paying in to the budget or accepting ECJ jurisdiction. Nowhere is this clearer than in security matters. But this cake and eat it fantasy is coming to an end. Barnier's speech in Vienna (HERE) the other day was unequivocal about Britain "losing the benefits" of the shared "ecosystem" that the EU has built.
In a speech earlier this month, David Davis urged the EU not to put “the protection of legal precedents” above the capability to catch criminals in its approach to security arrangements post Brexit. “[Terrorists] don’t check the passports of their victims” before they carry out attacks, he said, adding that the U.K. has “decided that Europe’s safety was far too important to be negotiated away.”
The government has even got the head of GCHQ (HERE) to publicly claim that excluding us from security matter will damage the EU as well as the UK. Jeremy Fleming said, "No country can defend itself alone against increasingly complex global threats which require a pooling of resource, expertise and, critically, data so that we can investigate and disrupt our adversaries".
This is after the UK voted to go it alone in a world of "increasingly complex global threats".
This is after the UK voted to go it alone in a world of "increasingly complex global threats".
It is this inability to face up to the "consequences" of Brexit as Barnier puts it that must drive the EU negotiators mad. Leavers knew exactly what they were voting for in June 2016 we are told. This included any number of warnings that Brexit would threaten our security. And yet a majority voted for it, including the twerp Davis himself. Now he says the EU is putting legal precedents above crime fighting. This is after we put fantasy above our own security.
Before the referendum there were plenty of warnings we would be poorer, weaker and less influential. Well we know we are poorer already with growth slowing and dropping us from the top to the bottom of the G7 growth league. After telling us there wouldn't "be any pain" from Brexit (Digby Jones) this £15 billion a year hit is now said to be one of the "bumps in the road". Now it's clear we will be less secure but the blame is put squarely onto the EU! Nothing to do with Brexit then?
We now have no judge on the International Court of Justice for the first time ever (HERE) and we know Trump doesn't get on with Theresa May because she lectures him like a primary school teacher. He clearly prefers Macron and the USA cannot really avoid dealing with Angela Merkel and Germany because it's the largest economy in Europe. The EU are coming to the conclusion that they can't continue to rely on Trump and need to build up their own defence capability which will render us even less influential.
So, Brexit is taking such a long time that almost everything that remainers warned about is coming true - even before we've actually left - and yet we're still going ahead because it's the "will of the people".
