David Davis has written a piece for The Sunday Times (HERE) where he describes the PM's claim that there is no alternative to her Chequers plan as "absolutely dishonest". He then sets out his own plan, which has already been published in sections on the Conservative Home website last week. Anyone who thinks there is dishonesty in knowingly misleading others will think his alternative plan is also "absolutely dishonest". It suggests things which he must know are just not possible - a practice he has been using on Brexit since 2015.
What is revealed by his "alternative" is that Davis, like the PM, also recognises the central, crucial importance of the single market. He goes to great lengths to try and continue with frictionless trade but proposes mutual recognition of standards and a complex system of assessments to judge (a) if any divergences might arise with new laws and then (b) if they are significant or not. But his proposal is almost certainly less acceptable to the EU than the common rule book proposed by Mrs May and that's saying something. He is also calling for a Facilitated Customs Arrangement, the one that nobody has yet invented!
But both May's and Davis' plans put frictionless goods access to the single market front and centre with extremely convoluted ways of replicating the status quo. What does that tell the EU? It surely reveals the desperate need we have to preserve what we can of British industry and the value we put on single market access..
The EU would be foolish not to know the value of the single market. This is what made Brexit such a surprise to our EU partners. But it must now be gratifying to them to see that our politicians, even Brexiteers like Davis finally acknowledging it. And how ironic that it was Davis who said during the referendum campaign that it would be easy to get a deal because German industry would put pressure on Merkel. Instead it is pressure from British industry to keep frictionless trade that seems to be influencing him.
Unfortunately, his whole plan is built on this sand. He doesn't want us to agree "common rules" like Mrs May but it amounts to the same thing in slightly looser form. From the ST article:
"The key difference is over the question of regulation. The original, and still best, proposal is to allow the absolute right to diverge over regulations. Then if parliament chooses to alter these regulations, the difference is assessed to see whether it leads to an important change in outcome or effect.[...]
"In the event that we are found to be getting an unfair advantage, we could either change our decision or face a limited but appropriate restriction on market access. And vice versa for the EU.
All this would operate within a “mutual recognition of standards and inspection” regime to minimise the burden of bureaucracy. The commission does not like this much, but it has negotiated mutual recognition regimes with other countries in the past. And on the basis of my experience, most European countries are comfortable with this."
Even if the EU accepted this idea - and the chances of that happening are well under zero - he also imagines an assessment of each new UK law, presumably conducted along with the EU. This is going to be ridiculously time consuming and is hardly taking back control if we have to get EU agreement and approval that any new regulations will not lead to "an important change or outcome". It will lead to endless arguments about whether it is a change at all and whether it's important or trivial.
Presumably, we would also need to assess each new directive or regulation issued by the EU and confirm if we intend to follow it or not. Who will do this? Parliament, the government? A joint committee?
And the next problem is the lack of a guillotine clause. If we do decide to diverge. the penalty in Davis world, would only be "limited but appropriate". Switzerland have a guillotine clause in their EU agreement whereby if they diverge on one thing all the 80 or do bilateral agreements fall simultaneously. If the EU were to relax things for the UK, Switzerland will want the same. It begs the question what a "limited but appropriate penalty" would be for something that gave us an unfair advantage for ever?
No, it's impractical, unworkable and unacceptable. If nothing else, manufacturers would live under a state of permanent uncertainty, just like May's Chequers plan, that a future parliament might suddenly decide to diverge in an area that impacts their business and destroys the model or slashes profitability.
The fact that cabinet ministers are resigning over this kind of stuff speaks volumes for the intellectual capacity of those who lead us.
