The House of Commons Library released a report yesterday on Brexit unknowns (HERE). If you were starting to get concerned about how little has been achieved so far after two tortuous years, now is the time to seriously panic. I am pretty sure the mainstream media will not pick this up at all but the 62 page report should set alarm bells ringing throughout Westminster among MPs from both sides of the argument. With 184 days to go to Brexit there is a worryingly long list of things we still don't know.
The Library by the way provides impartial information and research services for Members of Parliament and their staff in support of their parliamentary duties. Briefing paper No 8408 is a harbinger of the difficulties in the way of Brexit and how the government itself is about to be overwhelmed by the scale of the task ahead.
On beginning to read it, one is first struck by the almost constant use of words and phrases like these: not known., don't know, cannot know, do not yet know, not clear, know almost nothing.
If I open the report as a pdf and use CTRL+F, searching for "*t know" or "not clear", I can see there are well over 100 occurrences, plus quite a number of occasions were "we don't know" is followed by bullet points listing many more unknowns (about 60 in all). There are therefore I believe well over 150 important detailed questions that the HoC has yet to get answers to, plus another 8 items which are only "partially known". These are all highlighted in the copy you will find at the link above.
For example on page 10 we learn:
We don't know...
What the legislation for the domestic arrangements to implement the transition period will look like. This will need to form part of the forthcoming European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill (EUWA Bill), setting out, among other things:
• the basis for the continuing force and effect of EU law, including the implementation of any EU law coming into force after exit day; and • the constitutional arrangements for devolved authorities in relation to EU law.
Then on page 15 we discover what is not known about the role of parliament:
We don’t know …
• How much time between the publication of the final agreements and the vote in the House of Commons; • whether committees will be able to take evidence and publish reports on the final agreements; • How long there will be between the vote and exit day; • What additional documentation will be published to accompany the Agreement and Declaration; • How the resolution will be worded; • Whether the resolution will be amendable;• How long the debate will be.
After the ‘meaningful vote’ we don’t know:
• How much primary or secondary UK legislation will be required before exit day; • What role, if any, Parliament will have in scrutinising the negotiations on the future relationship; • Whether there will be another ‘meaningful vote’ in each House to approve the final text of the agreement on the future relationship.
The entire report meanders along in this vein for 62 pages.
And remember these are the unknowns that we know we don't know. What we have yet to find out are the unknown unknowns. The things that nobody anticipated or thought about.
Brexit is a total dog's breakfast. As someone said it is a bad thing, being done by bad people, badly. In the next few months we will discover just how badly.
