I want to point you in the direction of two articles which appeared in The Telegraph in the last few days. They are a small oasis of realism in a desert of arid fantasy and wishful thinking from the pens of people like Boris Johnson and Owen Paterson that usually appear in the pages of the great Brexit cheerleader. The first was by Jeremy Warner (HERE no paywall) talking about the Tory party's 'irreconcilable schism over Britain’s place in Europe'.
The article is about 'brand destruction' and although Warner uses a different, Shakespearean analogy, because he's better educated than I am, I imagine he is talking about our political class doing a Gerald Ratner on the nation. Warner says:
"[Brexit] is the mother of all messes, and I regret to say - without apportioning blame to either side - one that is widely seen from abroad as a monumental exercise in national brand destruction, that recalls John of Gaunt’s deathbed speech in Shakespeare’s Richard II. 'That England, that was wont to conquer others, Hath made a shameful conquest of itself' ".
Next, yesterday Peter Foster, The Telegraph's Europe editor had an article (HERE no paywall) about the so-called Malthouse compromise using high tech solutions to resolve the Irish border problem and avoid the need for the backstop.
Foster doesn't believe the EU will be impressed:
""It is not clear why the EU would agree to this, when it has already roundly rejected the ideas - based around technology to create an invisible border - advanced in this plan by Shanker A Singham.
That report suggests that “technical checks for goods take place at a reasonable distance from the border, including in facilities on either side of their common land border” - an apparent explicit contradiction of what the UK agreed in the December 2017 Joint Report that rules out any additional “physical infrastructure or related checks and controls”.
"Both EU, Irish - and importantly UK officials - spent two years examining the technicalities without reaching agreement. It was indicative of the scale of difficulties that the so-called ‘MaxFac’ solution required 80 per cent of trade on the border to be exempted".
The other plan he thinks is coming soon is the so-called managed no-deal using GATT Article 24, described by one trade expert in the article as a red herring, to allow trade to continue as it does now for several years. This is also given short shrift. His conclusions are:
"As David Henig is Director of the UK Trade Policy Project observes. 'The first idea is unlikely to be unacceptable to the EU, while the second [Article XXIV] is probably not a good idea for the UK either in terms of making a long term offer based on little information.'
"The reaction in Europe also highlights another risk, according to Mr Henig, who was a former senior UK official in the Department for International Trade, which is that it will do nothing to make the EU engage on more realistic tweaks to the backstop and how it might come to an end.
“ 'Instead make the EU feel there is no point in engaging further with the UK. Unless MPs can engage in real substance, the choice will be between the current deal and no deal,' he says. But for hard Brexiteers who crave a ‘no deal’, perhaps that is the point".
I really don't think the deal, even with some small revisions, will ever get a majority in The House to support it and we will sooner or later come to the conclusion it is no deal or no Brexit and the awful contemplation of these two outcomes for the nation and social cohesion will force politicians to go for another referendum. It would be far too heavy a responsibility for any prime minister or cabinet or parliament and the people will have to be asked again.
At least this is my own personal fantasy.
