Theresa May is jammed between two great Brexit mill wheels and, unless she gets out, she will soon be crushed to very fine powder and spit out the side. On the bottom is the great bedstone, the EU, who are utterly consistent, refusing to re-open the Withdrawal Agreement and even now making actual preparations for our no deal exit. On the top is the smaller runner stone, the House of Commons, with its inbuilt and significant majority for a soft Brexit or no Brexit, turning slowly all the time.
The idea she is going to dominate either is for the fairies. They will grind her into history.
Angela Merkel told reporters (HERE) in Berlin that “we will of course do everything to find an orderly solution, but we are also prepared if there is no orderly solution.”
Angela Merkel told reporters (HERE) in Berlin that “we will of course do everything to find an orderly solution, but we are also prepared if there is no orderly solution.”
The Associated Press has reported a top official at the French presidency saying Europeans would make no concessions on Brexit that would damage the European Union's core principles, including the integrity of the single market.
Speaking anonymously, he said 'nobody believes' the European Union would now be 'weak and febrile'...... 'And I don't think Theresa May believes it', he added. Doesn't sound like much 'give' there does it?
The PM is notoriously stubborn and while she now says she will 'reach out' across the House to try and find a consensus about what sort of deal will find a majority, at PMQs yesterday she seemed to make the offer through gritted teeth and studiously avoided mentioning Jeremy Corbyn or even the Labour party at all, as if they didn't exist - although she did later in the evening after winning the no confidence vote.
As a way of showing 'flexibility' the prime minister went over her red lines with thicker and redder paint containing a concrete mixture like road marking material. She dismissed any idea of staying in a customs union, a second referendum or extending Article 50 or revoking it. In other words all the flexibility must come from the EU and the House of Commons and not her. In Maybot world the wheat kernel is harder than the mill wheels apparently.
Several Conservative MPs said she needed to show flexibility and get rid of some of those red lines which have ineluctably brought us the deal which parliament comprehensively rejected on Tuesday. Ken Clarke tried his very best to explain the problem in simple terms for her (HERE Col 1159)
"I sat through many hours on every day but one of the recent debate, listening carefully to the extraordinary range of views expressed throughout it by Members in all parts of the House. It seemed to me that the only clear majorities in this House on a cross-party basis are against leaving with no deal; in favour of extending article 50 to give us time to sort out what we now propose to do; and in favour of some form of customs union and sufficient regulatory alignment to keep all our borders between the United Kingdom and the European Union open after we leave. Will the Prime Minister not accept, just as I have had to accept that the majority in this House is committed to the UK leaving the European Union, that she must now modify her red lines, which she created for herself at Lancaster House, and find a cross-party majority, which will be along the lines that I have indicated?"
This seemed to me to be rational thinking and the only way she can escape being destroyed but it was to no avail. Her answer was that there was 'a considerable number of views across this House' and she reaffirmed mantra-like that 'The Government’s policy is that we are leaving the European Union on 29 March'. This is her problem, she sticks to her policy long after everyone else can see it will not survive. We will not leave on 29th March, I would stake my house on it.
Parliament is not going to accept the deal or a revised version of the deal. I think that is clear. The BBC's Adam Fleming said in his opinion, Brussels will not renegotiate the WA but would be prepared to rewrite the political declaration to include a different and much closer future relationship. This would reduce the need and the potential for the backstop to ever be used. If that happens, Fleming said, the EU might then be prepared to 'tweak' the WA.
In the background, fading slightly now as we approach the real moment of decision, the old crooner David Davis is still singing his old song (HERE) about getting tough and 'proposing an alternative withdrawal text' while not wanting to 'punish EU farmers and car exporters'. He says the EU have a 'large trade deficit with us in agriculture' when I think he means a surplus. He thinks, "....call[ing a] 'no deal' will not be tolerable to the EU for long. The economic and political forces against it in Europe will be too strong".
He has been saying these things, like a cracked record, since well before the referendum and all the while he was DEXEU Secretary and the EU have shown not the slightest hint that they are laying awake at night worrying about it. It would damage them but be closer to existential for us.
It is Davis' own project fantasy 2.0 as he might say.
