This week is the crucial one

No post yesterday because we lost the internet for most of the day due to what BT called a 'major outage.' But normal service now resumed!

Since the referendum in 2016, the Brexit landscape has changed completely. We have seen two prime ministers go, two general elections and a change of opposition leader. Trump has come and gone and Joe Biden's victory last week has delivered yet another dimension. Johnson's options have narrowed and Ireland's already strong position just got even stronger. 

Being at odds with the EU is unfortunate but being at odds with the EU and the USA at the same time looks like carelessness - to paraphrase Oscar Wilde.

The next seven days will be crucial. Barnier and his team are back in London.  Today the Lords will be voting to amend the UKIM Bill and it seems the government will be heavily defeated. Whether the government will try again later is unlikely given Biden's opposition to it.  They are looking more and more isolated.

There is now only very hard choices ahead for Johnson. He can go for no deal and risk huge disruption and job losses for an economy in intensive care. This would upset the EU, Biden and a majority of people in this country, including many of whom voted to leave the EU but are still unaware of the consequences.  In a few weeks the government would have to crawl back to Brussels and restart the talks anyway.

Or he can go for a deal, mainly on EU terms, and get an extension to allow business more time to prepare. This will upset a lot of his Brexiteer supporters, the ERG and a lot of the grassroots Tory party. None of his options look good.  But in the end he will go for the deal.  To give you an idea of the problem Johnson has created entirely for himself by hubris, ignorance and lies, an article  on Conservative Home by David Gauke might help explain.

Essentially, it's a bit of advice for the PM suggesting he should go for a trade deal and ask for a 12 month implementation period. Mr Gauke is right, although he writes assuming Johnson had a choice. In my opinion he doesn't. He will be forced into a deal and an implementation period whether he likes it or not. The article itself is not really controversial but the reaction to it in the comments below is both stunning and informative.

It is as if readers of Conservative Home (founded by Tim Montgomerie), all dyed in the wool Tories at the very least and mixed with refugees from UKIP and The Brexit Party, have not been reading the news these last few months.  All the stuff about food shortages and lorry queues and portaloos the length of the M20  (who is going to empty them by the way?) and more recent warnings by the NAO of widespread disruption seem to have gone over their head. That or they still think it's all scaremongering.

Northern Gunner says:

"There is no doubt, however, that these members of the cult of EU will exploit any opportunity to extend our submission to the EU because they know that they could never again con the electorate into joining the nascent European super-state with its debt mutualisation, EU army and failed currency, especially not when it involves the re-seizure of our once rich fishing grounds."

Mags100 writes:

Now is the time to uphold the outcome of the brexit vote and leave on wto if necessary..remainers will continue to agitate and campaign to bring about a 'soft brexit' but Boris must deliver independence from the EU or suffer the consequences.

Terence_S says:

How the remoaners are still at it. They just can't let go. Now is the time to leave under WTO, let's not forget the pressure is also on the EU. They will cave in and quickly offer terms that an Independent Sovereignty would expect with respect.

Underweather thinks:

Trade will be progressing on the assumption of no deal. It's just clicks on a computer screen that exists for all trade going through terminals and bonded warehouses. Quotes will have already been provided for delivery after 1st January. The current exchange rate to the euro is 1:10, when the euro was first introduced 1:60 to the pound. That's quite a margin. Any company trading regularly will have their own arrangements sorted. A distributor or brass plate office in EFTA countries or Channel Islands.

These are just a few examples which I'll keep handy because they are going to go barmy when Boris agrees to an extension. These sort of ravings are interspersed with the occasional critic and rational thinker who agrees with Gauke but is then subjected to a barrage of vicious comments.

The Bank of England are already forecasting a damaging hit to the economy next year and a reduction in British exports even if we succeed in getting a deal.

When the extension comes to an end there will still be disruption because some companies will never be ready.  The extended transition period will be given a title that makes it appear something else and Gove will hide behind a barrage of semantics but everybody will know what it is. The period will be used to wind back contracts and rejig supply chains - all to the detriment of British industry.

The main objective now is to keep the wool pulled over as many eyes as possible. Johnson, Gove and Cummings cannot afford a disruptive exit - even with a deal - because it would reveal the empty hollowness of Brexit and that's the last thing they want.