The PM gave an upbeat assessment of the state of the withdrawal negotiations in the House yesterday. But it was really just another exercise in kicking the can further down the road. She was warned (HERE) by some of her own backbenchers about not conceding more money to the EU, something she is reported to have done privately and which we will have to do anyway at some point.
She is once again clinging to the fiction that we will be able to conclude a trade deal in time for it to be settled by March 2019. Unless the EU agree to this, she will not accept the transition period so she claims (HERE).
Nobody outside the No 10 asylum and the pro Brexit media believes that a trade deal by September or October 2018, in time for it to be ratified by EU parliaments, is remotely possible. But Mrs May not only thinks it is but we will also be able to conclude the withdrawal agreement and a transition agreement, all involving treaties, to be done and dusted at the same time. If we accept for the sake of argument that it is possible it would mean business groups (HERE) who have been pressing for the legal certainty of a transition period to be agreed quickly, won't know if the PM is prepared to use the transition period until October 2018 - at the very earliest! This simply cannot happen.
Mrs May also suggests we won't agree the Brexit bill until we know what the trade agreement will cover. She insisted she had been “very clear that the financial settlement cannot be finally settled” until the future trading arrangements with the EU are known. But here's an interesting point. The withdrawal agreement must result in a treaty which will need to be ratified by member states. It will include the money in some form or other (see HERE). The trade deal will take much, much longer perhaps years. So, for the government to think we won't agree to a sum until we know what we're getting is just another fantasy.
