Nick Boles, Conservative MP, has suggested we are in a pickle and writing in The Telegraph (HERE), says the only way out is for the UK to join EFTA and then the EEA. He was a remainer until June 24th when he got behind leave - presumably without any conviction but in an effort to return to ministerial office. He perhaps thought he could see which way the wind was blowing.
The way he writes, one gets the impression that for him leaving and remaining were all of a piece with little to choose between them. To make the switch, as he claims he did, one would have to believe we could leave in an easy way that didn't permanently damage our economy. But it took him a year to see how hard it was going to be. He writes:
The way he writes, one gets the impression that for him leaving and remaining were all of a piece with little to choose between them. To make the switch, as he claims he did, one would have to believe we could leave in an easy way that didn't permanently damage our economy. But it took him a year to see how hard it was going to be. He writes:
"In July of last year [2017] I wrote a column for the ConservativeHome website suggesting that we should decouple from the EU gradually, parking temporarily in EFTA and the EEA before negotiating a long term relationship based on a free trade agreement. In short that we should try to emulate Norway’s relationship with the EU before moving to a position more like Canada’s.
"At the time, the government was confident that it could do a better deal than that, that it would be able to secure full access to the Single Market and the Customs Union without being a member of the relevant institutions, or signing up to their rules".
"Now we know better - and the government is poised to sign up to a much worse deal than the one I outlined. A deal which would see us agree a €39 billion divorce settlement without getting anything in the return, accept an Irish backstop arrangement that threatens to separate Northern Ireland from the rest of the UK, and see us move from full membership of the EU to a transition in which we are bound by all the rules but don’t have a vote".
The EEA idea is also the argument of Dr Richard North but it's now being proposed by a senior Tory MP.
However, I'm not sure it was ever possible anyway. We would need to negotiate our entry into EFTA with those nations (Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein) all being well aware that we are only in it "temporarily" while we try and negotiate a CETA style deal, something that might take years. The EU would then have to negotiate with us the terms of our entry into the EEA (although there is some legal doubt as to whether or not Article 50 means we will leave the EEA next year) also knowing they will then have to start negotiating with us once again on a free trade deal.
I think EFTA and the EU would be happy for us to become permanent members but temporary ones? I'm not sure.
There is then the problem of selling the "vassal" status of the EEA to the hard right in his own party (and this won't be easy either) as well as to the general public. If we are going to continue in the single market and the customs union we might as well remain members of the EU. The EU have said for a very long time we can have a CETA style free trade deal anyway. Boles' argument comes down to saying we triggered Article 50 too soon before we knew ourselves what we wanted. Had the cabinet settled on a Canada style deal at the outset things might have gone a bit quicker. Note that CETA doesn't solve the Irish border issue either.
Meanwhile, in the same issue of The Telegraph the PM (HERE) is saying there will be no second referendum and no compromises on the Chequers proposal that aren't "in Britain's interests" - whatever that is. It looks like she is simply pressing on even though the EU have already rejected her plan and neither side of the party thinks it's any good. The Brexiteers certainly don't and clearly neither does Boles who is on the moderate wing.
We have still not come to terms with what Brexit means. Many MPs - in both parties - would be happy with EFTA/EEA membership and inside the customs union, while others want a more distant free trade deal that would have a severe impact on trade by introducing a lot of friction at the border. Boles is only arguing about the route, the destination would be the same. He wants to get to Canada, as does David Davis, but via Norway as if on a leisurely cruise.
But the government doesn't know where it wants to be, it has still has not made that choice. It continues to negotiate as if there is a middle way, a compromise that will somehow bridge the divide that we can be half in and half out of the single market, floating midway in the Atlantic alongside Iceland but having nothing to do with it.
It is just not possible, as we will soon discover.
Mrs May, in ruling out a second vote (HERE) on Brexit says the British people made a decision in 2016. I don't suppose she could say anything else. For her to even hint that she might think about another referendum would throw everything at home and in Europe into chaos. But one day there will be another vote to put right the historic mistake that the majority of British people think that Brexit is.
In any case she may not be able to prevent it if parliament and the opinion polls demand one.
Moreover, the divisions run very deep and another vote might be essential, either to confirm the original decision or reject it.
