Mutjaba Rahman is a former Treasury official who has also worked in Brussels and is now chairman of the Eurasia Group, described on Wikipedia as a political risk consultancy - whatever that is. He is well connected though and I follow him on Twitter where he is often quite accurate in his predictions. Yesterday he tweeted something which just might indicate the government has finally realised what a pickle it's in.
I have never thought the UK could ever contemplate leaving the EU without a trade deal. The political cost would be far too high and this is what Rahman's tweet demonstrates:
I agree there are now tailwinds behind a UK-EU Brexit trade deal, but *not* because EU is supposedly suddenly willing to compromise on state aid, but rather because @10DowningStreet now believes a deal is in its political interest 1/— Mujtaba Rahman (@Mij_Europe) June 25, 2020
He says that thinking inside government has changed "in the last few weeks" which if true is amazing. They really are feeling their way forward. I know they never had a plan for Brexit but here we are with just weeks to go and they seem to be tacking in quite a different direction.
Note also he does not mention the damage to the country as the possible reason for the U-turn but that it is in the government's "political interest." The whole thing really is an internal dispute in the Conservative party that has spilled out into Europe.
I think this will be the first of many hints that we will get between now and October before the final capitulation.
He claims the biggest driver is the way that Kier Starmer would portray a no deal outcome, giving him political space, opportunity and ammunition to attack the government. I can see this is how it might be sold to the ERG - as the only possible way out and for the Tories to stay in power. But I don't believe the ERG will buy it, some of them still think a no deal Brexit is a good outcome.
Rahman claims the government's "short-term" credibility is "shot". Which looks highly optimistic to me. Johnson's long term credibility is also shot - in so far as he ever had any.
John Peet, political editor at The Economist agrees that it was never likely that you could disguise the negative effects of a no-deal Brexit at the end of the year under the cloak of Covid-19.
I find this persuasive. Never really believed the line that covid-19 was so terrible it could swamp the negative effect of a no-deal Brexit at year-end. But making the necessary compromises, on both sides, in just four months still incredibly challenging....— John Peet (@JohnGPeet) June 25, 2020
The reason it is in their political interests is that despite proclaiming Brexit as the key to unlocking the nations's potential they have utterly failed to explain how that could ever be possible - or even to plan for it failing.
I suppose they have started to realise that with just six months to go we are nowhere near ready. Once again the EU has nimbly outmaneuvered us by getting prepared for a no deal outcome. Both France and Holland invested in new customs infrastructure and trained more staff and they are fully prepared having tested systems that we have not yet even designed.
Tom Harwood says he is "senior reporter" at the Guido Fawkes website (i.e. self confessed nutjob) and he tweeted a headline from the FT:
New from the FT: Brussels buckles. pic.twitter.com/tg9YxBfvoA— Tom Harwood (@tomhfh) June 24, 2020
This is also how they intend to play it. Brussels has "buckled."
If you read the article Brussels has done no such thing of course. What Barnier has said is that the EU is willing to "work with" the UK to find a "credible and operational" framework for the so-called level playing field conditions and ready to work on "landing zones" that respect the EU mandate.
I take this to mean that Johnson has already indicated he wants a repeat of last October where he gives away the shop and presents it at home as a great victory. In other words they will help him to describe a common rule book or a level playing field as something entirely different and present it all as a great success. The EU will help design the gas light and supply the gas.
On Brexit, Barnier gave an interview this week to the European Policy Centre and on their website I found a recent article by their CEO, Fabian Zuleeg which, if accurate, is rather depressing. The piece is called The Brexit time bomb and he is quite open in believing Brexit will be a disaster and that no other EU nation is likely to follow us:
"This [the threat to the integrity of the EU] seems counterintuitive at this moment in time: whatever the outcome of the current negotiations, it is already clear that the fears that were raised in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum in June 2016 – that other countries will immediately replicate the UK’s example – were unfounded. No country is likely to follow in the UK’s footsteps out of the EU any time soon, not least because of the apparent political, economic, social and societal costs the UK is imposing on itself."
He discusses what might happen in the long run and says at some point the UK economy will begin to grow and the "negative implications of Brexit will be absorbed" and the effects will fade over time.
"All of this does not imply that Brexit makes economic sense, nor that the costs of leaving the EU are somehow not real, as claimed by some Brexiteers. Leaving the EU will cause irrevocable damage. But it does indicate that the longer Brexit is a thing of the past, the less likely that neither the UK population nor populations across Europe will perceive it as the cataclysm it really is. Not only does this make it unlikely that the UK will re-join the Union at some point, but, in future, it might well also lead to Eurosceptics pushing it as a success story others should emulate."
I think he may be right and this is what we, and here I am talking about the pro-EU majority in this country, should guard against and be prepared for. Every negative consequence must be counted and pointed out. We must never forget.
