Thursday, 8 October 2020

An agreement creeps a bit closer

I didn't watch it but Gove and Frost gave evidence to the Lords EU Committee yesterday afternoon and I noticed people posting stuff on Twitter - including a longish thread from Jim Brunsden, an FT reporter in Brussels. I think we are getting to the business end of the talks with the UK looking ever more willing to compromise while trying desperately to make it look like it isn't. The EU's hint that they are willing to see the talks go beyond the end of October puts the ball squarely back into Johnson's court.

In a week's time, Johnson will need to make good on his pledge made on 7 September:

"There needs to be an agreement with our European friends by the time of the European Council on 15 October if it’s going to be in force by the end of the year. So there is no sense in thinking about timelines that go beyond that point. If we can’t agree by then, then I do not see that there will be a free trade agreement between us, and we should both accept that and move on."

Asked about the date, the idiot David Frost was a bit more equivocal about it so the talks are definitely going on beyond 15 October - and probably a lot longer.  Once we are past that date and talks are continuing, the chance of failure recedes a lot.  There is not even a deal "in principle" yet and if there is one it will need to be put into legal text which will take weeks, plus primary legislation will be needed in the UK and I wouldn't be surprised if MPs demand a lot more time to debate that sort of stuff.

The government really have very little choice. The border operating model for goods going between GB-NI and NI-GB has still not been published so we have no idea how that will work with less than three months to go, And that is just one of the things we are totally unprepared for.  No, the chances of a no deal outcome on 1 January is zero.

Here is Brunsden's Twitter thread which is about state aid:

Reading it, you can see Frost, who once said we wouldn't be dictated to by the EU on state aid, is now talking about "high level principles" without an "extensive text setting out the detail of how we design our system."  This was in proposals he submitted last week and which the EU rejected as not going far enough.

But the point for me is that presumably the high level principles would cover the EU state aid regime otherwise they would not be acceptable to the EU. And it follows that when these principles were set out in extensive text they would probably look very similar to the EU rules - or at least achieve the same objective. And don't forget they are also the rules we follow now. But we are absolutely adamant that we can't under any circumstances agree to comply with the EU rules - we MUST have our own.  I think the EU find it all baffling. It must be like negotiating with an imbecile.

Frost went on to say:

"I still find it a bit strange that this issue has loomed quite so large given the track records on both sides, but there we are. We will be in new situation after transition and the EU must come to conclusions about what it wants,” he said.

“Whether we can satisfy that I don’t know yet. It is quite difficult to agree the level of detail they want to see.”

He finds it strange because France and Germany have historically provided far more state aid than we have - about twice as much. Conservative governments from Thatcher onwards have been particularly tough on it so unless the Tory party has become more socialist than Corbyn it is hard to see what all the fuss is about.

Gove agreed that the chance of agreeing a deal was now about 66 per cent (in fact it has never dropped below 100 per cent) although his optimism isn't shared in Brussels. An article on Politico (HERE) says they just don't see the movement necessary yet from the UK:

"A senior EU official said after the call that Brussels was still unclear if the U.K. is willing to budge on key EU red lines, namely the so-called level playing field or governance of any agreement.

“In fact, our main message, you know we see signs that things are moving forward on a couple of things, but the main things still remain unresolved,” the official said. “And that’s why we are saying show your cards on the table. On the most difficult topics, which are essential to getting access to the single market, which they desperately want, we don’t see any signs of progress yet and that is at the heart of the discussion.”

In a sign things are hotting up, Charles Michel, president of the EU Council, spoke to Johnson yesterday afternoon and later tweeted:

This morning he is in Dublin to speak to the Taoiseach Michael Martin about Brexit. Something is afoot I think. The Irish Times say the two sides are moving closer on state aid and thinks Johnson looks set to compromise. You can bet on it.

One of the things Gove is most concerned about is the break up of the UK - although personally I think it's a bit late for that, Brexit has more or less guaranteed Scottish independence and Irish unification in my opinion. He will perhaps be worried that the Holyrood assembly have rejected the UK Internal Market bill. Although it has no constitutional effect, it is another cudgel for the SNP to beat Westminster with and they will use it.

Finally, amid a flurry of stuff happening at the moment, a John Lichfield claims that the recent UK-Norway fisheries deal is not as the UK government have presented it - he says "Last week the UK government suggested that an 'historic' fishing agreement with Norway was a model for the 'annual' agreements that it wishes to impose on EU fleets post-Brexit. It wasn’t. The opposite is true. It was closer to the kind of deal that Brussels is seeking."

This all turns on what DEFRA Secretary said about the Norway deal that it meant "negotiating access to waters and fishing opportunities annually.”  In fact, Lichfield says the tonnage is determined annually by scientific advice and while the agreement talks about “annual conversations” to agree access and quotas, it would be like the yearly EU-Norway – and intra-EU - talks.  In other words, he says, "despite the grossly misleading claims by Eustice, abetted by equally crass comments by UK fishermen’s leaders, Britain has agreed just the kind of long-term deal with Norway which it is refusing for the EU." 

I think this is a portent of the future. The government, after years of pretending Brexit is something it isn't, will begin a process of pretending it isn't something it is, if you see what I mean. Watch out for plentiful supplies of smoke and mirrors next year, regardless of what happens with everything else.

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