20/06/2016
If leave wins, Britain's partners are likely to offer just three options: the Norwegian model of the European Economic Area (EEA); the Canadian model of a free trade agreement (FTA); and the rules of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The EU doesn't want to give the UK bilateral treaties (like Switzerland), a customs union (like Turkey) or bespoke arrangements.
Charles Grant, Director of the Centre for European Reform
Years down the line, after thousands of hours of discussion and millions of words written on the subject, when it comes to our options for leaving the EU, one of the country's supposed leading Europhile think tanks is stuck in tramlines, like the car illustrated above - able to go in one direction only. Having established its basic, simplistic options, it has been able to develop.
Where Grant and many others like him fail is in their insistence of looking for an immediate settlement as the first hit. They evidently imagine that we will go to the negotiating tables in Brussels with our end game in sight, seeking to achieve it in the space of the two years allowed in the initial negotiating period allowed by Article 50.
This myopia is all the more remarkable when set against the history of European political integration. The original scope of the Coal and Steel Community, established by treaty in 1950, is very different from that embraced by the Treaty of Rome in 1957. And, 49 years on from that Treaty, the Communities have evolved almost out of all recognition, to become something very different from what was first created.
Yet people like Grant, who writes in
The Times alongside colleagues John Springford and Simon Tilford, of their leaden visions, would not seem to allow the United Kingdom the same degree of fluidity and flexibility in ordering their affairs.
Despite being content to allow the European Union to evolve over more than half a Century, they expect a departing UK to rush immediately to a "final solution". Moreover, it is required to do so within a time limit of two years, heedless of the fact that it took the authors of the Lisbon Treaty the best part of eight years to get their creation cranking into action.
With such blinkered vision, we find the same
limited set of options on offer, with different casts of characters chewing over the same narrow options. There are only marginal differences between the players. They are all basically trapped in the same unchanging narrative.
Through this means, there has been much discourse about continuing our EEA membership â which would allow us to leave the EU yet remain in the Single Market. This is seen as an attractive option, although it is also seen as of limited attractiveness to some segments of "leaveâ fraternity, as it would appear to require continued adoption of free movement of people.
If, however, we walk away from this claustrophobic argument where the parameters have been set by our enemies, and take a loftier stance, the horizons expand exponentially.
What we do is separate Brexit into its separate components. Firstly, we have to deal with the politico-legal problem of leaving the EU. Then we have to come up with a measured agreement which will enable us to continue working with the European Union. Thirdly, we need to consider our longer term future.
Never, on the basis of minimal public discourse and a complete absence of government involvement should we even be considering a settlement, negotiated under the artificial constraints of Article 50, to be a one-time deal that will last us for perpetuity. Anything we come up with is going to be an interim deal. Then we look at transitional arrangements.
The moment these points are conceded, everything changes. We need no longer be locked into prolonged and tedious discussions on the relative merits of different options â their advantages and disadvantages. As refugees no more turn their noses up at tents as temporary shelter, we as a nation can afford to look at an interim solution in an entirely different light.
With that in mind, does it really matter that the EEA option is far from ideal? In its alter ego as the "Norway option" it is hated by Norwegian Europhiles because they want to be in the European Union. It is detested by the No2EU campaign because they want a looser, free trade agreement. But, as a halfway house, easing our transition from full EU member to independent state, it has some merit.
The next point we have to deal with is the problem of naming of names. It seems we must have the Norway option (or even a Norwegian model), a Swiss option, a Canadian option, a Turkish option or even, as some have been accused of embracing, an Albanian option.
What no one seems to want to cope with is that the ultimate solution is "none of the above". It's not "options" we want, but solutions. And the solutions we eventually evolve are going to be uniquely British solutions â even if it takes some time to get there.
In fact, we will never get there. From 1950 to the present day, the European Union is work in progress. If it ever gets to be a United States of Europe, it will still be work in progress â just as the United States of America is in a state of constant flux, constantly evolving. Final solutions are for children and demagogues.
In the life of nations, adults commit not to a destination but to the journey â the process, not the outcome. As did none of the founding fathers of the independent United States see the fruits of their endeavours, none of us will ever live to see the final outcome. We can only hope to pass on something of value to our children.
Therefore, it is process that matters. Process is everything. Parliament is not an end state â a museum â but a process. Democracy is not a book or a dry set of rules, but a process. Hence leaving the EU is a process. Once we have departed, the separation and then parallel development will become processes â ever changing and ever-evolving.
Where that will take us, no one knows. The brave visionaries of the 1940s â our parents and grandparents (and for some, great-grandparents) - had no more idea of where there ideas would lead, than we can have when we put in place processes that will lead to our continued life as an independent nation.
However, what we do know is that, as a member of the European Union, we are tapped in an organisation which has as its declared ambition the creation of a United States of Europe and which regards the idea of an independent Britain as an anathema.
That really is the crunch. On Thursday, we will be choosing between a destination and a process: the certainty of a United States of Europe, and goodbye to liberty, or the process of democracy which will take us anywhere our people decide.
And if this means making concessions and compromises to get there, accepting interim solutions and transitional arrangements, so what? Rome wasn't built in a day â and neither will be a free United Kingdom.
