16/10/2016
Straight out of the "no shit Sherlock school" today comes the
Sunday Telegraph story which has ministers "privately" telling the newspaper that Britain could end up with the most "extreme" version of Brexit "because there may not be enough time to negotiate a good deal with Brussels".
The really stunning thing about this, though, is that it is even a headline. From the very first, the premise in
Flexcit has been the view that there wouldn't be enough time for an optimum deal, but now we're getting "senior ministers" (anonymous, of course) who believe negotiations may not be completed by 2019 because they are "very complicated and this has never been tried".
That, as we repeated
last July could â as this newspaper now tells us â lead us to crash out of the bloc and adopt World Trade Organisation rules. This, we are told, would mean that tariffs have to be imposed on trade between the UK and the EU â which would actually be the least of our problems.
It is certainly being styled as the "hardest" possible Brexit, with no access to the single market but, it seems, some senior ministers believe this is actually the best-possible solution for Britain because it will allow the UK to be "totally in control of its destiny".
One of these idiots actually goes so far as to say that, if the Article 50 negotiations don't succeed, "we go back to WTO rules". He adds: "This is seen by some people as some kind of disaster but that is not the case. Britain could succeed if that happens".
Having set out the consequences on this blog so many times, and then in
Monograph 3, one tires of this stupidity â and also of the number of people who seem unable to cope with its consequences.
The point about the WTO option, though, is that we drop out of the EU with no bilateral agreements or other formal settlement, and acquire "third country status" in respect of trade with the EU. This means no mutual recognition of standards, no mutual recognition of conformity assessment and no mutual recognition of customs systems, all of which will lead to considerable perturbation in our exports to EU Member States.
No one is saying that, overnight, every consignment gets checked at entry points to the Union, but it is the case that the smallest disturbances at the borders can have severe knock-on effects, with delays escalating very quickly, with catastrophic effect.
And as is pointed out in this report, something this complicated has never been tried before. There is no reason why â if talks have ended without an agreement â EU Member States should take a relaxed view of entry requirements for UK goods.
That said, from both sides of the divide, we've had a commitment to negotiations, so the only way the WTO option can happen is by accident. But that would make it a forced (i.e., unplanned) event. The effect would be that, there will be no systems in place to facilitate trade â which must have an impact on the flow of goods.
It is all very well then talking about work-rounds, and further negotiations to sort out the very evident problems, but there are some people who need to get their heads round certain facts. If we end up with the WTO option (and nothing on the books as an alternative), the vast array of agreements we have with the EU immediately cease to have effect. For sure, we can then start emergency talks to solve the problems, but that will take time.
For that reason, any one with any sense (and that does not include some senior ministers) will want to avoid the WTO option at almost any cost. And, because it is now increasingly widely acknowledged that we can't secure a bespoke deal inside two years, the best idea is to go for an interim settlement, using the EEA template to save time.
That, contrary to some claims, will exclude the UK from the jurisdiction of the ECJ, bringing it under the aegis of the Efta Court. And although this Court shadows the ECJ, in the final analysis, Efta Court rulings are not binding on states. Thus, the Efta states, "voluntarily" adopt the Court's "advice", thereby preserving sovereignty.
Bizarrely, though, the Sunday Telegraph is citing "senior EU diplomatic sources", stating that Mrs May's conference speech excluded the UK from jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) which, they say, "is necessary for any kind Free Trade Agreement".
This is so wrong-headed that one marvels that it could ever be published in a newspaper. Not a single nation, party to a Free Trade Agreement with the EU, is subject to the jurisdiction of the ECJ, and there is no way that this could ever be considered necessary. The ECJ has jurisdiction only over EU Member States and legal entities domiciled or trading within the territories of EU Member States.
Just as bizarre, then, is an assertion that senior officials in the Department of International Trade "accept that Britain will have to accept some form of bespoke 'supranational body' to regulate services trade between the UK and Europe, even if it is not the ECJ".
One assumes that might be the Efta Court (which, wrongly, styles itself as "supranational"), but any dispute body policing a Free Trade Agreement could not rightly be called "supranational".
But, while this inane chatter dominates the public debate, one can sympathise with the view that many in Europe are privately watching and waiting for Britain to feel the economic consequences of Brexit.
"The feeling among the Europeans seems to be 'let's not bother engaging with these people until they are feeling the pain a bit more. Just let the pressure build'", says a Whitehall source. They will start to talk seriously at the end of 2017 "when the Fox, Davis and co have come to their senses" â assuming that is at all possible.
