Brexit.

[Galen McGinnis]

Where Broccoli is heard to say "Give peas a chance"


eh. I'd be steamed too.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

And I still don't. May's deal with the Irish only backstop has a snowball's chance in Hell of passing Parliament.

At this point it's all theatre aimed at the British electorate, with a view to the forthcoming General Election.

Regardless of what the British parliament makes of the WA, there's no chance of it being able to pass, by the end of the month, all the necessary legislation to make that effective -- there's a whole raft of legislation needed to do that, with many contentious clauses, effectively giving ministers the power to repeal or re-rewrite existing legislation as necessary (the so-called "Henry VIII powers"), which won't survive detailed scrutiny.

And, of course, before the British parliament's views matter at all, the EU27 have to agree to the WA, in principle, which looks vanishingly possibile.

So, whatever happens, Johnson has to ask the EU 27 for an extension, whether to pass a Withdrawal Agreement which the EU 27 and parliament approve or to seek more time to agree the details of the WA before asking for parliamentary approval.

Assuming the EU give him the extension, then the government is going to collapse quite soon after, anyway, and the only question is when we have a General Election, at which point the way forward may well be somewhat clearer (and, please God, very different).

Whatever happens over the next week, the UK cannot leave the EU with a deal by the end of the month -- it's just not doable.

 

[Ariane]

And I still don't. May's deal with the Irish only backstop has a snowball's chance in Hell of passing Parliament.

All BoJo needs is for Parliament to pass some deal -- any deal -- in the next four days and the Benn Act ends. Fans of "No Deal" and idiotic fans of "anything but no deal" could come together to pass May's deal just to get a deal to pass. Then BoJo can run out the clock and get his No Deal Brexit by default.

Now if that scenario actually happens, I would expect a vote of no confidence and a new PM by next Monday.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

 

[Ariane]

So much for the Lib Dems being the Revoke or Bust party.

 

[Sid]

James Foster should have added: You can't trust Boris Johnson as well

 

[Innula Zenovka]

So much for the Lib Dems being the Revoke or Bust party.

I think this, like so much else, is political theatre, still.

Whatever happens between now and the end of the month, there's no time to prepare the multilingual legal drafts of any proposed agreement, have them scrutinised by all the parties, and have them agreed by the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers.

This means that, whatever happens, Johnson must ask for an extension, and to my mind it would be prudent for the EU to give him a very long extension, whether he wants it or not, because these things take time.

Meanwhile, the parliamentary arithmetic hasn't changed, and Johnson still leads a government with a negative majority (of his own making), and at any point during the extension, it's open to the opposition to bring down the government and trigger an early general election.

So I don't see how what happens on Saturday (if Parliament even sits then, which isn't certain) is going to affect things very much -- there's still at least a general election, and very likely a change of government, to come before anything is really decided.

 

[Sid]

No long extension!
The British parliament will start kicking the can down the road again as soon as they have the opportunity.
Europe has seen too often how British politicians are able to waste every ones time during the last years.
If May's agreement is still the basis of the new possible deal, it won't take all that long to translate, and if there is still a transition period in the new deal, than a very short (few months) extension is possible IMHO.
A longer extension should only be granted for something special like holding a new referendum over the deal.

 

[Essence Lumin]

Someone (Innula?) suggested a really long extension might be the best plan.

Maybe the EU should only agree to a 100 year extension and let everyone go about their lives like none of this ever happened.

 

[Sid]

I was in favor of a long extension too at first, but it solves nothing. British Parliament seems not to be able to compromise on anything over Brexit.
And if they hold new general elections, that will not solve a thing. Most likely the division in Parliament will only get worse.
That's why I'm now more in favor of an as short as possible extension.

 

[Ariane]

A 2 year extension would give them time to not only hold a new general election but a second referendum. The latter requires minimum 6 months, better if it is 9 months. Granted that was what the first 6 month extension was supposed to be about, and they piddled it away, but a short extension will just guarantee another extension.

Meanwhile, BoJo can't table a withdraw agreement even if he wanted to thanks to a passed bill that Rees-Mogg wrote. Extension is pretty much guaranteed.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

A 2 year extension would give them time to not only hold a new general election but a second referendum. The latter requires minimum 6 months, better if it is 9 months. Granted that was what the first 6 month extension was supposed to be about, and they piddled it away, but a short extension will just guarantee another extension.

Meanwhile, BoJo can't table a withdraw agreement even if he wanted to thanks to a passed bill that Rees-Mogg wrote. Extension is pretty much guaranteed.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

No long extension!
The British parliament will start kicking the can down the road again as soon as they have the opportunity.
Europe has seen too often how British politicians are able to waste every ones time during the last years.
If May's agreement is still the basis of the new possible deal, it won't take all that long to translate, and if there is still a transition period in the new deal, than a very short (few months) extension is possible IMHO.
A longer extension should only be granted for something special like holding a new referendum over the deal.

This thread provides an interesting insight into the logistics involved when the EU goes about turning a negotiated deal into an agreement that's ready for everyone to sign:


Whatever happens, I can't see this parliament lasting more than a couple of months, so I think that we'll certainly have a new parliament, and quite possibly a new government, in place by some time in late January or early February.

 

[Sid]

That's why the transition years after the actual Brexit date are so important, to get all kinds of additional/new agreements in place. And those years can be extended as long and often as needed to get things foolproof fine tuned, so both sides are happy.
I think it was possible to get an agreement with May relatively quickly, because of the transition clause.

 

[Kara Spengler]

At this point it's all theatre aimed at the British electorate, with a view to the forthcoming General Election.

Regardless of what the British parliament makes of the WA, there's no chance of it being able to pass, by the end of the month, all the necessary legislation to make that effective -- there's a whole raft of legislation needed to do that, with many contentious clauses, effectively giving ministers the power to repeal or re-rewrite existing legislation as necessary (the so-called "Henry VIII powers"), which won't survive detailed scrutiny.

And, of course, before the British parliament's views matter at all, the EU27 have to agree to the WA, in principle, which looks vanishingly possibile.

So, whatever happens, Johnson has to ask the EU 27 for an extension, whether to pass a Withdrawal Agreement which the EU 27 and parliament approve or to seek more time to agree the details of the WA before asking for parliamentary approval.

Assuming the EU give him the extension, then the government is going to collapse quite soon after, anyway, and the only question is when we have a General Election, at which point the way forward may well be somewhat clearer (and, please God, very different).

Whatever happens over the next week, the UK cannot leave the EU with a deal by the end of the month -- it's just not doable.

Maybe we can ship bojo and donnie off to the moon together while the rest of us rebuild our countries?

If the 2 of them manage to populate it somehow? I really do not want to know the details of how that happened.

 

[Kara Spengler]

No long extension!
The British parliament will start kicking the can down the road again as soon as they have the opportunity.
Europe has seen too often how British politicians are able to waste every ones time during the last years.
If May's agreement is still the basis of the new possible deal, it won't take all that long to translate, and if there is still a transition period in the new deal, than a very short (few months) extension is possible IMHO.
A longer extension should only be granted for something special like holding a new referendum over the deal.

Politicians in general act that way. Make the deadline in a month and they will squander 30 days and turn to it on the last day. Make it a century and yep, last day again.

A huge part of citizen lobbying is learning the care and feeding of politicians. They (no matter what side) do not have the same reactions and drives of normal people (and it is not always money=votes although that is a big part of it).

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Maybe we can ship bojo and donnie off to the moon together while the rest of us rebuild our countries?

If the 2 of them manage to populate it somehow? I really do not want to know the details of how that happened.

I'm pretty sure there's an international treaty against using the moon as a dump for toxic waste, though.

 

[Kara Spengler]

I was in favor of a long extension too at first, but it solves nothing. British Parliament seems not to be able to compromise on anything over Brexit.
And if they hold new general elections, that will not solve a thing. Most likely the division in Parliament will only get worse.
That's why I'm now more in favor of an as short as possible extension.

The whole problem is politicians are involved. The same exact thing would happen with any (yes, ANY) other country triggering article 50, just the details would be different.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Ads in BBC Canada.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

DUP says it cannot support Boris Johnson's Brexit deal

PM’s proposed deal suffers another blow after party objects to customs and VAT terms

www.theguardian.com