On Friday, Labour accused Theresa May of failure to compromise in Brexit talks. Nonetheless, May is on her way today Flying to Berlin and Paris in Bid to Persuade the EU to Agree to Article 50 Extension.
Barnier says EU Happy to Offer UK a Customs Union
In Dublin, Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, says he hopes the government/Labour talks will produce a positive outcome. He says the political declaration can accommodate a range of outcomes, including a customs union. It could be changed to make this explicit very quickly, he says.
If the UK were to leave the EU with no deal, the EU would not discuss any future trade relationship without taking into account the Irish border issue and citizen’s rights.
Mark Rutte, the Dutch prime minister, says he has spoken to Theresa May today. He says he wants to avoid a no-deal Brexit, but he also says the EU wants more assurances from the UK about an article 50 extension, including a promise relating to “sincere cooperation”. (That means the EU wants to know that May won’t follow Jacob Rees-Mogg’s advice and do her best to wreck the union from within if the UK is allowed to stay beyond Friday.)
Eurointelligence
The best way to understand what is happening right now is to look at the Brexit crisis from the perspective of Theresa May. Her party has failed to support her withdrawal agreement three times, and put her on notice that it wants a new leader and prime minister at some point this year. The success or failure of Brexit is the one and only policy for which May will be known after she leaves office. She hasn’t done much else in her time. So it should really not come as a surprise that she is now abandoning her party in pursuit of a deal with Jeremy Corbyn. And she is now framing the choice openly as a run-off between deal versus no-Brexit. In that framework, she may actually have an incentive to accept Donald Tusk’s offer of a long flexible extension.
Wolfgang Munchau writes in his FT column that the start of cross-party talks would constitute what EU leaders have described as a political way forward. He says that there is a good chance that the European Council will extend at its meeting on Wednesday, though Emmanuel Macron will push for hard conditionality. We think there are legal limits in respect of constraining a British prime minister’s voting right, but there is nothing to stop the European Council and May to reach a mutual understanding that the UK would not interfere in debates on the future of the EU. But such a deal would also tie the European Council much closer to May personally, as her successor could not be expected to abide by such an agreement. This is why Munchau argues that December should be the outer limit for an extension, as May will probably not be prime minister after that.
One of the issues in the discussions between May and Corbyn and their respective teams is how to make the deal Boris-proof as Labour calls it: to prevent it from being unravelled by Boris Johnson if he were to become May’s successor. We are not sure that it is possible for one government to insure against the action of a successor, just as one parliament cannot bind the next. Politics won’t suddenly stop.
In his Monday column in the Daily Telegraph, Johnson raises one potential issue that might come to haunt May: what if Corbyn uses these talks only to split the Conservative, and then walks away? We think this is indeed possible, which is why we are treating this development as genuinely open-ended. And we don’t think that the hard Brexit is off-the-table either. There is no way that the House of Commons will revoke Brexit or organise a referendum while May is still prime minister. If nothing can be agreed now, the decision might well fall to her successor.
May Abandons Tories
As I wrote last week, Theresa May has abandoned her party.
She is unfit to be prime minister.
Last week I commented In Bed With Corbyn and Unfit to Lead: File a No Confidence Vote Now
The Tories definitely need to get rid of May before she does more damage.
It would be a hoot if she survived only because of overwhelming Labour support.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Theresa May has abandoned much more than her party. She has abandoned the will of the British people and raised her middle finger to democracy in the process.
This is all that the pagan god of “democracy” is: Same old arbitrary rule by the sale old privileged hacks. Just wrapped up is childish rituals allowing the rulers to pretend their arbitrary, self serving actions are rubberstanped by their designated underlings.
It is all charades, UK will never leaves! We are way beyond the point of no return. It is really amazing that people still have energy to discuss it!
Here we are then. A choice between a deal worse than remaining in the EU, or remaining in the EU. Job done by TM and the other HoC remainers. It was what they wanted to do all along, stitch the people up.
There was no chaos in getting here, only the appearance of chaos in the choreographed dance of the politicians.
One has to worry for Corbyn. He was pro-Brexit until he was accused of doing nothing about anti-Semitism within the Labour party. My view is that there was some sort of blackmail involved here, because he suddenly became remain and the stories of anti-Semitism stopped. There are no coincidences in politics. Without Corbyn, we could have had a proper Brexit, and now we are stuffed.
Unfounded conspiracy theory. Seems as Corbyn has been shifting with the winds of politics and electorate. Neither the critique stopped nor was he a brexiter.
“nor was he a brexiter.”
Difficult to square that thought with Corbyn being an acolyte of Tony Benn. No one hated the EU as much as Tony Benn.
Corbyn is also a real socialist, and intelligent enough to know that you cant have socialism and open borders at the same time.
It’s ironic really. Here we are, come full circle. The evil May is in cahoots with the Fascist Left Corbyn to keep the United Kingdom in the increasingly totalitarian European Union. Ironic ? Well when the UK joined the damn thing Heath couldn’t do it with the votes of his own party, but had to rely on Labour rebels (they were opposed) to get the EEC Act 1972 through. Heath, like May couldn’t carry the Tory Party and the result was the poison we have seen for over 40 years. History often repeats itself.
Hard to do ones job as a well indoctrinated progressive tool, in a more exemplary manner than by delivering brexit by way of brexit proofing a permanent can kick….
May, Johnson. A plague on both of them.