Theresa May's Waffle and Fudge
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Title : Theresa May's Waffle and Fudge
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Title : Theresa May's Waffle and Fudge
link : Theresa May's Waffle and Fudge
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Just as she reached the podium earlier today to give her long-awaited Brexit speech, Theresa May paused to look at her watch and spent the next hour declaring fudge o'clock. While a convoluted word salad arranged to look appealing to the increasingly demented and unrepresentative Brexit hard right and editorial leader writers, the content proved to be just as light weight and, in some instances, contradictory.
Ireland, for example. Before Christmas, May signed the UK up to remaining in some kind of customs union with the EU to avoid a hard border between the north and the republic. Regulatory alignment was one of the phrases bandied about. Since then she and her cabinet of misfits have done everything they can to suggest they didn't mean it, all the while acting as if Brussels can't read English and doesn't keep tabs on the British press. Things got so bad that earlier this week, Boris Johnson (who else?) had written May a private letter intimating that dumping a frictionless border was a price worth paying for Brexit. Small wonder her speech made the claim "I have put upholding the Belfast Agreement at the heart of my approach." Why use a small lie when a whopper will do? She then went on to reiterate the dilemma the December meeting was supposed to put to rest, that having a separate agreement for Northern Ireland violates the UK's integrity. Which is true, and which is why, again, she agreed to regulatory alignment in the first place. There were some hints this would continue, albeit with the UK exercising its sovereignty by reserving the right to diverge. In other words, nothing has changed, nothing has changed, to coin a phrase. And she spent a chunk of her time waffling about it.
The second egregious aspect of her ramble through her negotiating position was the welcome but belated recognition that, yes, there is going to have to be some compromise. It may have taken 18 months and we're just over a year away from handing in EU membership, but reality has at last impinged on the Tory high command and their "have cake and eat it" strategy has fallen apart. While signalling that she wishes Britain to remain party to some EU agencies (with the requisite subs conferred), May is still holding out for some sort of deal with the EU that doesn't disrupt "40 years of economic integration", but simultaneously allows for Britain to strike advantageous arrangements with emerging economies - the blasted unholy grail of the Brexit ultras. She then went on to muddy the waters by talking about how the present single market is only a partial entity that reflects the interests of its members, implying the UK isn't as plugged in as we are led to believe and that in some way it disadvantages the UK. With a government this willfully deluded, you can understand why business is warming to Corbynism and that even Michael Heseltine is contemplating voting Labour.
Stated with enough bombast to crater North London during the referendum campaign was the claim the EU needs us more than we need them, thanks to the trade deficit between the UK and the continent and, well, because Britain. May stated it again with a little more humility by suggesting if we have to make "tough choices", so do the EU. Specifically, what she is getting at here is the character of the deal between the two following Brexit. In principle, she is right. Yes, I know, broken clocks, etc. The best Brexit deal for both parties is a bespoke one. If single market subscription is off the table, then something like Labour's customs union plus is the best starting point. However, May's problem is the EU27 prefer an off-the-shelf solution based on existing arrangements with countries outside the EU, and the weight sits with them - especially as Donald Trump has shown his (small) hand by whacking up tariffs on steel and made blood curdling comments on trading deficits with other countries and his embrace of the concept of trade war. The US hasn't got the UK's back. True, Labour might have been in a similar position were they negotiating Brexit, but then again Labour wouldn't have gone out of its way to antagonise Brussels and made light of agreements already entered into.
In short then, there was very little of substance here. Billed as a grand gesture it restated existing fudges, highlighted some small compromises on peripheral issues, and arranged a set of aspirations that would have been difficult to achieve had the government not pissed the UK's soft power up the wall. This was a long, windy speech that, for all intents and purposes, didn't move things on at all.
Ireland, for example. Before Christmas, May signed the UK up to remaining in some kind of customs union with the EU to avoid a hard border between the north and the republic. Regulatory alignment was one of the phrases bandied about. Since then she and her cabinet of misfits have done everything they can to suggest they didn't mean it, all the while acting as if Brussels can't read English and doesn't keep tabs on the British press. Things got so bad that earlier this week, Boris Johnson (who else?) had written May a private letter intimating that dumping a frictionless border was a price worth paying for Brexit. Small wonder her speech made the claim "I have put upholding the Belfast Agreement at the heart of my approach." Why use a small lie when a whopper will do? She then went on to reiterate the dilemma the December meeting was supposed to put to rest, that having a separate agreement for Northern Ireland violates the UK's integrity. Which is true, and which is why, again, she agreed to regulatory alignment in the first place. There were some hints this would continue, albeit with the UK exercising its sovereignty by reserving the right to diverge. In other words, nothing has changed, nothing has changed, to coin a phrase. And she spent a chunk of her time waffling about it.
The second egregious aspect of her ramble through her negotiating position was the welcome but belated recognition that, yes, there is going to have to be some compromise. It may have taken 18 months and we're just over a year away from handing in EU membership, but reality has at last impinged on the Tory high command and their "have cake and eat it" strategy has fallen apart. While signalling that she wishes Britain to remain party to some EU agencies (with the requisite subs conferred), May is still holding out for some sort of deal with the EU that doesn't disrupt "40 years of economic integration", but simultaneously allows for Britain to strike advantageous arrangements with emerging economies - the blasted unholy grail of the Brexit ultras. She then went on to muddy the waters by talking about how the present single market is only a partial entity that reflects the interests of its members, implying the UK isn't as plugged in as we are led to believe and that in some way it disadvantages the UK. With a government this willfully deluded, you can understand why business is warming to Corbynism and that even Michael Heseltine is contemplating voting Labour.
Stated with enough bombast to crater North London during the referendum campaign was the claim the EU needs us more than we need them, thanks to the trade deficit between the UK and the continent and, well, because Britain. May stated it again with a little more humility by suggesting if we have to make "tough choices", so do the EU. Specifically, what she is getting at here is the character of the deal between the two following Brexit. In principle, she is right. Yes, I know, broken clocks, etc. The best Brexit deal for both parties is a bespoke one. If single market subscription is off the table, then something like Labour's customs union plus is the best starting point. However, May's problem is the EU27 prefer an off-the-shelf solution based on existing arrangements with countries outside the EU, and the weight sits with them - especially as Donald Trump has shown his (small) hand by whacking up tariffs on steel and made blood curdling comments on trading deficits with other countries and his embrace of the concept of trade war. The US hasn't got the UK's back. True, Labour might have been in a similar position were they negotiating Brexit, but then again Labour wouldn't have gone out of its way to antagonise Brussels and made light of agreements already entered into.
In short then, there was very little of substance here. Billed as a grand gesture it restated existing fudges, highlighted some small compromises on peripheral issues, and arranged a set of aspirations that would have been difficult to achieve had the government not pissed the UK's soft power up the wall. This was a long, windy speech that, for all intents and purposes, didn't move things on at all.
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You are now reading the article Theresa May's Waffle and Fudge With link address https://newstoday-ok.blogspot.com/2018/03/theresa-mays-waffle-and-fudge.html