I can’t tell if the media has lost all understanding of what is happening, or if Raab is trying to sabotage the negotiations.
The FT is optimistically spinning this as Raab positioning himself with Brexiteers ahead of a future cave, which he can blame on May. Given what the FT is also reporting about the UK caving completely on financial services (if the FT is right, that Times story from a week back was totally wrong), this doesn’t seem implausible.
I can totally see that. May can always overrule him.
Will this pass the Commons, though, if May had to push it past Raab et al.? There’s no point acting this way now if they are going to concede the point in a vote. Heck, does Raab resign if May overrules him?
As far as I can see, the only way May gets anything past the Commons is with Labour votes.
The current rhetoric from her opponents within the party certainly points that way. The Guardian live blog highlights that both Grieve and Johnson are arguing - from opposite ends of the Brexit spectrum - that voting down the deal in Parliament might well be justified, and wouldn’t necessarily create the no-deal crisis they are being told would ensue.
You know, I’m thinking it would be best for the EU to disentangle from Game of Thrones land, y’all politics are crazy.
A big part of me still thinks that when push comes to shove, everyone will vote along party lines (just as we’ve seen before). The talk is crazy, but the actions rarely are.
Many people have said that in the no deal scenario WTO rules require that, in the absence of a bilateral regional trade agreement, the UK would be obliged to enforce a “hard” border. This makes sense, but I’m confused about this. The EU has made it clear that trade agreements cannot be agreed under the A50 protocol, therefore any backstop agreement which is legally binding on the UK as a result of the A50 withdrawal agreement is not part of a bilateral trade agreement.
I can see how temporary transitional arrangements could be made to work, but a permanent backstop cannot be legally binding on the EU (as the EU lacks the power to make that agreement under the A50 protocol), and therefore cannot meet the WTO definition of a trade agreement.
Thoughts?
I don’t follow this. A backstop as part of the WA can be legally binding (certainly Article 50 allows for a legally binding WA - in fact that’s almost the only thing it does). The question then becomes is it possible for a provision in a WA to meet the WTO terms. I don’t know the details of the rules, but I’d have thought it would have come up (not least from the UK side) if not. There’s no particular reason why the EU’s definition of an FTA, in terms of what it’s willing/able to commit to with a member state, should line up exactly with the WTO’s.
Also, from a purely legalistic perspective, what would be wrong with taking the trade related bits of the WA (agreed before agreeing a FTA was possible), waiting until the transition when the UK is technically a third country, pointing to it and saying, OK, that’s an FTA for WTO purposes, but we’re also negotiating a full FTA?
Also this, from the GATT, would seem to pretty clearly allow an NI related carveout:
By the same logic, the transition period is questionable in legality for WTO purposes! I’ve seen this discussed a bit, but nobody seems too worried. I’m guessing we’re missing something.
[quote=“Ginger_Yellow, post:2028, topic:78214”]
There’s no particular reason why the EU’s definition of an FTA, in terms of what it’s willing/able to commit to with a member state, should line up exactly with the WTO’s.[/quote]
If it’s about questions of willing, absolutely, but the commission claims that the WA legally cannot be used for trade agreements. It’s unclear to me how the permanent backstop is not a trade agreement in that sense.
The question would be whether the WTO would allow(*) an agreement which does not become binding on both parties simultaneously. A legal case could be made that that is two unilateral agreements. Having said that I suspect you are right and it could be finessed in this manner.
(*: Inasmuch as the WTO has the power to allow or disallow anything… which is pretty limited really)
Wouldn’t that allow facilitated arrangements in the no deal scenario as well? That looks like a pretty antiquated part of the GATT/WTO treaties though, I wouldn’t be surprised if it hasn’t been superceded.
I also wouldn’t be surprised if pretty much everyone in the debate isn’t just making up everything they say about the WTO and the way the rules are applied :)
I’m not saying anything about it not being binding on both parties. I’m saying that (it could probably be argued) that a binding NI backstop is simply part of the WA for Article 50 purposes, but also an FTA (or whatever other term of art the WTO uses) for WTO purposes.
It’s far from clear to me there’s a bright line between what the EU can agree to in the WA and what it can in a post-withdrawal FTA. That distinction has always seemed a political one rather than a legal one. Formally, the EU can only sign an FTA with a 3rd country, by definition. And it can’t have separate customs etc arrangements with a member state (absent some specific legislation, anyway). But it can have a withdrawal agreement with a member state.As long as the WA doesn’t change the common external tariff and certain other things before the withdrawal date, I don’t see why it couldn’t legally have trappings of a trade deal.
Likely. I do know that enforcement of WTO rules is, er…what’s a good word? Lethargic? So maybe legal fog is fine for a year or two.
By no means do I think Peston gets it right all - or even most - of the time, but it’s better than completely uninformed speculation on what is going on.
At what point does no-deal start to look probable, and what are we going to do to prepare? (Beyond, you know, turning motorways into carparks and stockpiling food and medicine.)
No deal planning:
- Emergency funding + use of the military to (attempt to) double customs capacity overnight.
- Emergency legislation to provide a legal framework for import of food and medicines from EU - largely to provide legal clarity, and so the EU cannot impose de facto sanctions under the guise of “preventing illegal exports.” - and there would be no suspicion that the EU would do this if it hadn’t been for EU sources telling the UK press it would happen!
- Attempts to conclude arrangements separate from the WA on routine “third country” matters such as recognition of airline standards, basic freedoms of the air (no cabotage rights), security cooperation, data protection etc. This must be combined with a effective PR campaign to contrast EU treatment of the UK to that of less friendly states or those which provide less robust regulatory frameworks such as Russia, US etc. (*)
- Attempts to conclude bilateral agreements with France and Ireland regarding the land borders, to provide a framework for their operation.
- Attempts to agree visa waiver schemes bilaterally with EU states.
- Emergency legislatation to allow EU operators to continue trading in the city on a firm statutory basis, with sunset clauses if the EU isn’t willing to reciprocate.
- Prepare an alternate WTO tariff regime tailored to British needs. I would go for zero-rate on everything except cheese, wine, finished cars, and probably a couple of other major EU-UK exports(**). Tariffs on wine would be balanced by a reduction in wine duty.
(*: It’s these things that the WA is really absolutely required to cover. Holding it to ransom over a transfer of sovereignty in NI is inexcusable, even if you believe the NI CU solution is the best solution for NI and the peace process. Of course both parties are heavily invested in finding much more than a “basic” WA, but not having a fallback position is insane.)
(** : Not sure exactly what the WTO rules are here. I believe there are various categories of goods on which different tariff rates are set, and we could change these unilaterally once out of the EU, but I’m pretty sure almost noone understands how this all actually works. ).
The thing that moves no deal from disastrous to cataclysmic is if the EU effectively denies the UK basic third party economic arrangements for a period of time, by adding a poison pill precondition to the entire WA (***). No deal preparations must focus on attempting to ameliorate this issue, and highlighting it if the EU isn’t cooperative.
EDIT: Oh, and we should work out our obligation to the EU using generally accepted accounting practices and none of this reste a liquideur nonsense, and agree to pay it. The remaining 25bn or so should be spent directly on trying to ameliorate Brexit impacts.
(***: I don’t believe anyone outside of Selmayr actually is doing this intentionally, but that’s the effect of the position.)
EDIT2: To clarify, these are my off-the-cuff examples of the kind of thing UKgov might do. I’m not privy to any special information
That all sounds terrifying.
There are none where this is concerned. Governments, let alone supranational organisations, don’t use IFRS or GAAP. To the extent that there are government accounting standards involved here, its Eurostat (I’m sure the UK government would love that). But it’s not fundamentally a question of accounting, its about legal and political obligations.
Today has been troubling from the perspective of seeing an agreement forming.