As I’ve stated above, the EU is also demanding completely open borders (on the island of Ireland), and was the first party in the talks to do so (which the FT article also makes clear).
So we are left with the situation (knowing what we know now about the EU position) that the EU’s red lines over Ireland can only be fulfilled by either a Norway+ solution (since even Norway has a “hard” border given the EU’s current interpretation of the term) or a solution that (gives the EU the ability to) permanently carve NI off from UK jurisdiction for regulatory and trade purposes, without a plebiscite in NI(*) ( which unionists justifiably see as a clear breach of the GF agreement).
You will note that no UK red line has yet been considered, and we are already left with the only situation that the EU will tolerate that is constitutionally possible for the UKgov is Norway+. How is that not bullying? How is “agree that the EU retains almost all powers over the UK it currently holds, and you have no influence, OR we will inflict no deal” not a punitive approach?
This is the simple result of applying the EU’s own absolutionist technical analysis to its own red lines. It’s true that if you apply the same analysis to the UK position you get an incoherent mess of cakeism, yes! But apply it to the EU position and you get something much nastier.
I don’t incidentally, believe that this is a deliberate action by the EU parties. Again, the FT article paints a clear picture of how things have ended up here. Most of the key EU players doubtless want a “good deal” from the EU’s perspective.
(*: The idea of a plebiscite is an interesting one, as it would bypass the DUP and (with a yes vote) allow the backstop agreement to be clearly constitutional. I’m not sure how that would work in practice though.)
I’m aware of the UKgovs concessions last January. It’s clear that the UK’s interpretation of those concessions has never matched the EUs, and though Johnson may not have been paying close attention you can guarantee Robbins and May were. Ultimately though, my point holds if we consider the EU’s conduct pre-January, so it’s not that relevant as a counter to my point. The UKgov agreement to the Jan backstop could be seen as a misguided attempt to get to a position where we could negotiate around the impossible EU demands. In any case I’m not that interested in re-litigating it, in hindsight it was a clear mistake, but the point of diplomacy is to forge an agreement, not to catch the other party in a mistake.
Yep. Without the NI backstop the EU could easily force a canada-style deal(*) structured to be a good deal for the EU and a poor deal ( but not a “bad deal” ) for the UK. (The only question is the UK parliament, but outside of a couple of ultras like Soubry and Clarke I don’t see the motivation for the Tory remainers to vote this down - the alternatives would be no deal or Corbyn, realistically). No deal is avoided, and life goes on.
(EDIT: to clarify, this would lead to a more significant border on the island of Ireland than is currently present. This would be a bad thing. It’s just the least bad way out of this for everyone concerned)
With the backstop we get no deal, disaster for the UK, increasing the chances of putting a Russophile, NATOsceptic PM into power (killing security cooperation), much worse consequences for the GF agreement, severe economic impact on Ireland (ironically), and a mild economic headwind across the continent that can be clearly tied to the EU’s failure to make a deal and will therefore benefit the worst kind of eurosceptic populists.
The EU absolutely has the power to pick the first option here rather than the second.
Wow, that is a much more persuasive argument than my previous arguments about the iniquity of the EU position on NI!
(*: Maybe I am overestimating May’s pragmatism here. OTOH it’s the one trait she’s noted for).
Again, so what? I don’t think it’s bullying, but even if it is. So? What does that change? Big mean EU is taking advantage of being bigger than the UK to get what it wants? Yeah. That’s part of the point of the EU.
Countries do that shit every time they negotiate, that the UK is not used to being the little guy, well, get used to it.
And, funnily enough, it’s not the EU. It’s Ireland. Ireland, for some reason, doesn’t trust the UK to keep the NI peace, and wants rock solid assurances, the backstop that guarantees no border. The rest of the EU would much prefer if the issue didn’t exist. But it does exist.
This would require the UK government anandoning their position on the border too, of course. I wonder if May would have done that, had it been helpful?
Again, what is the actual UK proposal for the Ireland / NI border post-Brexit? Other than handwaving about some nebulous and mythical ‘virtual border’ nonsense?
Actually, there was supposed to be a new UK proposal on the border. May even gave a live broadcast from Downing Street to say as much. But that seems to have never shown up?
Way things are going, chances of everyone being OK with whatever solution is minimal, so, hard Brexit is the most likely result. Good luck, we’re all going to need it.
You realize that this reinforces DarthMasta’s point? Unionists are all but threatening violence in support of the British goverment’s negptiating position. Imposing a border in Ireland is something.that people on both sides agree is a breach of the treaty, which is why Britain promised not to do it.
But Darthmasta was advocating the exact same perspective - except claiming that it was Republican terror he was concerned about. I interpreted that as an honest desire to maintain the amicable compromise in NI, and I would be grateful if you would extend a Nobel Peace Prize winner the same courtesy.
I don’t agree that the DUP see imposing a border as a breach of the GFA, and there are plenty of statements from them backing that up. Even Enda Kenny didn’t see imposing a border as a breach of the GFA (see article linked above). It’s a lot less clear cut than the current Irish government and the Commission would like you to believe. While the spirit of the GFA is very much one of openness between the Republic and NI, it doesn’t contain the kind of clear guarantees regarding the border as it does regarding the constitutional status of NI.
If you’re talking about UKgov, I don’t believe they’ve ever put it in such stark terms - although they have certainly always had minimising the border at the heart of their negotiating strategy.
I’m not really trying to excuse the UKgov’s hypocrisy and missteps here, although sometimes I err in that direction. It’s far more about examining the EU’s behaviour for me. People keep pointing out how much power the EU27 in these negotiations - so shouldn’t they be held somewhat responsible for the outcomes?
Ultimately I’m deeply worried that unless there is some kind of reform the EU will remain an easy target for populists because of its level of fiscal control and undemocratic structure. The EU has to do something to neuter the populists’ arguments. Maybe it shouldn’t have to, but noone said democracy was fair.
The GFA is an agreement that exists in a particular context, one that was made possible by that context; the context being, of course, that all parties were in the EU and there was therefore no border between any of them and no barrier to free movement or commerce between any of the parties. The absence of a border made possible much which would not otherwise be possible, e.g. the ability for families to be reunited regardless of where members happened to live.
It is not at all clear to me (or to anyone else) that the GFA can survive the imposition of an actual border. It breaks the premise on which the agreement was founded and the context in which it was intended to function. By way of analogy, the agreement also assumes that there is a government of the UK and a government of Ireland and I doubt anyone imagines that, were either of those governments to actually cease to exist, the GFA would continue to function as it does today.
Difference in my non English, non Irish eyes, is that a physical border in Ireland is real easy to target by any nutso Republican, while some building somewhere in England, with a bunch of not Irish Catholics in it, should be a harder target for a nutso Unionist.
I’mma kill British officials to prove how much of a Unionist I am?
I agree with the reform part, but I don’t see where the undemocratic part comes in. Because really, I’m a federalist, and even I don’t know if I want the EU to be more democratic. What would that mean? Because at the end of the day, the EU is a bunch of independent, sovereign countries, and making it more democratic means taking sovereignty away from the countries.
And I’m theoretically fine with that for some stuff, not so much for other, but real iffy on what an EU with the ability to truly dictate to it’s members would mean.
We’re still in a world where a former French Prime Minister running for Mayor of Barcelona is a big deal…
Thanks @Aceris, that was a much better description of the points you are trying to make - or, much more understandable to me, at least.
I remain unsympathetic to complaints over the backstop on grounds of sovereignity, because - as already mentioned - at no point has anyone claimed this would or should be a permanent solution. The point of the backstop is to have a solution in effect, until such a time as a permanent treaty has been negotiated (as opposed to having no solution if things come to a crash). And the reason - as DarthMasta point out - is that the Irish don’t trust the UK if negotiations break down.
But even if we agreed that the EU is bullying the UK and moving the goalposts, etc., etc., the point DarthMasta makes is perfectly valid. This is realpolitik. If you think the EU is bad, wait until you have to deal 1 on 1 with the US and China.
In general, though it’s just staggering to me how badly mishandled Brexit has been by the British government (and it’s opposition). Brexit was always going to be a bad thing, at least in the short term, but IMO there were many ways in which this could have been managed, such that the damage could have been minimized, and benefits achieved that would at least partially offset the damage. One would think that there would be more than enough intelligence and experience in parliament to see what needs to be done, and enough integrity to do it - but instead, you have a huge squabble where everyone is so focused on short-sighted gain/retention of power that they are willing to let the lunatic fringe steer the ship of state into the iceberg.
The past two years have not been good for democracy.
The problem is the EU can just say “This trade deal isn’t good enough on the Irish border, so we would need to keep the backstop in effect”. You are right about the lack of trust - although I think there is little justification for it (the UK has a good record at upholding its international agreements), but the lack of trust goes in both directions. There are certainly good reasons for the EU not to trust Johnson, but equally there are good reasons for the UK not to trust Selmayr, and he has a lot more power than Boris does!
That ship has already partially sailed (what an awful metaphor) - which is why I specifically called out the EU’s control over fiscal policy (or at least ceilings on fiscal policy).
And there is no way to get that control back without a crisis - as the Italians are finding out.
There was a joke some years ago that the Euro was a plot by Italy to acquire German central bankers. I guess that joke is not as funny as it used to be, though of course there was a lot of truth in the joke, because my god,
Italian central bankers!?
Yes, it does mean that the UK needs to settle the border issue with a deal that the Irish will accept. But that is going to be the case anyway. Because what you’re fearing, is exactly what the Irish will do. If the UK doesn’t propose a solution that is acceptable to Ireland, then their verdict will be “nope - that trade deal does not satisfy us - hard brexit for you”.
What the backstop actually ensures is that the Irish border issue does not prevent the rest of the negotiations to break down. It essentially allows the Irish issue to be dealt with in isolation from the rest of the trade deal. Which is not ideal - for anyone - but probably better than the alternatives. And if you think that’s unfair to the UK, I’m pretty sure that the Irish really don’t care.
Ok, yeah… I suspect pretty much the entire British Commonwealth would love to have a few words on how good that record is. And Ireland - especially - has zero reason to trust the UK. Whatsoever.
You do realize that back when the current border was created almost 100 years ago, the British government’s position was pretty much exactly the one you have today - let’s make a deal, and then we solve the issue later? That did not end well for the Irish. And not so well for the British either, in the long run. But yeah - telling the Irish that they should trust in British assurances on this matter, when the entire reason that the border is even this big an issue today is due to British duplicity… is really not going to work.
