Johnsons plan for a better Brexit

The UK debate on Brexit continues and before the Tory Conference this weekend, former Foreign State Secretary Boris Johnsons lay out his plan to save UK-EU exit mänegotiations and for a ‘better Brexit’.

“Here is what we should do.

• First, chick Chequers, and stop wasting time on a solution that can never be in the long term interests of this country.

• Then, go back to our EU friends and tell them that the December 8 Irish “backstop” arrangement – which effectively gives Brussels the perpetual right to the economic annexation of Northern Ireland if it deems there is ever any regulatory divergence between NI and the rest of the EU – is no longer operative and no longer acceptable to this country. That means we will need a different Withdrawal Agreement, stating that the Irish border question will be settled as part of the deal on the future economic arrangements, and that both sides are committed to avoiding a hard border. I recognise that this would be a difficult step, given the diplomatic energy squandered on the backstop, but it cannot be acceptable that the constitution of the UK should be held to ransom in this way, or the Belfast Agreement subverted in the manner proposed by the EU.

• We should agree a political declaration by early 2019, in parallel with the Withdrawal Agreement, which sets out the intention of both sides to use the implementation period to negotiate and bring into force a SuperCanada-type free trade agreement. This is a vital part of the package.  It makes no sense whatever to embark on a so-called Blind Brexit, whereby we sign a withdrawal agreement, but without specifying (yet again) what kind of future economic relationship we want. There is no way MPs could or should vote to hand over £40bn to the EU without any agreement about the future of the relationship. We would be abandoning our principal leverage in the talks.

• We should follow the logic of our own negotiating position and launch what we should have begun two years ago – practical preparations to operate our own trade and immigration policy and to leave the customs union. That will mean investing in the requisite technology, people and infrastructure, and we should get on with it and stop pussy-footing around. Of course such preparations should also be taking place among the rest of the EU, but we cannot expect them to have any sense of urgency when they see no activity on this side of the Channel.

• We should face the possibility – remote though I believe it to be – that we will not be able to conclude a Withdrawal Agreement and political declaration on this basis in the next few months, or to agree the new SuperCanada FTA by 2020. We need therefore to accelerate the work now belatedly being done across government to prepare for a breakdown in the talks. Rather than peddling endless propaganda about the chaos of “no deal”, the government should learn from the failure of Project Fear. People do not on the whole like to be panicked by their governments. What they want are practical ways sorting out what are – after all – basically banal questions of bureaucratic procedure about which most people have been in ignorance until they were turned into seemingly insuperable and existential challenges to the safety of the nation. Britain seems to trade very smoothly and effectively with countries not in the EU; we used to trade smoothly with France and Germany before we joined the EU. We can easily do so now.

• We should demonstrate that we are not just psychologically reconciled but indeed energised by the prospect of leaving. There could be no more vivid symbol of the ambition of Global Britain than to begin negotiations on Free Trade Agreements as soon as possible after March next year. It is critical that those negotiations are ready to start with a bang in April, and that the UK’s representative at the WTO moves immediately to assert an independent policy for Britain”.

You can read the entire article here: My Plan for a Better Brexit

Source: Daily Telegraph