‘No deal better than a Bad Deal’ sloganises Theresa
May irresponsibly—which is a dangerous proposition for the economy, trade and
living standards.
Mrs
May also says ‘We’ll make Britain Global’ … but I say we are already!
The second main reason why
Mrs May did a U-turn and called a snap election ( despite some 7 times stating
to the contrary ) was that she saw an opportunity to advance with her Brexit
project without having to explain hardly anything to the public about what
constitutes a ‘good deal’ or a ‘bad deal’ nor the consequences of a ‘no deal’. Keep everything nice and vague
was and remains her tactic—win the election with a massive majority and end up
with another five years unhindered…
But ‘events, dear boy
events’ intervened and so the Brexit debate slipped down the campaign headlines
as Mrs May’s series of U-turns, disastrous manifesto gaffes and her poor, if
not disastrous, campaigning style took centre stage.
Then recalling Wilson’s
warning that ‘a week is a long time in politics’ the Manchester and London
terror attacks came from nowhere and now questions as to Mrs May stewardship
over seven years of domestic security matters, terror surveillance and the
severity of police cuts are dominating the headlines.
Oh dear me …
This was not the way it had
been choreographed—being over 20% ahead in the opinion polls, her popularity
soaring and with a struggling Labour Party leadership, the winning strategy was
to be all about ‘My team’, ‘My manifesto’, ‘Strong and Stable’ leadership and
‘Give Me a strong hand to negotiate’ over Brexit.
Well before it’s almost too
late for this campaign, best return to the topic of Brexit, the negotiations
and where we are at currently.
Now I am passionately pro-Europe
and will campaign to either stay in the EU or, if the UK does actually Brexit
in 2019, campaign to re-join one day. As Nigel Farage and others said at the
time of the referendum, if the result was 52/48 in favour of remaining then
‘the matter was not settled’.
My position on Brexit is
possibly even more hardline than the Liberal Democrats stance (although it is close
to my views). Whilst disappointed with the Labour Party’s stance I readily
accept that it would be better to have a Labour team led by Sir Keith Starmer
negotiating with the EU, than the Conservative team led by David Davis. Starmer
is a better negotiator being less arrogant and confrontational.
The Prime Minister, as a
Remainer, in truth has little credibility. It is just not honest to hold the
views she had on the single market and security as during the referendum and
now argue completely to the contrary. The burning ambition of being Prime
Minister has caused her to quickly cast her principles aside, I am afraid. And
all for the sake of trying to keeping her party together. But I reckon, should
she win, the unity will unravel somewhere along the journey towards Brexit and
beyond.
Mrs May was right during the
referendum to describe the single market as the largest trading block in the
world—even Mrs Thatcher agreed in the late 1980s when the single market then embraced
only 300 million people whilst now its over 500 million! It can never be
replaced by a good or better deal, either with the EU or the Rest of the World.
Mrs May and
David Davis aim to replace the UK’s trading arrangements with 27 countries of
the EU and a further 57 countries with which the EU, and thereby the UK, have agreements presently in place. It is far from clear what these new trade
agreements might look like in the future and which countries would be involved.
With
Brexit divorce talks starting in two weeks’ time, as I have said Theresa May
fatuously insists that ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’. Continues to keep
everything close to her chest despite the fact that opinion polls indicate the
the public want much more transparency. After all the EU have done just that.
All we know from David Davis is that some 30 plus sector impact studies have
been undertaken but they are not going to be published. Also he has ready some
100 pages of negotiating detail. He will need much more than that as negotiations
proceed.
It
wouldn’t be the end of the world, Brexiters argue, if we failed to reach a free
trade agreement and had to fall back on
World Trade Organisation rules. After all, the likes of the US and China have no
preferential access to the EU and yet trade smoothly under WTO rules.
Then
Mrs May talks of having trade commissioners based
"overseas in nine different regions, determined by markets rather than
national borders, to ensure UK trade policy is guided by local experience and
expertise". It is all fanciful and of little impact compared to
out existing trading arrangements..
What are
the alternatives that they considering? A US-UK trade deal? Or a more extreme
worldwide trade deal? Based on the evidence of existing global trade agreements,
it is clear that if the Brexiteers want to limit the negative effects of
Brexit. The UK has no viable trade deal alternative to an agreement with the EU
that essentially does not replicate, to some extent, the present ideal situation
reading the single market.
Ah, but we can become
‘Global Britain’ so the story goes—there’s no need to worry! But we are already global and the yearning to reinvigorate, for example, Commonwealth trade is too
simplistic. Not only does the Commonwealth make
up a relatively small part of UK trade, receiving 8% of their imports, it is
dwarfed when compared with our exporting 44% to the EU and receiving 53% of imports
from the Union.
In this
post I have only concentrated on what might happen to UK trade after Brexit. It
is a serious question—and in this election no attempt has been made to begin to
give some detail other than platitudes and vague references.
There are
indeed some serious times ahead for all our industrial, financial, service,
food, drinks, agricultural and fisheries sectors. If I have to choose one or the other … I would prefer
to have Labour rather than the Tories negotiating Brexit for all sorts of
reasons…but that will have to wait for another day.