The problem is the Chequers plan the Government has presented to the EU is already a very bad deal and that's before it gets watered down even further in negotiation with the European Commission. It effectively keeps the UK under the jurisdiction of the ECJ and makes it extremely difficult if not impossible to sign trade deals with other countries. We are leaving the EU but in name only, effectively as a vassal state.Originally Posted by Graham Breeze
The Government has made a complete dog's dinner of the negotiations and I can't decide whether this is due to serial incompetence or because the politicians and officials involved never wanted to leave in the first place and therefore wanted to keep as much of the old arrangements as possible. We started with an excellent negotiating hand in the form of our budget contributions and our huge trade deficit with the EU but this has been thrown away. Mistakes include:
- Agreeing to pay £39 billion exit fee without getting a trade deal in return.
- Agreeing to the Irish backstop.
- Making next to no preparations for a no-deal scenario.
No wonder Trump thinks we are idiots.
The Government has acted under the delusion that it could give concessions to the European Commission and that they would reciprocate. But they were warned by the former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis what would happen from his own experience of trying to negotiate with them in 2015.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...at-theresa-may
I'm coming round to the view that the only way to save Brexit is to take the EEA (Norway) option as a half way staging post. This involves accepting many of the rules of the single market but we would be out of the Customs Union and CAP so could sign our own trade deals. It would require no agreement from the EU and would immediately take the £39 billion divorce bill off the table. At a stroke it would increase our negotiating strength and remove the ticking clock giving us time to negotiate a trade deal with the EU (Canada plus) for when we left the EEA. In the meantime the Government could make plans to adopt the WTO option if talks failed.
https://capx.co/the-norway-option-can-save-brexit/
In fact Varoufakis suggested this approach all along.
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