Brexit – Page 24 – Slugger O'Toole

From Jeremy Corbyn, the chance of a Brexit breakthrough

Brian Walker on September 27, 2018, 12:12 am

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For some, Jeremy Corbyn had at last managed to deliver the usual old conference guff and sound like a leader. But for many others well beyond the hard Left, Corbyn’s speech took them out of the tight old Tory straightjacket, if just for a moment. The Brexit passage was particularly clever. Whether he entirely believes in or not, Corbyn made an offer to Theresa May that could be the Brexit breakthrough, one that’s compatible with her comments on the plane …

Theresa May’s defence of “the precious, precious Union” takes centre stage

Brian Walker on September 25, 2018, 11:31 pm

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Let Labour tie themselves in knots over an election or another referendum. Let the Brexiteers demand the abandonment of Chequers. The lady’s not for turning, to coin a phrase. And more: she has rejected their favourite option, a Canada plus free trade deal, because it threatens the unity of the United Kingdom. Those were her essential messages to the travelling Westminster lobby on board the plane to New York for the UN General Assembly. And she invoked the taoiseach twice …

Efforts are mounting to drive a wedge between Theresa May and the DUP over the backstop

Brian Walker on September 25, 2018, 12:27 pm

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The Guardian has been the only media I can find claiming a British ploy to get round the backstop in these terms. Senior diplomats involved in the negotiations have reacted furiously to the details of a fresh UK proposal for avoiding a hard border on the island of Ireland, briefed to the Irish PM, Leo Varadkar, at last week’s Salzburg summit. Under the solution, May will agree to Northern Ireland potentially staying, in effect, in the single market, as the rest of the …

A second referendum will sadly become an orange and green issue in Northern Ireland

Sarah Creighton on September 24, 2018, 9:25 am

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As the fallout from Salzburg continues, there has been a renewed focus by remain voters in Great Britain to push for a second referendum. Campaigners want a rerun of the June 2016 referendum or a vote on the Brexit deal. Jeremy Corbyn is currently under pressure to back another vote at the Labour conference. There’s a perception that a second referendum would be relatively straight forward in Northern Ireland because it voted ‘remain’. In an ideal world, that would be …

Stepping back from the cliff edge has begun. Chequers is not dead – says the EU

Brian Walker on September 21, 2018, 11:36 pm

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The salvage job has already begun and a better verdict sought than disaster. If Salzburg was not all a misunderstanding, it was more like a farce without the laughs. People literally passed each other in the night. Theresa May’s ten minute pitch over dinner, followed by a leaders’ chat over lunch next day without her was hardly the stuff and style of diplomacy. In the gap between the two meals, rumours and spin raised suspicions and fears about British intentions …

Theresa wraps the flag around herself and Northern Ireland. But fresh proposals on the border may test the DUP deal

Brian Walker on September 21, 2018, 6:38 pm

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Flanked by two Union Jacks in the State Downing Room of No 10, Theresa May reacted to her mauling in Salzburg with a sharp sense of affront. Let’s face it, a woman can still register hurt dignity more convincingly than a man. The setting was in fact improvised; it had been moved inside from the street because of a deluge. And in a faint but uncomfortable echo of her disaster at last year’s party conference, there was a delay because …

Theresa May takes a big share of the blame for Salzburg but not all of it. How do they all walk back from the cliff?

Brian Walker on September 21, 2018, 1:14 pm

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Salzburg has turned out to be a Suez moment, a sudden and unexpected blow to the government’s prestige delivered by the discovery that UK does not possess the political and economic weight to make a deal with the EU so special that that it violates existential Union rules. The shock is all the greater because the EU decided that, too close to deadline, the British had allowed themselves to be deceived by too much diplomatic fudging; and this had tempted …

Chequers: they thought it was all over. It is now. Brexit brinkmanship or bust

Brian Walker on September 20, 2018, 4:50 pm

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Donald Tusk President of the EU Council At our EU27 working lunch today we had a good discussion on Brexit, which once again reconfirmed our full unity. Let me highlight three points. First, we reconfirmed that there will be no Withdrawal Agreement without a solid, operational and legally binding Irish backstop. And we continue to fully support Michel Barnier in his efforts to find such a model. Second, we agreed to have a joint political declaration that provides as much …

No breakthrough for May at Salzburg. More moves on the border needed and concessions on the single market

Brian Walker on September 20, 2018, 11:52 am

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God knows where we are now. Groping towards a solution probably. We’re unlikely to get much more clarity from Salzburg by the end of the day. The suggestion of a second referendum by the Maltese and Czech leaders made an interesting diversion but little more. The Irish Times headlined “stark divisions” between May and Varadkar in advance of their breakfast meeting today but added: Sources close to the prime minister accepted, however, that London would be bringing forward proposals on …

Brinkmanship on the border: May squares off before EU leaders as Barnier revises his plan

Brian Walker on September 19, 2018, 11:19 am

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To herald her appearance at today’s EU summit at Salzburg, Theresa May has presented a bullish case for her Chequers plan where it matters most – to the Germans. In an article under her name in the heavyweight paper Die Welt, she insists that Chequers contains the border solution without resorting to the EU’s legal draft of the backstop. Say it quietly but she may be pushing at a door, if not wide open, just left ajar. Pardon the cliché, …

New November “deadline” for agreeing withdrawal terms puts pressure on all sides

Brian Walker on September 18, 2018, 1:51 pm

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The mantra “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” may be joined with a new one, “ nothing changes until everything changes.” This applies in spades to the border backstop wrangle. Rather than face crunch point at Salzburg on Thursday, EU leaders have confirmed that the terms for UK withdrawal will be settled at a special Brexit summit in November. So that’s all good, then. But the backstop still nags and Theresa May has said nothing to wish it away, …

The burning border problem. Is it a gnat or a camel?

Brian Walker on September 17, 2018, 12:37 pm

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Only two things are sure about the Brexit arguments. Over the border issue ’they’re hotting up inside the Conservative party. And the binary nature of the exchanges between Theresa and Boris produces only deadlock as binary arguments tend to do. In her BBC interview no doubt she believes she’s defending “the precious, precious Union” and the will of the Northern Ireland people. But as interviewer Nick Robinson might have reminded her, they voted in favour of Remain. Does it really …

Brexiteer border plan is not a game changer, nor a government wrecker for the DUP

Brian Walker on September 12, 2018, 3:30 pm

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Will Arlene Foster proclaim the merits of the Brexiteer European Research Group’s plan for the border when she meets Theresa May? She will come under immediate pressure to give her verdict – for or against the Chequers plan on which May refuses to compromise; or in favour of the ERG’s? Nigel Dodds has declared the plan which is rival to the prime minister’s plan “positive and timely.” But is this an implied threat to withdraw support from the government? It …

As the practicalities of the border issue are wrestled with, the pressure on the DUP is mounting. Are the hardline Brexiteers preparing to rat?

Brian Walker on September 11, 2018, 11:41 am

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Now what? On the border issue, the EU Commission and the Brexiteers are coming closer together than either to the government, according to the Guardian. This report shows that both sides are getting down to the practical options, instead of political grandstanding. Do the options appeal to the DUP? Downing St are sticking with ” no EU officials” at British ports but for how long? Does ” no EU officials ” rule out categorically different rules for the island of …

The EU may shoot Boris’s fox and bail Theresa out

Brian Walker on September 10, 2018, 11:06 am

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The FT has discovered a blink of light for Theresa May amid the general Brexit gloom. The Daily Telegraph is among other papers lifting the story, labelling it, “Operation Save Theresa.” The EU is preparing to give its Brexit negotiator new instructions to help close a deal with Britain, in a conciliatory move that will bolster Theresa May as she suffers savage attacks from Brexiters at home. An informal summit in Salzburg this month between the EU’s …

When oh when will the UK government stop stalling on the backstop?

Brian Walker on September 8, 2018, 2:19 pm

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Why is Michel Barnier being messed about over the backstop and the border? On Tuesday he said this to the Commons Brexit Select Committee. I am very concerned about Ireland. We need to find a solution that avoids the return of a hard border and that remains today the main obstacle on our road to an agreement between the British and ourselves. On the ground, ladies and gentlemen, it is impossible—this is nothing new—to distinguish between customs checks and other …

The time has come for the next Assembly to vote on a border poll

Brian Walker on September 6, 2018, 12:01 pm

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In a brave attempt to discuss a border poll dispassionately, Newton Emerson is tentatively suggesting that it might be a good idea to hold a sort of test poll outside the terms of the GFA “to clear the air.” Unfortunately his analysis is better than his prescription, as a poll of any sort under official sponsorship, even one declared in some way not to count, would inevitably still stimulate the seven year itch among nationalists he rightly identifies , to …

From the London broadsheets, rare interest in Irish developing positions is to be welcomed

Brian Walker on September 5, 2018, 10:42 am

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The criticism is well made that British interest in Irish positions is generally self serving and fails to recognise their independent validity. Any slight shift in this is to be welcomed. The London broadsheets have paid Sinn Fein the rare compliment of taking seriously the party’s think-in at Cavan. It’s worth noting that they have yet to broach the notion that a Brexit solution would be so much easier if Northern Ireland were to join the Republic. Quite apart from …

Future Ireland: Where Can The North Thrive?

Claire Mitchell on September 4, 2018, 12:01 pm

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For some masochistic reason, I feel umbilically connected to the soil and the soul of this island. Especially this messed up northern corner of it. But there is no point in drawing borders in the soil, and driving flags into it, when it only has 60 more years of harvests left to give. It occurred to me recently that the best case scenario for Northern Ireland, as things stand, is to have a mediocre Brexit, for Stormont to limp back, for orange …

Brexit crisis point is arriving even faster than expected

Brian Walker on September 3, 2018, 2:16 pm

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At the opening of the Westminster season, no time has been wasted for open warfare to break out inside the Conservative party. Theresa May’s Chequers plan is assailed from both left and right, in the old terms, between Leave and Remain. Its main thrust – separating the authority to lay down rules for goods from regulations for services – is now specifically rejected by Brussels. Crying wolf is easy but this looks really serious. Boris slaps down his challenge in …