My guests this month were the Commentator, Liz Nelson and former SDLP candidate, Martin McAuley. David McCannDavid McCann holds a PhD in North-South relations from University of Ulster. You can follow him on twitter @dmcbfs
The Sun and the Guardian, raucous tabloid and campaigning broadsheet on either side of the Brexit trauma are united: Barnier has killed off the Chequers plan. The FT however is more circumspect. We have doubts it can be done without putting at risk the integrity of the customs union, our common commercial policy, regulatory policy and fiscal revenue,” said Mr Barnier. Mr Barnier and Mr Raab also said they had agreed to work on a model for financial services co-operation …
Patch Thompson is a postgraduate student at Queen’s University, specialising in Northern Irish and Labour politics and Anglo-Irish Relations. Last week, during his first political appearance since resigning as Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson told the House of Commons that, to his surprise, the question of the border in Ireland, which had previously been ‘assumed on all sides to be readily soluble’ was now ‘so politically charged as to dominate the debate’. Johnson’s shock at what anyone with basic comprehension skills …
Theresa May and Michel Barnier have spoken. Barnier has picked his way critically through the UK White Paper with its “facilitated customs arrangement” and common rule book, asking all the pertinent questions but turning nothing down. 80% of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU is now agreed, but the EU’s version of the backstop remains the bugbear. The black scenario is: no agreement on the border, no withdrawal agreement, therefore no transition and no deal. To be honest, nobody except …
Five Labour votes on Tuesday, plus really poor whipping on Monday night that allowed the Lib Dem leader and his predecessor to miss the vote are two crucial factors that helped save Theresa May’s bacon this week. The Commons will stagger on until Tuesday after all, as the government didn’t dare press for an early recess today after their hair’s breadth wins earlier this week. Internal opposition to May has come from both sides, first from Brexiteers opposing the Chequers …
Pressure may soon become irresistible for Theresa May to go against the habit of a lifetime and take a terrific political life or death gamble. Opening up beyond her bedraggled Facilitated Customs Arrangement unveiled at Chequers is Labour’s choice of a customs union – if not now, in the autumn. But this will mean a huge bustup and split in the Conservative party and require Labour support – official or unofficial – to pass. In the meantime, the Tainaiste is reconciled …
David Davis: “Theresa May and I both want to deliver the best Brexit. She’s offered a diluted version of it.” Watch again ▼@JuliaHB1 | https://t.co/sv3MZUm41c pic.twitter.com/Qe6UsXKt9a — talkRADIO (@talkRADIO) July 9, 2018 David Davis: “I will not run for leadership of the Conservative party.” Watch the full interview between Julia Hartley-Brewer and former Brexit Secretary David Davis on our YouTube channel ► https://t.co/Cpr3QLEXla@JuliaHB1 pic.twitter.com/0LR0ly9VK5 — talkRADIO (@talkRADIO) July 9, 2018 David McCannDavid McCann holds a PhD in North-South relations from …
Majority reaction to the Chequers summit is cautiously optimistic, most reservations from all but the Brexiteer fanatics being postponed, using the alibi of next Thursday’s publication of the 120 page government White Paper before they fully respond. If you’re naturally positive, you’ll see it as an undoubtedly soft Brexit; if you’re a cynic whether Leaver or Remainer, you may call it a fake Brexit. The outcome can be summed up by saying that on goods and regulations, the UK will …
The FT reports Theresa May is to present a new post-Brexit customs plan to her cabinet this week, in an increasingly desperate attempt to find a solution that can unite her feuding ministers and find favour with a sceptical EU. Details of the new plan have not been set out, but its existence — confirmed by Number 10 — demonstrates that Mrs May has concluded that neither of the two customs options under consideration by ministers for almost a year …
Trouble is, if you start a hare running you may have to shoot it. David Davis had proposed Northern Ireland have a joint regime of UK and EU customs regulations, allowing it to trade freely with both, and a 10-mile wide “special economic zone” on the border with Ireland, thus avoiding checks there. The Department for Exiting the European Union (DExEU) declined to comment directly on the report, but also did not reject it, saying work was underway to “refine” possible customs …
The Times reports the latest wheeze for sorting the border problem. The clear implication is that the UK government are admitting that neither of their transition ideas for a customs partnership or “max fac” will fly. But does it do any more than kick the can further down the road? Theresa May will ask the European Union for a second Brexit transition period to run until 2023 to avoid a hard border in Ireland. Britain will propose another transition covering customs and …
Tomorrow Nicola Sturgeon will unveil the SNPs economic case for another independence campaign. As it will focus attention on Scotland’s sluggish economic performance under an SNP government on the defensive, it’s a high risk strategy. Support for Indyref2 would first exploit resentment that the UK government has given no weight to the big Remain majority in Scotland and will ignore the Scottish Parliament’s refusal to give consent to a Withdrawal Bill that would fail to devolve powers over agriculture and fishing …
If the temporary extension of the customs relationship was greeted with euphoria, it was shortlived, as the FT reports. It exposes the next big issue. The single market looms. Mrs May was accused by some Conservative MPs of “bouncing” the cabinet into adopting the scheme, and others said they had been kept in the dark. Senior EU officials also expressed doubts about the UK approach, warning that it diverges significantly from Brussels’ preferred outcome. “If this is it, we will …
Has the fog started to clear? Can any sense be made of the claim and denial about extending the transition beyond 2020 to buy time to solve the customs relationship and the border? The Guardian, RTE and the BBC all thinks so, reporting top level briefings from both governments at the EU summit in Sofia. Without overdoing it sounds like a modest breakthrough on the hitherto incompatible versions of the stopgap . The longer term relationship involving a longer transition …
The rumour has now become fact (almost) Britain will tell Brussels it is prepared to stay tied to the customs union beyond 2021 as ministers remain deadlocked over a future deal with the EU, the Telegraph has learned. The Prime Minister’s Brexit war Cabinet earlier this week agreed on a new “backstop” as a last resort to avoid a hard Irish border, having rejected earlier proposals from the European Union. Ministers signed off the plans on Tuesday despite objections from Boris Johnson, the …
The Times has followed up on its report on how Theresa May challenged the complacency of the arch Brexiteer Jacob Rees Mogg in her series of back bench briefings in No10 when he claimed that a border poll could be won anytime despite Brexit, Mrs May said, ‘I would not be as confident as you. That’s not a risk I’m prepared to take. We cannot be confident on the politics of that situation, on how it plays out.’ ” This …
Times report Theresa May confronted Jacob Rees-Mogg at a meeting with Tory MPs designed to break the deadlock over Britain’s future customs arrangements with the EU, The Times has learnt. The pair clashed yesterday over the impact of rival plans on the Irish border, in what witnesses described as the prime minister “sending a tough signal” to hardline Brexiteers that she was not prepared to jeopardise the Union. It came after Mrs May went over the heads of her squabbling cabinet with a personal …
After appearing to side with her Defence Secretary on Wednesday in favouring a selective amnesty for former security forces in Northern Ireland, the Prime Minister has thought the better of it as the long delayed consultation on the Legacy Bill was launched. We are in the peculiar position of Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill broadly welcoming the Bill, while the DUP leader Arlene Foster contemplates a legal challenge to the High Court ruling that she wasn’t entitled to refuse to submit a …
Will the DUP and Sinn Fein pay any attention to the eloquent pleas of the elder statesmen to return to the Executive? On the surface the answer appears to be no, unless something is going on behind the scenes we don’t know about. Local politics suffers from elder statesperson fatigue. This generation has learned how to take in their stride the high sounding generalities from popes, presidents and prime ministers past and present. The shock of the new wore off …
Another day, another doubt. After a weekend of sherpa preparations for the EU summit on Thursday and Friday, both sides are still unsure they can reach an agreed position by tomorrow night on transition terms and duration for the UK’s departure from the EU. From the Irish Times preview of the David/Barnier meeting, it’s clear that the Irish government neither want nor need to take sole responsibility for imposing a veto on a transition timetable later this week. Irish and …
