Exactly what’s going to happen with Brexit is deeply unknown – circumstances will have changed by the time I finish typing this let alone by the time you’ve read it. There are, however, some basic ground rules to consider. I should start by pointing out that I’m deeply biased here: I stood as a candidate for UKIP (the political party arguing for Brexit for those lonely decades) and worked for it as a press officer, ghost-writing articles for Nigel Farage, sending out press releases, and so on. I am not ambivalent about what I want to happen with Brexit. Perhaps I should also point out that I live in Portugal, and I very much like the varieties of Europe and her peoples. It’s the political structure of the European Union I’m against, not the place. In an American sense, it’s being just fine with the country and Americans, it’s the federal government that are being eyed askance.
What I want is that the United Kingdom crash out of the European Union in March 29 with no deal in place, that we revert to World Trade Organization terms and be finally and totally rid of the embrace of Brussels. That’s the end of my opinion, and on to the facts.
Fortunately for me and mine that’s also what the default option is at present. There was a fun court case a few months back which insisted that the House of Commons must have a significant vote on whatever the deal was as we left the EU in response to that referendum result. The aim was to make sure that the majority in Parliament in favor of not leaving at all would be able to insist upon that will. The amusement is that it’s rather backfired.
That default is that we just leave, without a deal. That’s what the current law is. We invoked Article 50, we’re leaving. It takes a positive act for anything else to happen and that ruling says that it needs a majority in the House of Commons. But there is no majority in the commons for anything.
As Tuesday’s events showed, there’s a majority against the deal cobbled together by Theresa May. There might even be a majority against the very existence of Theresa May’s government – note that in a parliamentary system you must be able to command a bare majority of the House of Commons on really important votes or we start over with a new government – but there’s no positive majority in favor of any specific alternative.
Some would just say it’s all too difficult so we shouldn’t leave at all – generally those who weren’t in favor of even asking us voters the question in the first place. Others say that we should delay, the problem with that being that to be able to do so means agreeing that we’ll not then turn around and leave anytime soon. Revoking or delaying the “Article 50” exit, as it’s called, doesn’t gain a majority. There are various ideas about having a new referendum to see if we all really meant it. But the law says there has to be a useful time for such a campaign to run and we’ve not got the months left for that to happen, nor that majority of MPs to vote for a new referendum.
Tossing out the current lot, having an election, and starting again is popular among all but those who might not get re-elected but it doesn’t actually solve the problem. March 29 is still approaching and there is still no majority in favor of any other deal.
There’s a plethora of idealistic hopes variously named the Norway Option, Canada Plus, and all that. Again, none of those gain a majority as needed in Parliament and most of them don’t even gain bare acceptance on the other side of any deal, the other 28 members of the European Union.
Back to opinion: I’m such an extremist that I insist the very existence of the European Union is a bad idea and that our leaving might be the first tumbling brick which brings the whole edifice down. Yet it is still factually true that the Brexit process is in a bit of a bind. Among those who have to decide, those parliamentarians, there is no majority in favor of any action or deal. And yet the default, without such positive decision making, is that Britain leaves without a deal at all, and reverts to WTO terms.
Myself, I’m shivering with anticipation even as I note that rather a lot of my countrymen disagree.
Tim Worstall (@worstall) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a senior fellow at the Adam Smith Institute. You can read all his pieces at The Continental Telegraph.
