Johnson sets own Brexit deadline as UK threatens to renege on Withdrawal Agreement
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 | By Daniel Capurro,
Front Bench Editor |
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Brexit is firmly back on the agenda. Today Boris Johnson will declare an October 15 deadline for reaching an agreement on a trade deal with Brussels. The Prime Minister will release a pre-recorded statement saying that if the deadline is not met: “then I do not see that there will be a free trade agreement between us, and we should both accept that and move on."
It’s not entirely a deadline of Johnson’s own making. The EU has already made clear in private that October is the real cut-off point for a deal, despite the transition period running until December 31, because of the long ratification process involving Europe’s parliaments.
The PM’s comments follow on from those made by Dominic Raab, the Foreign Secretary, and David Frost, the UK’s chief Brexit negotiator, yesterday.
– Tear it all up –
The biggest sign yet that Britain is ramping up the pressure on Brussels, however, is the news that London plans to undermine the Northern Ireland Protocol of the Withdrawal Agreement, which aimed to resolve the border question. The Withdrawal Agreement was signed last year ahead of the general election and avoided a no-deal exit at the time.
The story, first reported by the Financial Times and since corroborated, is that the Government plans to use the upcoming bill on the UK internal single market to override key provisions of the Protocol covering state aid in Northern Ireland and the need for customs paperwork on goods shipped to Great Britain. The Finance Bill, which makes the Budget law, is then expected to be used to undermine tariff provisions.
If the UK were to go ahead with the plans, it would make any agreement with the EU impossible.
– Is it a bluff? –
It would be a fairly bold act to repudiate an international treaty and one signed less than 12 months ago by this very PM. So what’s going on? Brexit policy is run so tightly and secretively from the very centre of the Government that it is hard to do anything other than speculate as to their intentions. Still, there are a few factors to consider.
First of all, the EU has been confident at every stage since 2016 that Britain would suffer far worse in a no-deal scenario. The one major caveat was the Irish border, but with that issue neutralised by the Withdrawal Agreement and the UK targeting a far weaker level of economic integration, Brussels’ incentive to do a deal has greatly diminished. Threatening to rip up the Northern Ireland Protocol changes that calculation.
Another possibility is that there is no great strategic gamble at play and this is simply a policy choice. State aid is clearly of growing importance to Dominic Cummings and his hopes of a high-tech economic revolution. Meanwhile, there were hints earlier this year that Johnson & Co didn’t yet grasp how much they had already signed away on Northern Ireland. If no deal is now the most likely outcome, they may simply see the Protocol as a price not worth paying.
– More than a little drastic –
Yet there are reasons to doubt how sincere the threat is. Even in the bleakest moments of the Brexit negotiations, only the most hardcore of Brexiteers were advocating signing a deal and then ripping it up.
For Brexit to be a success, the UK will need to sign a number of international agreements, while “Global Britain” and the UK’s long-standing position as a guarantor of the international rules-based order rely on its staunch defence of treaties. Take Hong Kong and the Sino-British Joint Declaration, for example.
Reneging on the Withdrawal Agreement risks undermining all of that.
– The Last PM of Scotland –
It also strikes directly at the greatest fear that has often animated Tory opposition to no deal – the Union. The idea of a no-deal exit is intensely unpopular in Scotland, so to be seen to deliberately pursue it could be catastrophic for hopes of avoiding Scottish independence. That’s a line Labour will push hard this week.
Right now it’s hard to say which route Downing Street is targeting and Johnson and Cummings have shown a willingness to U-turn dramatically in negotiations with Europe before. But, as it stands, a deal looks very, very unlikely. |
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