Brexit again
 

Dear British friends,

Again I turn to you in confusion about British politics. (Your politics are fascinating just now, and I find it hopeful that there is a country where conservatives are willing to put what they perceive as the nation's best interests above loyalty to party!) Can any of you help me understand a couple of points?

What's up with Johnson and the backstop (keeping Northern Ireland in a (temporary) customs union with Europe)? He seems not to have proposed any alternative to it, but his interest in negotiating one is reported seriously, as though such negotiation can take place without any alternate proposal.

Why did Johnson give Parliament time to rebel? Why did he prorogue Parliament beginning mid-September and not immediately (or immediately on their reconvening after their break)? (I don't mean to ask you psychoanalyze him; I'm hoping there is a practical reason, maybe some law, that explains the timing.)

Thanks.

Good questions, Mark.

Regarding the first, the problem with the backstop is that it isn't temporary. There's no time limit and no provision for the UK to exit unilaterally. The effect would be to keep us permanently within the Customs Union and unable to negotiate trade agreements with other countries. States don't agree to such things unless defeated in war.

The second is a puzzler. The Government has no need to fear the legislation going through the Commons. They can filibuster in the House of Lords. If that fails, they can ask the Queen to refuse royal assent (which constitutionally she must do). If they don't want to embarrass the Queen, the UK can vote against an extension or ask an ally to do so; and since the decision must be unanimous the request will fail.

So I'm guessing that the prorogation delay was to enable the Government to call an election.

If what you're saying is true, David, then why would Johnson have bothered kicking people out of his party? Sounds like he can get his way no matter what. Are you suggesting that he really doesn't want to push Brexit through until his decision is validated by winning another election? He's willing to take the risk of losing?

As far as I can see that's the only explanation, though I'm surprised he wants to have the election before 31 October.

Post Brexit it's going to take years to conclude the negotiations, so it's necessary to purge the party of dissidents.

Nah, I'll try to stay out of this one. (I won't return, but just to be transparent, a summary of what I deleted: Boris isn't long for the job, Brexit, if it ever really were, isn't supported by the public anymore, never mind a no deal and so of course these "rebels" are actually representing their constituencies' desires. And, oh yeah, I didn't think Trump could win so I could be wrong about Boris not being around long. Morons seem to be the in thing, politically speaking.)

Roger,

It's not clear that Johnson can get his way at present, he's well short of a majority since the 'purge'. He'd promised that we'd be out by October 31st, deal or no deal. (And he'd promised he could get us a better deal, by threatening a no-deal to force the EU to give us a deal -- and oddly, also telling the EU that this was his strategy).

And it's no deal that was looking the most likely until yesterday, and some might even say, that's what he wants, or had settled for: Leave without a deal, blame the EU for the lack of deal (rather than Boris failing to achieve what he'd said he could), follow this by a quick election before the damage done by a no-deal-Brexit becomes too apparent, and sweeten the pot with some already-emerging promises of masses of extra spending, in the hopes that people forget the last 10 years of austerity.

However, Parliament is in the process of legislating against a no-deal Brexit, which would require the UK to ask for an extension to the leave date if a deal can't be reached. So now Johnson wants to call an election ASAP, before the Oct 31 deadline, presumably because he thinks that would place him in a stronger position to carry out his pledge to ensure we leave by the deadline. And, of course, because he I reckon he knows he's not really going to get a deal sorted out. Since him sorting the deal the said he could sort would get us out on time.

If there was an election on Oct 15th, which is what Johnson now wants, and he got a majority, and having purged his opponents within the Tory party and replaced them with allies, he might be able overturn the anti-no-deal legislation and allow us leave without a deal on the 31st. But to do this, he needs parliament to agree to having an election (and by a two-thirds majority I think), which requires the opposition parties to agree to let him do this.

However, the opposition have said they won't agree to the election until the bill that prevents the UK leaving without a deal becomes law. By which point, I think, it'd be too late to call an election before the deadline for leaving the EU, especially as pro-Johnson allies in the House of Lords are trying to slow it down as much as possible. So, Johnson is not going to get what he wants here either.

So, assuming Johnson doesn't magically conjure up a new deal that the EU will accept (which I don't believe he expects to be able to do), then the election, when it comes, would likely happen after the October 30th deadline and we'll still be in the EU then. At this point Johnson's claims that he could negotiate a stronger deal and that he'd get us out by October 30th will not have come to pass. But, of course, then he can blame Corbyn's 'surrender plan' and the say that had he not been hamstrung by this, he'd have got us a deal, because the EU would have been scared into it by the prospect of a no-deal, alongside blaming the EU for not negotiating the way he wanted them to.

The obvious benefit of kicking MPs out of the Conservative party who don't agree with him, is that come an election he can replace them candidates who do. So, basically, the old rebels, the ones who voted against the government's proposed deal, upon taking power, kick out the new rebels and consolidate their power. Of course, this could backfire in an election. For example if the ousted MPs stand for reelection as independent Conservatives against the new Tory candidates and split the Tory vote.

That's my take. Obviously I'm not an expert and things are moving very quickly.

I'm staying out of this one too, but my husband has just called the whole Brexit business a "clusterfuck".

I said to him, "A what??" I've never heard that word before, but I've learned that it's a US military term meaning a "disastrously mishandled situation or undertaking".

How very apt! :rolleyes:

Jayne

Yes, the term seems apt. I do think Putin must be delighted at every passing minute, as Western democracy pays the price.

Cheers,
John

Thanks for all the thoughts.

Does no backstop mean a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland or is there a third option?

Another question I have is why call another general election, in which people's votes could be affected by issues other than Brexit, and not instead call for another Brexit referendum? Aren't there some who might vote against Brexit but still generally prefer Tory policies in other areas?

I've also read that there may be ways to change the rules in order to call another general election without a two-thirds majority. Have I heard right? Apparently they can change the two-thirds rule with a majority vote.

I'm not sure that Johnson would win another referendum. It would also be a bit mulligan-y, since the people have in fact voted already, FWIW.

Cheers,
John

Oh - the joke goes like this. An Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman walk into a pub. Then the Englishman wants to go, so they all have to leave.

I didn't suggest that Johnson would want to call the referendum. I meant Parliament. Can't Parliament do it?

Yes, it's mulligany, but so is the process being pursued at the moment. It seems to me that a referendum that is over three years old, older than the last two (?) general elections themselves, and conducted before numerous aspects of the question and the difficulties of implementation became well known, ought not to be binding on the country. If the current electorate (which includes many who were not of age to vote years ago) feels differently, it seems a bit strange to hold them to the wishes of the electorate of three years ago. After all, we're talking about doing it now, not three years ago, so it makes sense to consult the people of now, not the people of then. If the process dragged out another ten years, would the country still feel beholden to the electorate of 2016 in 2029? When would the referendum expire if Brexit keeps on not happening?

Well, Donald Trump usefully pointed out that another referendum "would be unfair to the winners." So there's that.

Cheers,
John

I think fairness has gone out the window by the time we all start to learn what proroguing is. Time to go rogue when you prorogue, I think.

But if Parliament can repeal existing laws, as of course it can and does from time to time, and it's not considered unfair to those who passed the prior law, I don't see why it's unfair for the people acting in a referendum to reverse an earlier referendum. I just don't see the difference.

Sadly, many democracies seem to be playing constitutional hardball these days. The object of the game is to keep your own team in power by any means necessary, usually by exploiting loopholes and technicalities and as many dirty tricks as a court of law will let you get away with, and some that they won't.

The authors of the Wikipedia article seem to have forgotten two Census-related instances of constitutional hardball. The first is the use of gerrymandering when drawing new districts based on Census data, in order to consolidate or split geographical groups favorable to a particular political party. The second is Trump's recent attempt to add a question to the 2020 Census that would decrease Census participation (and therefore the Census-determined share of political power) in communities with large numbers of undocumented immigrants--i.e., in districts that tend to oppose Trump's xenophobic policies.

Back to Brexit. Suddenly dredging up and employing some arcane rule like proroguing, which everyone's forgotten about because it's so outrageously out of the norm that the last guy who tried it was beheaded, certainly seems to fit right in there, doesn't it?

Constitutional hardball destroys justice and freedom in the homeland you claim to love, but who cares? What's important is that your side managed to seize (or remain in) power, and to defeat those evil bastards on the other side. It's okay to fight evil with evil, if you can persuade your followers that there's no other way to win. Go, team!

The alternative to winner-take-all government depends on compromise. And the more polarized and extremist a society becomes, the less acceptable compromise becomes.

Here's one option, a partial alternative, apparently being considered. It was leaked I think, and Johnson has said he's "open to it".

https://www.irishnews.com/news/brexi...rexit-1702628/

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This...

Julie: "Constitutional hardball destroys justice and freedom in the homeland you claim to love, but who cares? What's important is that your side managed to seize (or remain in) power, and to defeat those evil bastards on the other side. It's okay to fight evil with evil, if you can persuade your followers that there's no other way to win. Go, team!

The alternative to winner-take-all government depends on compromise. And the more polarized and extremist a society becomes, the less acceptable compromise becomes.

... is the whole ball of wax.
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Thank you, Matt. That's interesting. I don't understand why it is only a food zone that is considered. Other goods seem equally at issue.

It's good to know that there is another option on the table (at least for food) and that Johnson, at least theoretically, is prepared to make a significant concession.

Well, the Irish died in their millions due to British rigidity about markets in the C19th (the potato famine), so I imagine food has special significance in these negotiations.

Cheers,
John

Roger, you made some excellent points in #10, #12 and #14 about the addled referendum imposed on us in 2016 by the Conservative chancer Cameron, now skulking in his shed.

How the narrow result of this incompetently-framed exercise has become the unchallengeable 'will of the people' for a catastrophic No Deal Brexit engineered by the Arch-Chancer and his Dr Strangelove of a Special Adviser and String-Puller at the head of the fanatical sect the Tories have become is beyond me.

Thanks. The short version of what I'm saying is that it's weird to say that calling for a referendum is anti-democratic.

Just to share my opinion a moment - I'd love to see another referendum. But my UK friends, who mostly feel the same, tend to note their reservations about having one. It's the best gauge I have as to UK opinion on the topic, apart from the joke I posted upthread. My sister has a UK passport and would dearly love to vote again.

Cheers,
John

Yes, it is distinctly strange when the argument against a second referendum is that asking the people what they think now is deeply undemocratic and undermines "the will of the people", irrespective of what the "will of the people" is now that it's clearer what we're getting ourselves into (and certain campaign promises have evaporated ...). The Greeks, who invented democracy, often re-voted and changed their minds. I also seem to recall Theresa May putting her deal to the vote multiple times in the hopes of getting it through. Johnson is doing the same in his attempt to get a pre-deadline election.

I guess a more reasonable argument against a second referendum would be that, with the country essentially split down the middle, a second referendum is likely to yield another marginal result that is, say, 51.9% in favour of staying (whereas the previous one was 51.9% in favour of leaving), and thereafter calls for a third referendum would arise (or for a "best of three") and so on ...

Looking at opinion polls, although staying in has consistently been more popular than leaving for the past two years, there's still not an awful lot in it, and if the polls are right, likely what you'd get would indeed be a marginal victory for staying in the EU (though there's no guarantee that polls give an accurate prediction in terms of who'd actually come out and vote). Opinion may have shifted a little, but it doesn't look like there's been an overwhelming change of heart, I think.

I'd say positions have become become increasingly polarised and unlikely to change all that much in the face of facts, reasoned argument and statistical likelihoods, all of which can easily be dismissed as lies and fake news (by either side), and often are. Especially given how complicated the whole situation is and how much is unknown. Witness, for example Rees-Mogg's ad hominem dismissal the concerns of a doctor who compiled the government's own report on the impact of a no deal Brexit on the supply of critical drugs and medicines. Mogg's argument was simply that the doctor was a "remoaner" and this was more "Project Fear".

A referendum could help settle what the "will of the people" is on the no deal situation. Currently it can be argued that, since the referendum result was to leave, we should leave at any cost. Conversely, it can be argued that when people voted for leave, they weren't voting for no deal, but to leave with the promised advantageous deal we were told that we'd easily get from EU. Had they specifically been asked about leaving without a deal, they'd have voted differently.

Various polls have consistently shown the British public would prefer to stay in the EU to leaving without a deal, and the margins here are bigger than above, typically staying is around 10 percentage points ahead (often around 45% versus 35%). If this were replicated in a referendum, the argument that leaving without a deal was fulfilling "the will of the people" would be much harder to make.

That said, another (one-off) poll suggest the majority (52% to 38%) want it over and done with by 31st October whether there's a deal or not. So, maybe that's the will of the people too. And yet another (one-off) poll suggest the public are split almost exactly 50:50 on the question of whether it's worth extended negotiations til January 2020 to avoid a no deal. Both polls can't be right.

But since it seems 99% certain that there won't be a deal (right?) wouldn't the relevant referendum be whether to move forward with a no-deal Brexit? The deal Brexit, it turns out, is simply not an available choice, so there's no point having a referendum to find out if people want it. That's another good reason to have a second referendum, since the question has changed now. Last time around, people were voting on the deal Brexit, not the no deal Brexit. In a sense, a new referendum wouldn't even be a do-over, since the question has changed.

Well, the leaving with a deal isn't happening because Parliament couldn't agree on one. May's deal was acceptable to the EU, but too soft for Hard Brexiters in her own party (who are now in control of the party) and too hard for (most of) Labour, who wanted a 'softer' deal.

None of this would prevent a referendum resolving what sort of deal we had, given that the deals on offer were deals that EU would agree to. May's deal being one, and there alternative "softer" deals too.

Personally, I think it would make sense to have a referendum on how we leave before we do. Here is the deal (or deals) that would be acceptable to the EU -- i.e, a viable deal, not a fairy tale one. Do want to want to leave with this deal, or leave without a deal, or stay in the EU. That way the referendum is voting with much fuller information than the original one. Quite a complicated ballot paper, though, I guess.