An anti-Brexit sign is seen outside the Houses of Parliament in London, Britain, October 22, 2019. REUTERS/Simon Dawson
Britain faces fresh uncertainty as to just when it will leave the European Union, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson signaling he will pause his attempts to pass the required legislation after losing a key vote in Parliament on October 22.
The prime minister did manage to
secure formal approval for Parliament to assess his Brexit bill—the so-called ‘second
reading’—by 329 votes to 299. But his effort to limit discussion on the most
crucial piece of peacetime legislation in seventy years to just three days in
the House of Commons was defeated by 322 votes to 308.
Crucially, although Johnson had said
earlier in the day that he would pull the legislation and call a general
election if he lost the timetable vote to limit debate, he actually responded
to the vote by merely saying that he would pause the legislation while he
consulted with EU member states concerning an extension to the current October
31 deadline for Britain’s departure from the EU.
“Until
the EU have reached a decision we will pause this legislation,” Johnson told a
packed House of Commons. “The EU must now make up their mind how to answer
Parliament’s request for a delay.”
But
his statement also included a declaration that sounded more like a threat than
an offer to compromise further on his withdrawal agreement. “The Government must
take the only responsible course and accelerate our preparations for a no deal
outcome.”
His
comments were made immediately after Opposition Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn had
offered to work with the Government to deliver “a reasonable compromise” to set
a new timetable for discussion of the Brexit bill that the Government had
brought to the House at the start of the day’s proceedings.
The bill covers such key elements as
the transition period between the UK’s formal withdrawal from the EU and the
actual implementation changes in trade and regulatory relations between the UK
and the remaining twenty-seven EU member states.
The withdrawal agreement that
Johnson’s government concluded with the European Commission on October 17
provides for this transition period to last until the end of 2020, but further
extensions may be required in some areas.
It also covers such politically
contentious issues as the rights of UK residents in the EU and of EU residents
in the UK, and the payment of the 33 billion pound “divorce bill” required to
meet the existing UK obligations towards the current EU budget and longer-term
commitments such as infrastructure and pensions.
Above all, the bill establishes a de
facto customs border in Irish Sea in order to ensure—for legal, political
and security reasons—that there is no need for a customs border on the island
of Ireland, even though the British province of Northern Ireland, which will
leave the EU under the Brexit legislation, shares a 310 mile land boundary with
the Republic of Ireland, which remains in the EU.
All this is set out in a 110-page
bill that is accompanied by no less than 636 pages of explanatory notes. No
wonder so many MPs wanted more than just seventy-two hours to scrutinize what
the bill means for the UK’s future. Moreover, the Government’s rushed timetable
ensured there was no time for the Independent Office of Budget Responsibility
to carry out its widely anticipated analysis of the economic impact of the Government’s
Brexit plans. At present, the prevailing assumption is that a managed Brexit would
cause a fall in gross domestic product, possibly by around four or five per
cent.
It is therefore hard to escape the
conclusion that the bill was not only being rushed because Boris Johnson wanted
to deliver on his promise that Britain will quit the European Union on October
31 but in very large part because the Government did not want the bill to
undergo any detailed examination.
One element that will certainly be
addressed whenever consideration of the bill is resumed is that, if no further
agreement is reached on future trade relations with the EU by the time the
transition arrangement expires at the end of 2020, the Government can still
take the UK out of the EU without a deal. The bill does not include any
mechanism for Parliament to ensure that Britain does not leave without a deal
at that stage.
Responding to the day’s events,
European Council President Donald Tusk said the EU would grant the UK an
extension to its departure date. But the European Commission in Brussels will
now have to decide just how long an extension to grant Britain—and for what
purpose. It could limit the extension to just a few weeks, to give the UK
government time to get the through Parliament. But it may opt to give it much
longer, not least if it thinks that the fraught nature of British politics is
such that a general election or a referendum might have to be held before Parliament
finally decides the issue.
At present it does not look as if
there is sufficient support in the House of Commons for a new referendum, and
while Johnson would like to have a general election, he is constrained by
legislation that requires him to secure a two-thirds majority in the House of
Commons if one is to be held before the next scheduled poll in 2022.
So right now the ball is in the
Commission’s court. But in the next few days they will bat it right back to
Boris Johnson. And who knows what he will do with it then.
John M. Roberts is a UK-based senior fellow in the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and Global Energy Center.
Further reading
Sat, Oct 19, 2019
In a day that has created as much uncertainty as any other in the four-year long saga of Britain’s proposed exit from the EU, Johnson actually managed to trigger not one but two constitutional crises.
New Atlanticist
by
John M. Roberts
Sun, Sep 22, 2019
Just two years after Scots narrowly rejected independence by referendum, a second bite at the apple―IndyRef2―is being widely discussed, and one recent opinion pollshows it leading to a pro-independence result.
Long Take
by
Andrew R. Marshall
Tue, Oct 1, 2019
While London and Hong Kong will continue to play outsized roles in international business, their privileged status may be more precarious than it seems.
New Atlanticist
by
Michael B. Greenwald
It is hard to escape the conclusion that the bill was not only being rushed because Boris Johnson wanted to deliver on his promise that Britain will quit the European Union on October 31 but in very large part because the Government did not want the bill to undergo any detailed examination.
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