This blogpost was written on May 27th 2018.
This week the Brexit negotiations resumed in Brussels with the UK presenting a series of papers, or rather PowerPoints, on issues ranging from future economic relationships between the two sides, through security cooperation to data protection and data flows.
On data protection, an issue with which we are very familiar, the UK’s pitch can best be summed up as:
Can we all pretend, and act, as if the UK has not left the EU?
Can we have exactly the same arrangement on data flows as we have now?
After Brexit, we won’t really be a third country, you know, not really, so can our data protection person still turn up at meetings of the European Data Protection Board?
But, of course, we will be outside the jurisdiction of the European Court and so we will need our own procedures to resolve disputes.
The only surprise is that the presentation did not end with that much used advert punchline: “…because we’re worth it”.
Having your chief negotiator on top of their brief should be a given. Knowing all relevant facts and figures is usually helpful, as is being familiar with the procedures that are to be followed.
Another week, another seven days that leaves us little wiser as to what happens next. With each passing day it becomes ever clearer that the UK government fundamentally misunderstands the position it has placed itself in as regards exiting the European Union.
“Repeal and replace” makes for a great political slogan. For Republicans in the US, who minted the phrase, it meant repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”). In January of this year, President Trump told ABC news that “he wanted “good coverage at much less cost” and “a much better healthcare plan at much less money.” Over recent months President Trump has found that while “repealing” might possibly be easy, replacing is a lot harder. To date, the Act has been neither repealed nor replaced.
Another week and we are no clearer as to what is going to happen. Last weekend the UK newspapers were filled with stories that the government had come to a consensus that a “transition” or “implementation” phase would be needed after March 2019, when the UK is scheduled to leave the European Union. The only disagreement between government ministers appears to be over the length of such a transition. Should it be two, three or four years?
Never have the words of former UK prime minister, Harold Wilson, sounded so true: a week is a long time in politics. Last Monday, the current (for now) UK prime minister, Theresa May, was confident of returning to parliament this week after last Thursday’s general election with an increased majority, allowing her to remake the government in her own image. She expected to face a crushed and broken Labour Party across the aisle. Instead, she is the one who is crushed and broken, losing her previously slim, but workable, majority in the House of Commons, leaving her dependent on the votes of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) from Northern Ireland. How long this political arrangement will last is anyone’s guess.