Daily Mail - 27.08.2019

Daily Mail, Tuesday, August 27, 2019 Page 15

nts Brexit done

with Canada

O

nly Boris Johnson’s ene-

mies could deny that his first

month in office has been

something of a tour de force.

Even his admirers have been

taken aback by his energy, enthu-

siasm and oomph.

last week he charmed Angela Mer-

kel, Chancellor of Germany, and got on

much better with President Emmanuel

Macron of France than expected. He

apparently secured their agreement

that the Withdrawal Agreement is not,

after all, set in stone.

Over the weekend he joshed and larked

his way through the G7 meeting in Biar-

ritz, making a predictable hit with Donald

Trump, who love-bombed him in his press

conference yesterday afternoon.

Even that lugubrious EU bureaucrat

Donald Tusk, who has been inexcusably

rude to Theresa May in the past in what

seemed a misogynistic way, pawed Boris

affectionately.

So the nation feels chirpier than it did

this time last week. A solution to the

impasse suddenly seems feasible, though

my blood chilled a little when the Prime

Minister declared that Britain could ‘easily

cope’ with no Deal. Only in the sense that

our ancestors coped easily with the Great

Fire of london.

yet the fact is that, while our spirits are

higher than they were, we have not in

terms of policy advanced any further. Mrs

Merkel has given Boris what he described

SO FAR SO

GOOD, BORIS

• BUT WHAT

IS THE PLAN?

with opposition leaders today as they plot

how to block Mr Johnson taking the country

out without a deal. But even before the meet-

ing, Mr Corbyn came under attack from those

he was courting support from.

liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson said

he risked jeopardising a vote of no confi-

dence in the Government by insisting he

became caretaker prime minister.

Ian Blackford, the SnP’s Westminster

leader, said it was increasingly clear that

passing legislation to block no Deal appeared

to be the option most likely to unite MPs.

The labour leader wants to bring down the

Government so he can be installed as a care-

taker prime minister and seek another Brexit

extension from Brussels. The ‘Gaukeward

squad’ of Tory former ministers, which is led

by Philip Hammond and David Gauke, is

also looking at how they can use parliamen-

tary mechanisms to stop no Deal.

Mr Johnson is braced for a turbulent week

as the Commons returns from its summer

break next Tuesday. But a senior British offi-

cial told the Daily Telegraph: ‘He [Mr John-

son] thinks European leaders should not be

listening to the very wrong messages emerg-

ing from some Parliamentarians who think

that they will stop Brexit.’

Comment – Page 16

By

Stephen

Glover

as a ‘blistering timetable’ of 30

days to come up with a substi-

tute for the dreaded backstop.

This is a moment of truth. On

the one hand, the Government

has to show quickly that it has

credible proposals for avoiding

a hard border between north-

ern Ireland and the Republic,

and for respecting single mar-

ket rules in Ireland once the

UK has left the EU.

And, on the other hand, Brus-

sels has to demonstrate that it

is open-minded enough to

accept an alternative to the

backstop if one can be found

which promises to keep open

the border while recognising the

integrity of the single market.

This is the $64,000 question:

Is the backstop deep-down a

ploy by Brussels for keeping the

UK in the Customs Union post-

Brexit, and subject to EU rules

and regulations while no longer

having a seat at the table – a

kind of vassal state? It is what

some Brexiteers suspect, not

without cause.

In weeks, we should have a

definitive answer to this ques-

tion. But only if no 10 is able to

come up with a detailed set of

sensible proposals calculated to

appeal to reasonable people.

In yesterday’s press confer-

ence, Boris merely conceded

that developing new plans was

a ‘big job’. He swatted aside a

question from the Mail’s Dep-

uty Political Editor, John Ste-

vens, on the subject, and stone-

walled or evaded every other

question. At the very least he

should have shared with us

when he will unveil his ideas.

The truth is that he has so far

been characteristically broad-

brush in describing his alterna-

tive plans to a backstop. He has

spoken breezily of ‘MaxFac’ or

‘Maximum Facilitation’ (a

phrase almost bound to turn

off ordinary mortals).

This would involve companies

in northern Ireland and the

Republic signing up to ‘trusted

trader’ schemes which would

remove any need for physical

customs checks. Declaration of

goods would take place away

from the border.

Fortunately for Boris, other

minds have spent a good deal

of time and effort in fleshing

out this thought. One of them

is former Tory minister Greg

Hands and his Alternative

Arrangements Commission.

Mr Hands has spent months

working with international

technical experts to come up

with ideas that would do away

with the need for the backstop.

He has produced a series of

administrative and technologi-

cal measures, all of which he

says are already in place some-

where in the world.

A

‘TRUSTED trader’

scheme similar to that

between the US and Can-

ada has been copied,

which would avoid routine bor-

der checks. There would be ani-

mal and food checks away from

the border.

His carefully worked out pro-

posals were presented to a

gathering of German Cabinet

members and German entre-

preneurs by Mr Hands in June.

He claims his audience was

interested and sympathetic.

Meanwhile, a different set of

ideas has been presented by Sir

Jonathan Faull, a former Euro-

crat, and a group of academics.

Outlined on yesterday’s Radio

Four Today programme, they

enlist the criminal law in both

the Republic and northern Ire-

land. It would become an

offence under UK and EU law

for companies or individuals to

export goods in commercial

quantities across the border on

which duties had not been paid,

and which did not meet each

side’s specifications.

Sir Jonathan is no loony,

misty-eyed Brexiteer but a

hard-headed former civil serv-

ant who has spent his working

life in Brussels, and under-

stands the pedantic mindset of

the Commission, and its obses-

sive adherence to single market

rules, as well as any man alive.

The point is that both Greg

Hands and Sir Jonathan Faull

• and no doubt there are other
  eminent people – have studied
  this problem carefully, and
  believe there are workable
  alternative arrangements to
  the backstop. Of course, it
  would take months to finalise
  any new plan.
  But this could be done during
  a transition period after Britain
  leaves the EU on October 31 –
  provided there is a deal.
  In short, much of the spade-
  work has been done. Boris and
  his team at no 10 need to focus
  on various viable proposals,
  and produce a plausible scheme
  to present to Angela Merkel &
  Co in very short order.
  I am presuming the Prime
  Minister wants to meet Mrs
  Merkel’s challenge.
  I trust there isn’t a powerful
  faction in no 10 which would
  prefer no Deal in any circum-
  stances, and will try to thwart
  every attempt to avoid it.
  What will happen when the
  Government brings forward its
  new ideas? The answer to that
  question must partly depend
  on whether, when that point is
  reached, Brussels thinks Boris

has overcome Remainer resist-

ance, and must therefore be

dealt with.

For we may be certain that as

long as EU leaders believe a

cross-party coalition is likely to

see off Boris, they won’t offer

him any concessions on the

backstop, or anything else.

And if Boris vanquishes his

political opponents? In those

circumstances, should EU

leaders – not least Ireland’s

intransigent leo Varadkar –

persist in clinging to the back-

stop, the conclusion will be

that they don’t want to reach a

sensible agreement with the

British Government.

T

HEy have insisted time

and again that the back-

stop is only temporary.

Even curmudgeonly chief

negotiator Michel Barnier has

reiterated it.

This will be shown to have

been a lie if they refuse to

replace it even after Boris

comes up with a practical

substitute.

If the EU is genuine in saying

the backstop is not permanent,

why in God’s name can’t it

accept that its removal must

be agreed now rather than at

some unspecified date in the

future? As the Prime Minister

wrote in his letter to Donald

Tusk last week, no sovereign

country can accept being

locked into an international

agreement from which it can’t

escape without the say-so of

other states.

The backstop has been

rejected three times by Parlia-

ment. The British Government

wants rid of it. It will soon

present an alternative – and

only then we will discover

whether or not the European

Union wants a reasonable deal.

‘Do the right thing

and honour pledge’