The UK Leaves the EU

THE UK LEAVES THE EU

 

in IP Watch at http://www.ip-watch.org/

After a long, lively, disputed and sometimes acrimonious campaign, the British people chose to leave the European Union. Over seventeen million people (52% of voters) stated their will to leave the euro-mess and go it alone.

Here are some notes on the referendum:

1- David Cameron is the most visible loser. He set the bar high when he committed to revamp the United Kingdom’s relationship with the EU and then to put the British membership of the bloc up for a vote. Negotiations with the other 27 Member-States soon proved to be difficult (Treaty change was quickly set aside) and Cameron chose to settle with relatively meek concessions. The fact that he considered these were relevant enough to defend the “Remain” vote, showed that he was more committed to staying in the organisation than to bring home some substantive reforms. This way, he lost credibility among Conservative euro sceptics and did not acquire any from other sectors, such as Labour supporters. On the day after, he naturally resigned.

2- The Leavers (Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, Nigel Farage) were the big winners. They assembled strong, focused and appealing campaigns in which the EU bureaucratic non-democratic behemoth, the recovery of sovereignty and national identity and immigration were the main messages hammered away. This message cut across the political and geographical spectrum, from Tories in the South of England to Labourites in the North and in Wales. Johnson and Gove can conceivably be the architects of the actual exit and their day-after posture was serious and reassuring.

3- Fearmongering and Foreign admonishments were among the main tools of the Remain campaign. I always found it incredibly stupid to use foreign meddling for domestic political gains. It is a tried and failed tactic. Most people are not keen on having foreigners tell them how to vote. Notwithstanding, this was used ad nauseam in this referendum: the EU, the Commission, the European Central Bank, the IMF, the OECD, France, Germany, the United States, all chipped in with dire warnings of an impending apocalypse. This was obviously construed to be a gross self-interested exaggeration. Actually, this exorbitant concern scantily hid a more sincere worry: the impact of Brexit in their own countries. As the stock exchange downturn in Milan, New York, Paris and Frankfurt (all considerably sharper than in London) showed, this fear seemed to be warranted. Anyway, most voters did not buy into the notoriously overblown forecasts. This, eventually, undercut even the more realistic negative analyses.

4- Labour and Jeremy Corbyn were the outsiders of the referendum. The party still battered by last year’s devastating electoral defeat and the leader mostly aloof and ambivalent on the EU question. So much so, that the ever fundamentalist and intolerant “The Economist”, accused Corbyn of sabotaging the “Remain” campaign. The fact is that a great share of the Labour voters voted to leave and Jeremy Corbyn is already facing a leadership challenge.

5- In the UK, for the time being, most of the turmoil is political with both the Conservative and the Labour parties facing leadership change and challenge, respectively. Although that is a bit unsettling, it is not really out of the ordinary.

 

in “The Guardian” at http://www.theguardian.com/international

The British people’s decision to leave the EU is one of the most relevant events in International Relations in the 21 Century. Like most events of this magnitude, they entail risks, challenges and opportunities.

Going forward, it is clear that the risks are multilateral and not confined to the UK. However, even outside the EU, the United Kingdom has many assets and advantages which, coupled with some reforms to make her more competitive and shedding some of the more stifling European regulations, could make Brexit more of a winner than a setback.

I believe it to be more unlikely that the EU will be able to implement the huge changes it needs to leave the stasis it finds itself in.

BREXIT or BRITIN?

BREXIT OR BRITIN?

 

BREXIT OR BRITIN?

in “THE ECONOMIST” at www.economist.com  

This year will be marked by the British referendum on the United Kingdom’s staying in or leaving the European Union (EU). It is difficult to overstate the importance of a vote that will determine the fate of the 2^nd largest country in the EU and whether or not the EU will see its membership diminish for the first time ever.

Two things are evident: the majority of the British establishment supports the “In” vote and the other 27 member states also want the UK to stay. However, it is for neither of these groups to decide the outcome of the referendum. That will be for the British citizenry to decide, and they clearly have not made up their minds yet.

The “Stay” (or Britin) side, which is led by David Cameron and is also supported by Labour, the Liberals and the main Welsh and Scottish parties, will hail the agreement reached this month by Cameron in Brussels as guaranteeing enough concessions and changes as to reforming the EU to a certain extent and assuring a special status for the UK in the EU.

Amongst the former, there is the increase in competitiveness, the red tape cutting (both staple promises seldom fulfilled), the protection of the rights and interests of non-euro countries and  the red card, the supposedly veto power given to national parliaments over EU legislation. As for the latter, the Stayers will point to the exemption London guaranteed concerning the elusive “ever closer union” mantra and concessions on welfare payments to immigrants.

On the other hand, the “Leave” (or Brexit) camp, will stress the harm of Brussels’ smothering bureaucracy and its encroaching on British independence and sovereignty. Furthermore, they will present Mr Cameron’s deal with the other 27 states as nothing short of insignificant, noting that there is no real “sovereignty devolution” to Westminster. The Leavers will naturally be led by London’s Mayor and Conservative M.P. Boris Johnson, other Conservative heavyweights like Justice Secretary Michael Gove and, of course, the UKIP led by Nigel Farage and Douglas Carswell.

 

David Cameron’s gamble: will it pay off?

in “THE ECONOMIST” at www.economist.com

The Britin camp will be favoured by the electorates’ tendency to vote conservatively in a referendum, i.e., choosing the supposedly safer option, the known one as opposed to the unknown. Their strategy will also be very much based on fearmongering about the mortal dangers involved in exiting the EU. Connected to this is the idea that the UK will stand to lose a lot economically if she leaves. Finally, they will be led by a Prime Minister who has recently been re-elected with an outstanding victory at the polls.

The Brexit camp will benefit by the agreement’s obvious shortcomings: there is no real reform of the EU, there is no real downsizing of the Brussels bureaucratic monster’s power and dimension, there is no real significant sovereignty devolution to London (no repatriation of EU social and employment laws, for instance) and there is no discernible contagion to other member states who seemingly are done with the EU’s overreach. Brexit will have the an and of counting with the support of most of the press which is strongly anti-EU. Finally, they will be counting on the natural aversion to the EU, a feeling which seems to be ingrained in a large part of the population.

In the end, the UK did extract some concessions in the deal and Britin will be able to extoll its benefits pointing that it would be difficult to have gone farther. This may be true, but it is really not a good deal: it was designed to attain the minimum standards so that Cameron could uphold it in the campaign trail and to prove that the 27 made a real effort to keep Great Britain in the fold.

That, however, falls very short of the goal of EU reform and sovereignty devolution. For that, Mr. Cameron would have to drive a much harder bargain, to spend much more time, diplomatic effort and cajoling and political capital, especially to engage with countries that might be more receptive to contain and reverse the EU’s overstretch.

Mr. Cameron chose instead to wrap up a deal as soon as possible for electoral expediency, convinced that the later the referendum were held, the worse his prospects would be. But his haste has weakened his case, opening his flank to corrosive attacks from Brexit.

By the Summer solstice we shall know if Mr. Cameron’s gambit paid off, or if both the United Kingdom and himself will be out.

Tory Hunch

TORY HUNCH

 

The 2010 election exi poll posted on the Big Ben.

in BBC News at www.bbc.com/news

Yesterday before dinner, roughly 3 hours before the exit polls on the UK elections were released, I posted this on Facebook:

I have a hunch that the Tories will fare better than expected and win the election tonight. Let's wait and see....

Then there were the exit polls pointing to a clear Tory victory.

And after a long and exciting electoral night, the Conservatives snatched the absolute majority: 331 MP’s out of 650.

The United Kingdom is back to normal, one-party majority governments.

And we, at Tempos Interessantes, will strive to continue to provide you with good forecasts. Or even a hunch. Let’s call it an educated guess.