The UK’s negotiating position? It’s all a bit J Arthur

An article in The Economist entitled ‘Facing up to Brexit’ highlights the farce that is playing out as a result of a narrowly won referendum last summer which will put an end to the UK’s membership of the European Union. The crux of the article being that the UK government are in denial about the consequences of such action, and are facing disaster unless they wake up and smell the croissants as they disappear back over the Channel.

Before every TV news item on the subject of Brexit I’m half expecting the old J Arthur Rank opening sequence (a big burly guy in a state of partial undress clattering a gong) to appear on the screen heralding a ‘Carry On Downing Street’ knockabout comedy.

There seriously must be an argument to be made somewhere that the robotic premier, now so unpopular that polls are showing that she is the least popular Prime Minister in the immediate months after a General Election that there has ever been, and her band of assorted right wing and far right wing millionaire careerists, are trying to deliberately throw the fight, because surely they really can’t be as incompetent as they appear to be, can they?

EU negotiators, bemused by the clear lack of preparation of the British side, have made it known that they are ready to get down to the hard discussions. Discussions on the issues that were set out as key fundamentals requiring decisions, prior to any discussion on any arrangements for what might happen after Brexit. Issues that were agreed the last time Michel Barnier took easy advantage of David Davis’s poor negotiating skills. Issues like the treatment of EU and UK citizens resident in the respective countries involved, and what it’s going to cost Britain to step away from its financial commitments to the EU.

These are areas that the EU suggests that they would have expected that the UK by now would have established a firm position about.The problem seems to be that the UK doesn’t appear to have a firm position on anything, apart from immigration, and that’s not that clear. Instead they are winging it. What is not clear is whether this strategy deliberate or is it simply that there are so many factions infighting within the Tory party that they can’t come to a consensus?

Safe in the knowledge that nobody really wants her job just at the moment, although there are plenty forming alliances and quietly signalling allegiance over brandy and cigars, or during conversations in shady corners of the Palace of Westminster (the Gove’s, Boris and Rudd’s of the world) for when a leader is required to save the party when the real damage of Brexit starts to emerge, and it all hits the fan, it’s holiday time. Theresa and Mr Theresa have left their respective governments and hedge funds behind, it being the summer and everybody is entitled to a holiday, apart from those that they keep in abject poverty, and gone walkies. The hiking boot are on, and the lesser Alps of Switzerland will be alive with the sound of the clanging bells of scattered lonely mountain goats as they trek their merry way from peak to peak.(Just keep walking east Theresa and we’ll meet you back here in about a year, your lot are always talking about patriotism, that would be the most patriotic thing you could do for your country right now).

The Economist article makes the point that the civil service who are going to be left to sort all of this mess out have reduced in size by about a quarter in the last decade, and hasn’t negotiated a trade deal in a generation. Hark, I hear the private sector calling. It won’t be long until vast amounts of your money will be going into the pockets, yet again, of the big players in the world of financial consulting and accounting, the KPMG’s and Ernst & Young’s, all very cosy, once more transferring the wealth of the many to a small privileged few, and making the best of a bad situation, for them only. Watch out for that one.

Bear in mind too that currently the UK has the dubious honour of having the slowest growing economy in the whole of the EU.

The other week Theresa May was publicly asking for cross-party assistance with all of this, at least letting on that she was anyway. I think it’s time she started listening to what the likes of Nicola Sturgeon has been trying to tell her for the last 12 months, before it’s too late.