Another dislocating week on Brexit and this will continue for the next few months because the political and technical processes are heavily out of sync - we're end game in one and barely getting going on the other 1/
The political negotiation process is well known - we need a deal within weeks. But 18 months was never going to be enough. Both sides share blame for this, and they want to have a similarly unrealistic timeline for the next phase as well 2/
Technically we're just getting going. You can blame the UK government being slow, true to a degree. But getting deeply into the detail of technical checks and other border stuff, then getting a negotiating position, takes time 3/
Meanwhile the discussion outside the negotiation - that's us - needs to keep up, and you see in the last few days much more realistic discussions on the Northern Ireland backstop than we've had before. Even the ERG are getting more realistic 4/ thesun.co.uk/news/politics/…
So normally at this point technically you'd be looking at 1-2 years to bat around detailed technical solutions before coming up with solutions. You'd then have the last few most sensitive issues handled by the political leaders 5/
Do detailed negotiations really have to take this long? Yes, unless one side is just giving in to the other. There are 36 UK government bodies involved in border operations according to IfG - that gives a sense of complexity 6/
Those bodies have to talk in detail with their counterparts in the EU, ask questions, discuss internally, coordinate with domestic stakeholders, come up with positions in line with overall talks, challenge the other side, revise etc 7/
To take a real example the Northern Ireland backstop if it happens is going to end up being phenomenally complicated. What does it mean for technical regulations, tax, customs, EU representation, cross-UK trade, EU law etc 8/
And you have to talk with stakeholders extensively to make this work - because they will raise all manner of issues you didn't think about. Here the UK government is to blame - it has treated business as the enemy not an essential part of the process 9/
How do we fix this? Some advocate extending Article 50 i.e. the UK doesn't leave until later, but that looks politically troublesome on both sides. I'd always thought we'd need an endless or very long transition as the only way to give us the time needed 10/
Narrowing down a little I suspect that given 5-10 years we could evolve into a new economic relationship with no new barriers with relation to Northern Ireland, and a close but not EEA relationship between UK and EU. It would be complex 11/
This is a standard EU trade negotiations timescale. And they are usually easier. If this was a normal trade negotiation we'd either end it because of a political change (TTIP and the election of Trump) or extend until agreement 12/
In Brexit the most vocal voices want to end the negotiation (to remain or to leave with no deal). The centre ground, trying to find a sensible solution, are in the minority and cannot deliver on the timescales. That's the dislocation we feel 13/
Brexit campaigners promised we could get a good deal quickly, and the government followed. Not for the first time in trade deals they face having to admit they couldn't deliver. Do they give up or admit the scale of the task? 14/ ends
