Profile picture
Ian Dunt @IanDunt
, 21 tweets, 6 min read Read on Twitter
Bit late getting to future relationship document, will comment as I read. Bear in mind this is political, not legal, and they can change it later.
"High standards" of workers rights etc. Not very specific. Withdrawal Agreement only secures non-regression - ie sticking to existing baseline - not a dynamic relationship which would take on future improvements.
This section appears to rule out EEA because of free movement point. But then, it is itself total nonsense, cos withdrawal agreement doesn't really protect UK's internal market or, in any realistic practical sense, allow for independent trade policy.
"Evolve over time" seems to suggest that EU is keeping open doors to enhanced EEA type relationship, or levelling up from bare-bones custom arrangement to a fuller one. Or it could be blather.
This is very welcome. If it was enshrined in a treaty it would stop a future Tory govt from removing us from the ECHR.
Either this is true, or the UK loses it's internal market, or the Irish border promise ceases to hold. But they can't all be right.
Here's the kicker. Like a slab of fudge with some dynamite inside.
Hilarious. How this fits with an independent UK trading regime doing FTAs with the US, for instance, is beyond me.
"Build and improve" on the bare-bones customs arrangement in the withdrawal agreement. So that is the baseline and we go up from there.
Impressively deep regulatory cooperation envisaged here, incl some kind of participation with EU agencies (UK wanted this, but we'll see on what terms - presumably a say but not a vote)
Tech solutions carrot. Easy to say because of course you would do this - it's just that it'll never be enough to satisfy the commitment to a frictionless Irish border.
Fudgtastic.
Equivalence for financial services. This is tenuous stuff - can be cancelled with minimal notice. But it was as much as they were ever likely to get.
Immigration bit has no detail, except to say that it'll go both ways. Basically up to UK to decide how hard it wants to be.
Fishing: We'll figure it out later, but you're not going to be able to go all get-off-my-waters on us.
Level playing field: Even without the backstop, you're not going to be able to do a Singapore.
Dispute settlement. Same system as the withdrawal agreement: try to figure it out politically. If you can't, arbitration.
Emergency brake. There are bits like this in EEA agreement, so it's not unusual. They're never used, mostly because no-one wants to face those "rebalancing measures".
And there's the punchline. This impossible thing reflecting several different and contradictory requirements will all be sorted out by 2020. In "good faith".
And that's it. A quivering tower of fudge.
As ever, I'm not a trade expert for shit - I just listen to them. So if any of them say anything which contradicts what I wrote here, they're probably right.
Missing some Tweet in this thread?
You can try to force a refresh.

Like this thread? Get email updates or save it to PDF!

Subscribe to Ian Dunt
Profile picture

Get real-time email alerts when new unrolls are available from this author!

This content may be removed anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime, convert it as a PDF, save and print for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video

1) Follow Thread Reader App on Twitter so you can easily mention us!

2) Go to a Twitter thread (series of Tweets by the same owner) and mention us with a keyword "unroll" @threadreaderapp unroll

You can practice here first or read more on our help page!

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just three indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member and get exclusive features!

Premium member ($30.00/year)

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!