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Paul Mason
@paulmasonnews
, 5 tweets, 2 min read Read on Twitter
Brexit: 1/ all eight options were rejected - but the Customs Union and the Second Referendum are in touching distance. We're a parliamentary democracy and if May - 149 votes down - can have a second chance, so should these...
2/ The prime minister has no authority, has signalled she'll soon be gone. Parliament should now take permanent control of the agenda, with MPs consulting their constituents over the top three options...
3/ If after Monday, May has no majority for the Withdrawal Agreement, and there is no majority for Customs Union, we need an election. The election is cast as a distraction by the #FBPE crowd but there is literally no support even for EEA membership in this parliament...
4/ If you want, as I do, either the softest possible Brexit or to halt the process, there has to be an election. This parliament looks incapable of taking decisions, or even being run constitutionally...
5/ If you want the background to why the Tory party is falling apart in office, here's my take: newstatesman.com/politics/uk/20…
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Paul Mason
@paulmasonnews
Brexit upsum (to celebrate not leaving at 23:00 tonight). 1/ All the momentum is towards Customs Union/ Second Referendum, not towards backing May's deal. DUP considering it, SNP talking to Tory moderates about it. Labour didn't whip against it this week...
2/ If May backs herself into a corner where it's No Deal or a General Election, the Tories will disintegrate. Their hardcore voting base wants No Deal and nobody will support May as PM. They will self-suppress their own vote anyway...
3/ So the Customs Union option is like the bottom of the valley: I always said the water would find its course, irrespective of parties/positions. For those actively implementing Labour's strategy the key is to make all deals conditional on a Second Referendum...
Read 15 tweets
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Paul Mason
@paulmasonnews
A quick thread on @theresa_may promise "I'll quit if you pass my Brexit bill". 1/ Never trust her. She has run one of the most duplicitous administrations in British history. Get it in writing before the vote....
2/ The internal dynamics of the Tory party mean her replacement will either be an outright hard-Brexiteer or a centrist prepared to do hard Brexit. Why would any moderate Tory trigger civil war in the party in those conditions. It's a promise aimed at the Tory xenophobic right...
3/ The EU now knows it is negotiating with a zombie PM, if it didn't before. By forcing May to make this statement the ERG have debased and weakened British diplomacy...
Read 5 tweets
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Paul Mason
@paulmasonnews
Brexit latest (h/t @Steven_Swinford ). May will use a 7-option indicative vote, unveiled tomorrow morning, in a final attempt to scare Tory MPs into voting for her deal. 1/ She refused to set a timetable for her own departure, thus piling pressure on Tory right...
2/ It looks like the options will *exclude* Labour's plan for Customs Union + close alignment with EEA, though she is calling this "Boles Plan" and using it to scare Tories that it will be the default option. She is right on that...
3/ Though nobody actively wants a Norway+ arrangement it is like the bottom of a valley: it is where the water will flow along the path of least resistance. What does all this mean?
Read 10 tweets

Related threads

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Nick Vucic
@npv708
Brexit, but in gifs.

#Brexit
The Leave Campaign prior to the referendum:
The Remain Campaign prior to the referendum:
Read 82 tweets
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Open Europe
@OpenEurope
Labour leader @jeremycorbyn delivering #Brexit speech in Wakefield: Let there be no doubt: Theresa May’s deal is a bad deal for our country and Labour will vote against it next week in parliament.
Corbyn: If the govt cannot pass its most important legislation, there must be general election at the earliest opportunity.
Corbyn: If general election cannot be secured, Labour will keep other options on the table, including another #Brexit public vote
Read 11 tweets
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Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
So seems point 1 is an extension/elucidation of what @DLidington told #r4today on Dec 14.

FWIW am told by Brussels sources this is now focus of UK 'ask' on reassurances/ clarifications. To set clear aspiration date for trade deal to avoid backstop /1

@DLidington Which as @DavidHenigUK quickly pointed out is, to put it mildly, ambitious. /2

@DLidington @DavidHenigUK This is not least because even if you think a 'quick and dirty' deal is doable on some aspects (you hear some discussion of this) the UK would STILL need to know what it wanted.

And as the Political Declaration makes painfully clear, it doesn't know. Or cannot agree rather. /3
Read 20 tweets
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Lord Snoutintrough #FBPE
@Rowland72James
1/ Theresa May has made 3 fundamentally incompatible #brexit promises regarding Northern Ireland at least one of which she has to break and one of the 3 groups she will have to betray
2/ Theresa May has promised A. Continued open border in Ireland to the Irish B/ to the #Brexit hardliners that we will withdraw from the customs Union and single market and an end to open borders C/ no difference in #brexit terms between Northern Ireland and rest of the UK
3/ the only way to keep the promise of No hard border in Ireland is to stay in single market and customs Union. This will incense the tory #Brexit hardliners as it will result in losing any say on making rules we still have to obey rendering brexit pointless
Read 9 tweets
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Peter Foster
@pmdfoster
Brexit is the backstop; the backstop is #Brexit.

After 3 days in Belfast, talking to all sides, here's what I've learned - on the business and the politics of this deal. And its viability.

1/Thread
First the business/technical aspects of how a backstop would work.

I talked to business lobby groups, Stephen Kelly from @ManufacturingNI fresh back from talks with Barnier. And bosses of big companies.

The are surprisingly sanguine. /2

telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/…
@ManufacturingNI If the backstop emerges as the British want (and that is still an 'if') it would look as follows:

- all-UK in a temporary customs Union
- Northern Ireland only in Single Market for goods, via devolution
- no checks GB-NI
- 'de-dramatised checks on regs NI-GB

/3
Read 26 tweets
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Nicolai von Ondarza
@NvOndarza
"#Brexit and EU agencies", our extensive look into third country relationships of the 36 EU agencies and how the UK might fit in.

swp-berlin.org/fileadmin/cont…

Albeit largely technical, agencies will have huge implications on Brexit.

Five points stand out in particular:
First, Agencies matter. Like the customs union, they are a technical aspect of the EU, that works and was thus hardly discussed in the UK before #Brexit.
But they are important for single market, but also justice and home affairs.

UK gov thus has already asked to continue participation in selected agencies, in particular in sectors important to the UK economy, like aviation, chemicals or pharma.
Read 10 tweets

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