And as I've said before the EU wouldn't even offer Canada the same deal now as they gave in 2020. Not to mention us asking for more. Not only does trade policy move on, but it is always different for neighbours.
Thing is, if Johnson now goes for the available deal (shifting the UK position) there's more room for him to be criticised by strong Brexit supporting MPs for wimping out of his threats. So no-deal probably is now marginally the more likely outcome.
What has changed from before is that Johnson had the chance to do the deal by now and chose not to do so. He may yet change his mind, using some excuse or other, but he is making it harder to do so.
Important - looks as if Johnson and Frost genuinely still believe the EU could offer market access more or less free of conditions. This is an aggressive brief, given that the EU (and most commentators) believe it is the UK that must make the larger moves.
More will doubtless follow over the weekend. But contrary to popular belief this is not the normal state of affairs just before a trade agreement is reached. That's confusing trade talks and internal EU haggling. In trade talks such hostility is hard to overcome.
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Always a very powerful argument to claim that your neighbours or some other country want to restrict you. Also happens to be a line particularly popular with paranoid dictatorships. And a discouragement to business or said neighbouring countries to deal with you.
Maybe at some stage the government could be asked, who wants to control us more, the EU wanting us to sign up for level playing field conditions, or the US wanting us to sign up for food rules (and by the way level playing field conditions).
Another question for government - in what exact ways do the EU want us to forfeit our independence? How do these differ from, for example, WTO rules? And what rules are we prepared to sign up for?
Brexit. UK-EU talks. Let's try to explain why we're in such a state, of increased risk of no deal, moving away from the fish and playing fields which are the detail but not the answer, to differing philosophies and divorce parallels that might just help... 1/
First, with apologies to those concerned, we need to go beyond those saying this is the inevitable path to deal / no-deal. Half of them will be right and I'll definitely be wrong (don't worry, I'm hedged in wine bets), but it wasn't inevitable, typical, or necessary. 2/
I'll also ignore the content of any deal, which has been clear for months, the UK compromises on level playing field, the EU on fish. Something so obvious really isn't the fundamental issue. Could, as some not noted for their perspicacity have said, be done in an afternoon. 3/
A letter from the PM on the EU talks which is confused, exaggerated, and internally contradictory. There could be no possible basis for a trade deal if the letter was to be taken seriously.
The EU-Canada agreement is not based on "friendship and free-trade" but is absolutely full of conditionality. I've clipped a random bit of text, but frankly there are dozens of similar examples.
"They want the continued ability to control our legislative freedom".
Distortion / exaggeration. All trade treaties involve a restriction of legislative freedom. You might as well say the same about other members of the WTO.
Worth noting as we play future scenarios, that no trade deal is probably not a stable UK EU end state as it will mean more such demands to denounce the Withdrawal Agreement.
Anyway, the deal available to the UK (and EU) is more or less as we've known since June, and not technically difficult. The politics and choreography horrendous. We wait to see what the coming days bring.
In the mean time, at least tonight, 🍷
Ah, this is not what happens in the run up to a deal
At a rough guess EU leaders have become bored and irritated by optimistic London pronouncements about a deal not backed up by a willingness to make significant movements on substance, indeed with the internal market bill, backsliding. theguardian.com/politics/2020/…
Not perhaps the EU's finest negotiating moment either, for while we know fish is a domestic sensitivity the UK maintaining status quo on waters always was a non-starter. But removing the word intensive about future talks appears to have had an effect. thetimes.co.uk/article/back-d…
But as before, still mainly for the UK to show we can accept the deal on offer, and drop the internal market bill threats, before the last minute fish haggle. Over to the PM to make the decision...
Trade deal or not, the Brexit dream is dying. Trade deal and we spent the coming years in a push-pull relationship with the EU over economic alignment. No-deal and we intensify the battles over the future of the UK.
It wasn't supposed to be like this.
The fundamental problems being those piloting Brexit assuming the EU would provide the access we wanted with few responsibilities, and failing to create any national consensus with business and devolved authorities.
They assumed they could do it even when advised otherwise.
At the basic level the UK will still have greater freedom outside the EU. But it will be far from the dream because the US and EU have demands over regulation in trade deals, and trans-national business supply chains use their regulations. Watch EU data adequacy in particular.