Thought for Follow Back Friday.
I'm still seeing people who are concerned about feasibility of #RejoinEU on the basis of misunderstanding the accession process.
1: it's a process. Not a request, to be accepted or rejected. Think less slamming door, more, please wipe your feet.
I'm still seeing people who are concerned about feasibility of #RejoinEU on the basis of misunderstanding the accession process.
1: it's a process. Not a request, to be accepted or rejected. Think less slamming door, more, please wipe your feet.
2: no applicant is ready to join when they apply.
Two whole stages, screening and negotiation, are devoted to identifying gaps with EU law, and closing them.
Accession can be thought of as the process of becoming admissible.
Two whole stages, screening and negotiation, are devoted to identifying gaps with EU law, and closing them.
Accession can be thought of as the process of becoming admissible.
3: the first stage, the Copenhagen criteria and those in the TEU, is not an 11+. The EU likes to expand. Copenhagen was created to see if former Soviet satellites had really moved on. That they were democracies, able to withstand market forces, with ability to enforce EU law.
4: democracy is also not an on-off switch. Think of it as a volume knob. UK used to be about 8. BJ has taken it down to 7. But the EU only needs 6. You and I may feel rightly aggrieved at the Government's damage to democracy. Some of you started following me when I wrote a letter
to Gove about this.
But please don't confuse our strong internal critique with the assessment the Commission would be asked to make. We still have elections, multi-parties, unions, media (does anywhere have "perfect" independent media, whatever that is?), courts etc.
But please don't confuse our strong internal critique with the assessment the Commission would be asked to make. We still have elections, multi-parties, unions, media (does anywhere have "perfect" independent media, whatever that is?), courts etc.
The only realistic thing that would present an obstacle is if we leave ECHR. But rejoining that one is a doddle, it's just 21 days notice to Parlt & sign the instrument of accession. And again, EU wouldn't slam any door, it would indicate a need for progress on that issue.
5: anything Johnson does can be undone. This is very basic UK constitutional theory.
In this thread I'm not going to tackle baseless speculations like "they'll never have us back" or "we'll lose all the opt-outs". Check my blog for more on that.
But please,
In this thread I'm not going to tackle baseless speculations like "they'll never have us back" or "we'll lose all the opt-outs". Check my blog for more on that.
But please,
If you're going to argue against #RejoinEU, don't make up man down the pub scare stories about the process. It's a boring technical matter, not an emotive psychodrama.
#FBPE
#FBPE
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