Thread by @faisalislam

“The ewes are lambing in a couple of weeks time, those lambs will be sold in a post Brexit market - I need to know is there going to be a market” says farmer Davies of NFU Cymru - 90% of exported lamb goes to the EU - today’s #brexitforensics film

So I have been going on and on about sheep exports today for a reason - there is a big piece of politics symbolised in this which has an impact on where LAbour go on Monday re Customs Union & Single Market, & thus everything else in Parliament. Thread:
news.sky.com/story/long-rea…

1/10:
I put to Carwyn Jones that Wales voted Leave and that means out of the Customs Union:
FM: “Brexit needs to happen but not in the most damaging way... there are territories inside the CU outside the EU - Jersey and Guernsey. There’s a precedent. “

2/10 so no new trade deals then?
FM: not going to happen in timescale people expect. It’s cloud cuckoo land... take 6 to 7 years to negotiate. We can leave the EU built that doesnt mean that we’ve got to build a wall around ourselves see people leaving farming at a rate of knots

3/10 what about the WTO tariff quota carve up (ie NZ/Oz lamb?)
FM: It is an issue - we dont want to see a stitch up behind close doors that destroys welsh farming

4/10 what about new markets?
FM: “look at steel - if we had free trade deal with China it would wipe out welsh steel industry - simple as that. FTAs offered as some great panacea but only work if you have market of similar standard of living. Otherwise you just export jobs”

Point here is First Minister of Wales is making a very public case to stay in Customs Union AND Single Market in a place that majority voted Leave, and feels confident Labour voters, including LEave ones, and also Leave farmers, are on side...
5/10

That political confidence comes from the Election result (best Labour result since 1997) AND a calculation that totemic Welsh industries - steel and sheep - will not benefit from likely free trade deals, made difficult by CU strategy
6/10

..by “will not benefit” I should probably say - risk being crushed by competition from free trade with Southern Hemisphere and china... bigger point “free trade deals” are no great prize for the Labour Party - many routinely go on demos against them
7/10

So the entire framing of the debate in Westminster - “Because we MUST do new Free Trade deals, we therefore have to risk new frictions [as frictionless as possible] with our biggest market” looks quite different for a Labour leader in Cardiff
8/10

...indeed that will be especially keenly felt by someone who has the Bridgend Ford engine plant which exports across Single Market and Customs Union in constituency - indeed Ford already expressing concern about inevitable application of Rules of Origin outside Customs Union 9/10

Point is, perhaps surprisingly FM forcefully making this case, meetings with BArnier, published own impact studies - within Labour, appears to be winning, incl framing EEA membership as “participation in” not membership of Single Market.

All from an area that voted Leave.
10/10

..while ahead of GE2017 obsession was with impact of Lab leave voters in deindustrialised towns/ex Ukip going Tory, result showed dynamic only impacted v patchily.
It’s Wales not Walsall. strategy on Monday will reflect winning in the former rather than losing the latter.
11*/10