Interesting Links for 17-01-2019

[andrewducker]

Young Trans Children Know Who They Are

(tags: lgbt transgender children )

Jeremy Corbyn snubs Theresa May offer to work together on Brexit unless PM rules out no-deal

Of course, no detail on how to rule out No Deal when it's what happens automatically if nothing else is agreed...
(tags: UK europe labour )

A majority of Americans support raising the top tax rate to 70 percent

(tags: usa tax )

Hundreds of homeless people fined and imprisoned in England and Wales

(tags: England homelessness OhForFucksSake )

The BBC's article on the Gillette advert is *terrible*

(tags: BBC journalism twitter OhForFucksSake )

The Scottish government isn't funding autism support which actively saves money

(tags: NHS autism scotland OhForFucksSake )

Isle Of Man Is Now The First Place In The British Isles To Decriminalise Abortion

(tags: abortion GoodNews )

How Do People Communicate Before Death?

(tags: death language viaSwampers )

Hitachi scraps £16bn nuclear power station in Wales

(tags: nuclearpower uk Wales doom )

A question of interest: Is UK household debt unsustainable?

(tags: UK debt economics )

This is an excellent summary of the current Brexit situation and our options

(tags: UK europe )

Comments

[andrewducker]

Or accept the WA on that day 😉

[drplokta]

That would simply be accepting the withdrawal agreement, which has already been comprehensively defeated in Parliament.

[andrewducker]

I suspect that revoking article 50 would also be comprehensively defeated in parliament.

[danieldwilliam]

It is not clear that Parliament needs to give its consent to revocing Article 50.

That might still be within the Crown perogative.

[drplokta]

A conditional revocation on the day before Brexit if no deal has been agreed, with Labour and Tories both whipping in favour, would probably pass.

[andrewducker]

And persuading both leaderships to whip in favour of that?

(doable on March 27th, I suspect)

[drplokta]

Corbyn should have no problem with it, since it is merely the logical conclusion of his demand that no deal be ruled out. If it gets to the day before Brexit day with no deal agreed, then pulling the notification is the only way to prevent no deal. May’s opposition is of course the current disagreement.

[danieldwilliam]

Aye - it is the logical conclusion of what he's asked for. Cetainly absent anything else happening.


Unilaterally revoking the Article 50 notification on Brexit Day -1 looks like the only way within the UK's control that guarantees no EU exit with No Deal.

But I think there some processes between now and then - such as returning to negotiations having decided to solve the on-going honouring of the Good Friday Agreement by staying in the Single Market. Which is more likely if Corbyn can extract a binding promise from the Government that there will be no No Deal as this forces Brexiteers to conceed that the only way they get Brexit is if they can get a deal through Parliament and the Brexiteers ought to realise that May's harder line deal would have to softened by becoming a deal that shapes the UK for membership of the EEA. Brexiteers wouldn't like that but the slippery careerist ones like Johnson might be persuaded to go for it, especially if it destroys May in the process.

I wish I believed that Corbyn fully understood this. At best I think he is trying to worry at the Tory Party by getting the various factions to fray. At worst I think he's not really through this through or has some Lexit scheme of his own.

[drplokta]

There’s no possibility of concluding negotiations to stay in the single market before Brexit day, and so even if that becomes our intention, the backstop is still required in case the negotiations fail. It changes the non-binding political declaration, but not the withdrawal agreement.

[danieldwilliam]

I think in practice the two documents are too heavily linked not to be treated as one.

The Irish border backstop is only contentious is you intend not to be in the Single Market. if you intend to be in the Single Market you have already agreed that the UK will not be making bilateral trade agreeement and that it is easy for Northern Ireland to be in the same market as both Ireland (GFA requirement) and Great Britain (DUP requirement).

One is essentailly bringing forward the moment when Hard Brexiteers have lost and know they have lost.

[danieldwilliam]

I do not think you can do a conditional revocation.

Firstly, my understanding of the ruling in the Scottish Case was that the UK could unilaterally revoke its Article 50 if it was a sincere and good faith revocation and not an attempt to do an end run around the need for uninamity for an Article 50 extension. I'm not sure that putting in conditions that touched on the EU would pass that test.

Secondly, the unilateral revocation completely revokes the Article 50 (or it has no effect - see above). Therefore, in terms of UK constitutional proceedure we are probably back to the position pre EU referendum. I am not sure it would be possible to put in place any conditions for UK counter-parties that were enforceable.

"I will vote to revoke Article 50 so we can renegotiate the Irish Border with the EU and we will trigger it again in a year" probably falls foul of the good faith requirements under the Scottish Case.

"I will vote to revoke Article 50 if you promise X, Y and Z (a Section 30 Consent for a Scottish Independence Referendum for example)" is difficult to enforce because Article 50 is revoked and would need an Act of Parliament to re-invoke (per the Miller Case).

In the second case you'd be entirely relying on the good faith of the Prime Minister of the day and that they remained Prime Minister until the point of delivery on their side of the bargain.

[drplokta]

The only condition would be that we’d got to the day before Brexit day without agreeing a deal or an extension. The revocation under those circumstances would be unequivocal and unconditional, as required — we would then be staying in the EU, not trying to buy time.

[danieldwilliam]

I'm thinking more of an attempt to write that in to UK law during the week of the 21st January. Which requires having the fight with Brexiteers now.

And also turns on whether one thinks being able to leave without a deal strengthens our negotiating position in any meaningful way. I tend to think that it doesn't but I understand that others think it does.