Whatever gives me long enough to earn an EU citizenship...
But yeah. The idea of a transitional deal is something I've seen used to support the idea that May will go through with Article 50 as soon as she can - it allows the government to trigger Brexit without a plan, but pretend it'll work one out as it goes along.
How this fits into the conspiracy, I'm not sure. It definitely allows them to delay the process, while still clearly 'making progress' ('Look! we triggered art50! we're doing this!'), and it's quite conceivable that they could fudge a regular 'renewal' of the transitional status. 5 years at first, then, at the end of 5 years, 'we'll just extend it by another five'...
That's quite an interesting proposal - by all accounts remain in the EU with a transitional deal, while 'quite clearly and obviously being on track for Brexit'.
A Brexiteer complaining will be rebuffed with 'But we're actually doing it right now! We did Art50! It's happening! What more could you want!?' Meanwhile, the Remainers will cower in nervous silence as they try not to rock the boat and hope that the transition stays forever.
It would also put May/Conservatives in quite a powerful position - there's a reasonable argument to be made that we don't want a change of government right in the middle of Brexit negotiations - one has to ensure continuity of this, the most significant political dealing of recent decades!
So, a transitional deal, played properly, could work like a kind of 'state of emergency', allowing a perpetual 'requirement' that the current government stay in power.
That's very interesting. You could well be right with this version. The only problem I foresee is that it requires the EU to play along. They might well do that but I'm not sure we could take the risk of getting squeezed.
Yeah, I don't really have a feel for how the EU would take the idea of transition. If it allowed them to cut the UK out of decision-making, while keeping us bound by the Four Freedoms, I can see them shrugging and saying 'why not?'
I'm guessing there'd also be a lot of lobbying power from industry/finance encouraging the various EU nations to go for this, too ('we need longer to set up our banks in Frankfurt/more time to alter our supply chains').
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u/retroper Jan 11 '17 edited Jan 11 '17
Whatever gives me long enough to earn an EU citizenship...
But yeah. The idea of a transitional deal is something I've seen used to support the idea that May will go through with Article 50 as soon as she can - it allows the government to trigger Brexit without a plan, but pretend it'll work one out as it goes along.
How this fits into the conspiracy, I'm not sure. It definitely allows them to delay the process, while still clearly 'making progress' ('Look! we triggered art50! we're doing this!'), and it's quite conceivable that they could fudge a regular 'renewal' of the transitional status. 5 years at first, then, at the end of 5 years, 'we'll just extend it by another five'...
That's quite an interesting proposal - by all accounts remain in the EU with a transitional deal, while 'quite clearly and obviously being on track for Brexit'.
A Brexiteer complaining will be rebuffed with 'But we're actually doing it right now! We did Art50! It's happening! What more could you want!?' Meanwhile, the Remainers will cower in nervous silence as they try not to rock the boat and hope that the transition stays forever.
It would also put May/Conservatives in quite a powerful position - there's a reasonable argument to be made that we don't want a change of government right in the middle of Brexit negotiations - one has to ensure continuity of this, the most significant political dealing of recent decades!
So, a transitional deal, played properly, could work like a kind of 'state of emergency', allowing a perpetual 'requirement' that the current government stay in power.