I have commented already on this morning's published Brexit deal. I omitted to mention that it is likely to also be illegal under this legislation:
I have checked what subsection 2 means by reference to the GATT agreement. It says:
There is not a shadow of a doubt that under the new Brexit deal Northen Ireland has substantially different tariffs and most especially other regulations for commerce from the UK: it will be in the single market when the rest of the UK is not, for example. And there will be a customs border between it and the rest of the UK.
Now that 2018 law could be repealed, of course.
But that would acknowledge that the ERG has really sold out.
What will they be saying about it? The reality is that the issue will have to be addressed: the GATT would appear to require it.
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See Jo Maugham’s court case.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/16/brexit-legal-action-stop-boris-johnson-putting-withdrawal-agreement-before-mps
Jo is right
No he isn’t, he lost again..
I am puzzled why Barnier has agreed with this so-called deal. Perhaps because he sees this as an internal UK matter? The DUP have so far rejected it. Guardian editorial has contended that the deal sacrifices the workers, presumably, though they don’t say, on the alter of his ego.
Larry wrote: “I am puzzled why Barnier has agreed with this so-called deal. Perhaps because he sees this as an internal UK matter?”
I suspect the simple truth is that Barnier and other EU officials are heartily sick of Brexit taking up 3 years of their time and preventing them from their real work of managing a complex pan-national organisation on behalf of its member states and their populations. It is entirely understandable that they want Brexit off their backs and if the UK wants to make a fool of itself on the international stage, so be it. The UK is widely seen as a laughing stock across Europe and beyond as a result of its chaotic attempts at Brexit, so why not let them have another opportunity to demonstrate their ineptitude?
The impracticalities of the latest proposals for NI also demonstrate the arrogance and ignorance of successive UK Tory governments:
– Were they not aware that the tax proposals are in contravention of UK tax law?
– Do they not see that the latest “Deal” undermines the Good Friday Agreement and the fragile peace that it brought to all of Ireland?
– Do they not understand that the DUP represents a minority of the NI electorate and therefore can’t be seen to speak for all its people?
– Are they unaware that creating a key ongoing role for Stormont in appraising/ratifying future changes viz-a-viz borders, tax, customs etc is granting powers to an Assembly which might never reconvene if Sinn Fein continue to refuse to share power with the DUP?
– Have they not thought about how the new proposals might play with the NI voters, who might now increasingly see union with the Republic as more attractive and/or inevitable?
Boris is truly living up to the description of ‘a man educated beyond his intelligence’.
He has agreed to it because Vardakar likes it.
All the talk about the GFA was just bluster.
Ireland got what it wanted
The Unionists have been sold out
And what about Section 54 which makes it illegal for HMRC to collect customs duties, VAT and excise duties on behalf of another country? Is that not also in point?
Yes….
When has acting lawfully bothered Boris Johnson and his dark money backers?
https://mobile.twitter.com/Keir_Starmer
Keir in 10 tweets destoys the ‘deal’, it’s worse than Mays and worse, throws out the good bits of the political agreement!
The no No-Deal fat lady ain’t sung yet! We’ll be in the courts again next week.
It’s certainly not all over yet
And his is, as he says, a terrible deal
> Ireland got what it wanted
Ireland wanted and wants the GFA to be upheld in full, including Strand 2 on the all-island economy. Nothing more, nothing less. It did not want a border in the Irish sea. Entirely an internal matter for the UK how it upholds its obligations – – whether or not NI diverges from GB.
So, Ireland got what it wanted….
Isn’t one part of the UK having different trading rules to the other against the Treaty of the Union ?
It’s against UK law, as I mentioned yesterday
Northern Ireland is, I think, now in a semi-permanent ‘other place’ as long as it remains in the UK, nominally
In 1922 the 26 counties became independent. I am beginning to feel that 2022 might see the other six join them. I can’t see quite how but it begins to seem inevitable.
This really is about raw, naked power as exercised by a leader who has no proven mandate with no majority in parliament and only in his position because of an internal vote of his party.
The trouble is that there is such weakness in Parliament that he is likely to get away with it.
You would expect some unravelling of the law to begin with before you went down this route – it looks we are entering an era of ‘ad hoc’ law. From the supposed party of ‘law and order’.
Under Thatcher and other Tory leaders, at least the Tories tried to but a sheen of respectability on their grasping and indifferent extremism. This new lot have no scruples and are happy to wear their extremism for all to see.
We can only live in hope that many voters will find this repugnant along with those who have had second thoughts about BREXIT.
https://twitter.com/StewartWood/status/1184413538351222785
Stewart Wood
â€Apologies for the spanner in the works, but a Brexit deal based on keeping just Northern Ireland in the EU customs union seems to directly run up counter the Government’s Taxation (Cross-Border Trade) Act 2018.
As Jacob Rees-Mogg knows: because it was his amendment.
https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/boris-johnson-brexit-deal-faces-late-legal-challenge-as-it-breaks-legislation-from-jacob-rees-mogg/16/10/
UPDATE: The legal challenge to the Brexit deal will be heard at the Court of Session in Edinburgh on Friday
Anti-Brexit campaigners plan to lodge a legal action in a bid to ban the Government from putting its proposed Withdrawal Agreement before Parliament as it is unlawful — due to legislation put forward by Brexit champion Jacob Rees-Mogg.
In what may be the most bizarre twist in the twisted, bizarre permutations of enacting the so-called will of the people yet, it is an amendment made by ERG awkward squad leader Rees-Mogg that may provide the ammunition that delays Brexit beyond the October 31 deadline Boris Johnson has vowed he would rather lie “dead in a ditch” after.
Jo Maugham QC said he believes the agreement Johnson has negotiated with the EU, due to be debated in a special parliamentary sitting on Saturday, contravenes legislation stating it is “unlawful for Her Majesty’s Government to enter into arrangements under which Northern Ireland forms part of a separate customs territory to Great Britain”.
Case lost.
https://t.co/fZ5SHv9ccG?amp=1