From Twitter:
The Withdrawal Agreement has received Royal Assent and is now law. We will leave the EU on January 31st 🇬🇧
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) January 23, 2020
(Featured image is “UnionJack” by www.rubenholthuijsen.nl. Used under creative commons license.)
Jaybird
Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com
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The legislatures of Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales, all refused consent to the agreement. This is ugly.Report
It sucks to be a conquered people.Report
I have some attachment to the UK, and in particular the U part – being a citizen of the place, and having visited three of the four countries even though I’ve not lived there since I was a small child.
But I wouldn’t blame the people of any of those three countries if they ended up splitting from England in order to stay in the EU. It’s what I’d want to do if I lived there.Report
Well, NI has a good chance of it, being able to join up with the south and use its economic factors. Scotland is F’d in the B as they have no currency of their own, no natural attachments and a lot of handouts from the main country. I don’t think that Wales has a very large separative movement, but I could be wrong.
Then again, “British economy will grow faster than eurozone rivals, says IMF”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/d37b4c70-3bbd-11ea-9bc3-b4804128329e
So, they got that going for them, which could be nice.Report
As I recall, England sends tax dollars to all three of NI, Scotland, and Wales. This may be on Boris’s mind.Report
Votes that matter relieve all a lot of responsibilities. The Sewel Convention states that (1) the UK Parliament will not “normally” (2) legislate on “devolved matters” without consent, (3) but there is no remedy if the UK Parliament ignores it. I don’t think anyone truly believes that EU membership is a devolved matter, these votes are intended to signal something.
A majority of voters in Wales supported the referendum, though their political representatives have generally not.
In Northern Ireland, a majority voted remain, but the DUP campaigned in favor of Brexit and is the largest party — their vote is against “this BREXIT” (and if you scrape the surface off their talk, its clear that they are opposed to the party privileges they lost in all of this) The second largest party is not opposed to BREXIT, they are opposed to the British.
The main inflection point is Scotland, where a strong majority voted to remain, and in the Parliamentary elections sent a strong majority of the Scottish Nationalist Party to the UK Parliament. Opinion polls skin-of-the-teeth opposition to independence, but the UK government will oppose another referendum, while increasing spending in Scotland and other reforms to strengthen ties. This seems like the window for independence and its shrinking.Report
Votes that [don’t] matter relieve all a lot of responsibilities.Report
Hold up:
Report
So? At worse, it’s an announcement that the government has decided the UK won’t be in the single market after mid-2021. Given what’s already been said, it’s quite likely they won’t be in the single market after Dec 31, 2020 anyway. A better question is whether the Brexit deal means Northern Ireland has to adopt Article 13.Report
I’ve seen many things about how bad Brexit would be.
This is the first thing I’ve seen that says “huh… maybe there are upsides”.Report
Some of the Brexit side have been asserting all along that getting out from under the EU’s regulatory regime (ie, leaving the single market) is an upside. Mostly those people seem to think a lot of regulations will simply go away: that Parliament can’t (or won’t be allowed to) pass replacements for all of the EU regulations that will no longer apply. The conspiracy crowd (eg, over at Lawyers, Guns & Money) says this will happen in particular in financial regulation, so the rich folks can turn the UK into a massive tax-avoidance and money-laundering machine.Report
Oh, I’ve seen the Brexiteers saying that it’ll all be skittles and beer afterwards.
But this is the first time that I’ve seen anything from a nominally non-pro-Brexit place admit that, okay, maybe *SOMETHING* good could come out of this in theory.Report
I’m confused over which specific thing you think non-Brexiteers have said might be good about Brexit. Not adopting one aspect of EU copyright law? Having only part of the UK adopt that copyright law? Not being in the single market? Regulations disappearing in a haphazard fashion?Report
I’ve only seen this piece from the BBC saying “huh, we might not have to deal with this aspect of EU copyright law”.
The only other good things about Brexit that I’ve seen have come from, presumably biased, pro-Brexit outlets.
Understand: I know that there might be bucketloads of “okay, maybe Brexit won’t be so bad” articles out there from the anti-Brexit outlets. I haven’t seen them, though. I’ve only seen “Brexit will be good” from the people who argued for it. “Brexit will be a *DISASTER*” is stuff I’ve seen from the anti-Brexit folks.
And I say that not saying “and that’s the way the world is” but “and that’s the only stuff that has leaked into my ignorant little corner here across the pond”.Report
Seeing the iconic British blue passports in The Daily Express makes it all worth it.
Passport-1.jpg
“Your mother was a hamster” is a very British message to customs agents around the world. ^_^Report
Conservatism, in a nutshell.Report
Nothing says I’m not in the EU like a blue passport without the words European Union.
Finally, the UK will be allowed to have them
Oh, wait
https://www.croatiaweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Passport.jpgReport
Nothing says I’m not in the EU like a blue passport without the words European Union.
Finally, the UK will be allowed to have them
Oh, wait
https://www.croatiaweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Passport.jpgReport