Ross Clark Ross Clark

Theresa May’s Brexit compromise won’t work

So, finally, we have a spirit of compromise. Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May are going to sit down together and hammer out a deal on which both their respective parties can agree. Well, maybe not. There has been plenty of analysis over the past few hours predicting how it could all unwind – with further ministerial resignations and so on. But there is something more fundamentally wrong with what Theresa May has proposed. While searching for compromise might be a reasonable way to proceed on most political issues it simply doesn’t work in the case of Brexit.

Either of the ‘extreme’ ends of political opinion on Brexit make sense: repealing Article 50 and staying in the EU on existing terms or leaving without a deal, exiting the single market and customs union in the process. True, the former would cause outrage among Brexit voters and would be politically impossible without backing in a second referendum. But it is at least logically coherent: we would stay in the club and continue to make the rules along with the other 27 members. Leaving without a deal, on the other hand, would cause disruption in the short term, but it is, too, a logical course of action. Once past the initial stage of disruption, we would benefit from the freedom to make our own trade deals and to deregulate our economy. It is a much braver, adventurous thing to do compared with remaining in the EU, but in the longer term it might prove to be the far better option – resulting in the UK pulling away from the moribund Eurozone and more closely matching US rates of growth. And of course, while we might be leaving the EU with no trade deal with that bloc, that situation would be unlikely to endure for long – in time we would surely forge some sort of trade deal with the EU.

What doesn’t make sense, on the other hand, is any option which falls between these two extremes.

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