We can delay Brexit – and we must

Omissions can be as instructive as inclusions. I noted a curious example in a column Nick Timothy wrote last month for the Daily Telegraph: ‘Why Dominic Grieve’s push for a “meaningful vote” really would mean stopping Brexit.’ Until he left Downing Street, Mr Timothy was jointly principal adviser to Theresa May. He wrote the following:

‘According to ministers, the choice Parliament will face is to leave on the terms negotiated by the government, or leave with no deal. And they are right: the European treaties assert that the withdrawal process can last no longer than two years…’

This is not the case. Mr Timothy seems to have overlooked a key provision laid out in Article 50 of the relevant treaty (my italics):

‘3. The Treaties shall cease to apply to the State in question from the date of entry into force of the withdrawal agreement or, failing that, two years after the notification referred to in paragraph 2, unless the European Council, in agreement with the Member State concerned, unanimously decides to extend this period.’

It seemed worrying that this provision, which is highly inconvenient to his argument, had escaped Mr Timothy’s notice. My worries had first been aroused earlier in his column when he remarked that the formal notification of an intention to leave the European Union Article cannot later be withdrawn because ‘[as] Lord Pannick QC argues, this is now irreversible: “The bullet has been fired and nothing will bring the bullet back to the gun.”’

Lord Pannick did say this to the Supreme Court when arguing (successfully) for Parliament to be given a meaningful vote on a draft treaty, but my understanding is that to help the court focus without distraction on the issue of a parliamentary vote, both sides in the case had agreed in open court that they wished the argument to proceed as though notification were irreversible.