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Parliament: sovereign or supine?

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by Dr Andrew Blick
Senior Lecturer in Politics and Contemporary History at King’s College London; Senior Research Fellow at the Federal Trust

8th March 2019

Parliament, it might be tempting to believe, can now seize control of the Brexit agenda. But a closer examination of the present political environment reveals a picture less flattering to the heart of representative democracy. The Commons will indeed be asked to vote on one or more propositions next week. First, does it accept whatever revamped exit deal the government may obtain from the EU? If not, second, does it want to leave without a deal? If not, then, third, does it want the government to seek an extension of Article 50? MPs may also vote on whether or not they want a second referendum.

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Parliament on the brink of Brexit: meaningful or meaningless?

by Dr Andrew Blick
Senior Lecturer in Politics and Contemporary History at King’s College London; Senior Research Fellow at the Federal Trust

26th February 2019

It is an irony frequently remarked upon that the Brexit process, though embarked upon partly in the name of the sovereignty of Parliament, has seen this institution marginalised. Some of this exclusion from meaningful involvement in Brexit has been self-imposed. Parliament approved legislation, the European Union (Referendum) Act 2015, providing for an open-ended question to be put to the public which it subsequently accepted as producing a binding requirement, in some form, to leave the EU. It then provided the Prime Minister, through the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Act 2017, with the statutory authority required to trigger Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union, without attaching any conditions to the exercise of this power. Parliament has subsequently proved more effective at asserting that it should have power than actually exercising it. It has lately been willing to reject options it finds undesirable, most dramatically the deal secured by the UK government in negotiations with the EU. But even when expressing negative views, parliamentarians have voted in the same direction for different and opposing reasons. The imposition of a positive course of action – a function that is surely the essence of a ‘sovereign’ body – has not been attained.

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Parliamentary Control of Brexit is Easier Said Than Done

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

20th February 2019

A frequent criticism of the Prime Minister is that she prematurely triggered the Article 50 negotiations in March 2017 and did so without a realistic plan for their conduct. If she had waited longer and planned better, her critics contend, she could have negotiated a more acceptable Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration than the texts she is now having such difficulty steering through Parliament.  It is certainly true that Theresa May began the Brexit negotiations with no realistic plan. But no amount of delay and no amount of planning would have allowed her ever to achieve results acceptable to a majority of “Leave” voters and their Parliamentary sympathisers, let alone to the electorate or to Parliament as a whole. “No deal” was from the beginning the most likely outcome. The contradictory and unrealisable expectations reposed in “Brexit” could never lead to an outcome with which its partisans would be satisfied.

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Brexit: Will Parliament decide in February what it failed to decide in January?

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

1st February 2019

Four conclusions emerge from the series of votes on Brexit in the House of Commons this week (29th January):

• First, this government is so paralysed by internal division that it is incapable of pursuing any coherent policy in the negotiations. As long as it is in office but not in power, the UK is therefore on track to leave the EU on 29th March 2019 with “no deal.”

• Second, there is a majority of MPs, probably a significant majority, who wish to avoid the UK’s leaving the European Union without a Withdrawal Agreement.

• Third, this majority is not yet willing or able to impose its will on a government that runs the risk of bringing this about.

• Fourth, tensions and divisions within the major parties will make it difficult, although far from impossible, for Parliament to impose its will on the government before the end-March deadline. The possibility of the UK’s leaving the EU in two months with “no deal” having been agreed remains as high as ever. Whether this anarchic event occurs will depend on the interaction between the above distinct and contradictory conclusions emerging from this week’s vote.

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Brexit: Can Parliament take control?

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

16th January 2019

 

A weakened Prime Minister

It is significant and appropriate that the Conservative MPs who voted on 15th January against the Prime Minister’s Withdrawal Agreement from the European Union should have been drawn from opposing wings of her Party. While the majority of her internal opponents came from the European Research Group, some came from a very different part of the political spectrum, like Dominic Grieve and Justine Greening, who favour a new referendum with the option to remain in the EU. The 2016 referendum was largely a product of divisions within the Conservative Party and the conduct of the Brexit negotiations has been dominated by the internal manoeuvrings within the Party. The Prime Minister’s attempts to please everyone within her fractious Party during the Brexit negotiations have ended up pleasing very few Conservative MPs outside the ranks of her government, members of which are bound to support her in a public vote.

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Brexit: A national government or “no deal”

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Brexit: A national government or “no deal”

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

18th December 2018

In a recent article for the New York Times, the distinguished historian of the Conservative Party, Professor Tim Bale, argued that the “will to power” of the Conservative Party would enable it in the long term to reconstruct its inner cohesion, currently compromised by the Brexit debate. Professor Bale’s argument is controversial but, even if accurate from a historical perspective, it is highly unlikely to be reflected in the functioning of the Party over the crucial next three months. Last Wednesday’s ballot of Conservative MPs was at best a Pyrrhic victory for the Prime Minister.  The 117 votes recorded against her probably if anything understated the degree of opposition to her proposed texts for the Withdrawal Agreement from the EU and its accompanying Political Declaration. It is clear she cannot possibly rely on her Parliamentary Party to steer these proposals through the House of Commons against the opposition of the Labour Party and others.

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Blame Brexit, not Theresa May

Blame Brexit, not Theresa May

28th November 2018

 

 

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

 

In the confused discussion surrounding the Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration negotiated by Mrs. May with the EU 27, two particular criticisms are frequently voiced. Mrs. May, we are told on all sides, has failed to respect the result of the EU referendum of June 2016; and her failure is at least partly due to having triggered prematurely the Article 50 notification without a strategy for the negotiations. Both criticisms are unjust. The Agreement and Declaration are the logical and predictable outcome of the deluded vote for Brexit cast by 37% of the electorate in 2016; and there was no better plan available to her in 2017 or later for implementing Brexit than the path she chose. Continue reading Blame Brexit, not Theresa May →

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Brexit: The Beginning of the End?

BREXIT: THE BEGINNING OF THE END?

 

16th November 2018

 

 

by Brendan Donnelly
Director, The Federal Trust

 

In the documents released this week by the British government and the EU there is a striking contrast between the detailed and specific nature of the proposed Withdrawal Agreement (WA) and the cursory, imprecise nature of the accompanying Political Declaration (PD.) The WA is a binding legal document, creating bankable rights and obligations. The Political Declaration is a purely aspirational text, pointing towards a range of long-term outcomes for the next stage of the Brexit negotiations, and expressing the pious hope that these outcomes will be as benevolent as possible for all concerned.

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BREXIT: The Political Declaration

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BREXIT: THE POLITICAL DECLARATION MUST BE VAGUE AND PRECISE AT THE SAME TIME

 

by Brendan Donnelly, Director, The Federal Trust

11th October 2018

 

The issues relating to the status of Northern Ireland after Brexit, and in particular the Irish “backstop,” have not yet been resolved. The major political and administrative challenges confronting the Brexit negotiators in this area are however relatively clear. Assuming that the major economic changes ushered in by Brexit do not take effect until 2021, how can it be ensured that these changes do not create after that date the need for a “hard border” on the island of Ireland that would jeopardise the achievements of the Good Friday Agreement? At the time of writing no answer has been found to this question that will satisfy the British government, the European Union and the Democratic Unionist Party. The terms of the problem needing solution are nevertheless well-established and elements of a possible compromise become daily more sharply defined. Continue reading BREXIT: The Political Declaration →

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Brexit: Salzburg makes a People’s Vote more likely

by Brendan Donnelly, Director, The Federal Trust

24th September 2018

 

 

Over the past two years, the Conservative Party has been riven by the conflict between those who wanted the United Kingdom after Brexit to remain closely aligned with the European Union as a trading partner; and those who did not, or at least attached little or no importance to doing so. The Prime Minister’s desire to find a negotiating strategy reconciling these two widely different approaches led to the enduring stalemate and incoherence which the “Chequers” plan was designed to overcome. Unsurprisingly, this plan pleased neither side of the Conservative debate and attracted a final, unexpectedly categorical rejection from the EU at the Salzburg summit. Continue reading Brexit: Salzburg makes a People’s Vote more likely →