E U S S R Gives "solemn" Vow That Back Stop Will Be Temporary.....

[ToraToraTora]

https://news.sky.com/story/live-pm-to-set-out-brexit-deal-reassurances-to-mps-11606999
write into the deal then! At the moment it's like Chamberlain's "piece of paper" - worthless.

[jim360]

While this is true, it's also worth acknowledging that the Backstop arrangement is hardly ideal for the EU either. So in practice it *will* be temporary because it's in both side's interests to resolve it and work out a better arrangement.

Still, once you realise that there is a need for such an arrangement then it cannot be forcibly temporary. A backstop -- an emergency contingency in the event that negotiations drag out too long -- can hardly be temporary, because it wouldn't serve its purpose otherwise.

[Old_Geezer]

Trust me, I'm a politician.

[ToraToraTora]

yes jim but as it's written it can be indefinite, so all they need to do is change the deal to give it a time limit.

[ludwig]

'Temporary' is meaningless without a time limit. A week is temporary, as is 10,000 years.

[New Judge]

"E U S S R Gives "solemn" Vow That Back Stop Will Be Temporary....."

That's good enough for me (he says with fingers and everything else crossed).

There's only one reason the EU want a timeless "backstop". It is so they can dictate the terms of any trade deal that might be agreed post-Brexit. They will have Northern Ireland (and to a lesser degree the whole of the UK) complying with Single Market and Customs Union rules which is, however you'd like to put it, totally contrary to the notion of the UK leaving the EU. They will have that sanction unless and until the UK acquiesces to its demands which will undoubtedly involve some sort of compliance with the Common Fisheries Policy, the Common Agricultural Policy.

However, the "backstop" arrangement is only one of a multitude of totally unacceptable conditions being imposed on the UK by Mrs May's deal. MPs are quite right to reject it. What they are not right in doing is to say that since this deal is so unacceptable the only alternative is to remain.

[jim360]

A backstop isn't a backstop if it expires by a certain date. There is no chance that the EU -- and, in particular, Ireland -- will want to introduce a time limit.

[New Judge]

Exactly, Jim. A meaningless gesture by the EU. and misleading of Mrs May (how unusual) to suggest it alters anything.

[Peter Pedant]

This is like Ground Hog day

are we any further on from
foo da europeans want to change fings and they can't
an we - an we want to change brexit because present Brexit is truly crap
an we can and they can't - foo ! dat fair - no?

no we arent
I blame Trump - he just said a whole load of treaties are er not treaties anymore
and then it occurred to spectators - if you can agree something like a treaty and then unagree it
then nothing is permanent and what is an agreement on Monday may be in bits on Tuesday - by tweet!

[ichkeria]

Surely more nonsense has been written and spoken about this wretched “backstop” than anything.
I heard the unionist party leader Robin Swann - with what I could only see was a straight face - say that the Brexit deal in offer was vital for NI’s economic future. It’s supported by just about everyone who cares about that. And yet he couldn’t support it for “constitutional” reasons.
I thought that just about summed up Brexit: “We’ll go to the wall but at least it’ll be our own beautiful wall”

[gulliver1]

Trouble with the Tory Party is Mrs May can not control her Cabinet or her own MPs, the party is in Disarray. sooner this shower has gone the better.

[Old_Geezer]

No one is going to any wall, despite the best efforts of the fear stories to convince.

[Jackdaw33]

This reminds me of the days of Harold Wilson when the TUC gave a 'Solomon Binding agreement, as it became known, not to undertake industrial action against the government's economic policies. It was neither solemn nor binding, as events quickly showed.