The list of implausible Tory claims about Brexit is long, including old assertions that Britain holds all the cards
leadership contest was triggered by Theresa May’s repeated failure to pass her Brexit deal. The deadline for Britain to leave the European Union is less than four months away. So the big question for the two men hoping to succeed her is: how credible are their plans for Brexit? And the answer is: not very. Worse, their campaigns are reverting atavistically to claims made after the referendum in 2016 that have since been debunked.
Both Jeremy Hunt and Boris Johnson make much of their Trump-like dealmaking ability. Neither is prepared to smudge Mrs May’s restrictive red lines of leaving the single market, customs union and European Court of Justice. Both agree that threatening to walk away with no deal is the best way to extract further concessions from Brussels. And they are equally adamant that they can get Brexit done by October 31st.
None of this will be easy to negotiate, let alone by October 31st. Mujtaba Rahman of the Eurasia Group consultancy says thesees the withdrawal agreement as a compromise that cannot be unpicked. It may expand the accompanying political declaration about the future, but that would amount to putting lipstick on a pig. Contrary to Mr Johnson’s plan, there would be no transition period if there were no deal.
As Mrs May found over two years of hard bargaining, the truth about power and red lines is less forgiving. German and otherfirms have made clear that they value the integrity of the single market more than access to Britain. TheGDP,s. Another drop in sterling would raise prices. Almost no countries trade solely onterms—which is precisely why Brexiteers want free-trade deals round the world.
The second is a shift of Brexit talk towards the extreme, epitomised by the two candidates’ embrace of no-deal. The linguistic changes are telling. Mrs May’s deal used to be termed a “hard” Brexit, as it would take Britain out of the single market and customs union. Now it is widely derided as “Brexit in name only”. A “soft” Brexit that would keep Britain in the single market, like Norway, is pilloried as no Brexit at all.
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