Boris Johnson compares himself to the Incredible Hulk in an interview with the Mail on Sunday. But he doesn’t have miraculous powers. We won’t leave the EU on October – even if he gets a deal with the EU.
The Prime Minister claims “real signs of movement” in Berlin, Paris and Dublin over ditching the “backstop” designed to keep the Irish border open. After more than three years of chaos and confusion, this sounds too good to be true. The UK faces a litany of obstacles to get a deal with the EU.
It’s not just that Johnson wants to get rid of the backstop. His negotiator, David Frost, has told the EU that the government also wants to ditch the “level playing field” commitments Theresa May made not to undercut EU rules on workers’ rights and the environment. The French are particularly wary of British attempts to undercut the single market by turning the UK into a Singapore-style low tax, low regulation economy.
What’s more, the Prime Minister is already desperately short of time. And he is making things worse by hanging back from tabling detailed proposals until after the Tory conference at the beginning of October for fear that even more extreme Brexiters in the party will criticise any whiff of compromise.
Still Johnson pretends he’s superhuman. “Hulk always escaped, no matter how tightly bound in he seemed to be – and that is the case for this country. We will come out on October 31 and we will get it done.”
So let’s suppose for a moment he does reach an agreement at the European Council on October 17. The snag is it usually takes months to the legal text of a treaty. Crucially, without that text government lawyers can’t write the Bill necessary to incorporate it into our law.
Parliament then normally takes several weeks to pass the Bill. Talk of all-night sittings and weekend working is all bluff and bluster. The Prime Minister has no majority in either House of Parliament and can’t set the timetable for the Bill’s passage. And, as Brexiters always forget, the European Parliament has got to agree to any deal too.
Finally, there is the question of having enough votes in the Commons for a Bill to pass. Johnson might persuade some members of the ERG to back him. But if he agrees to modify the backstop so it only applies to Northern Ireland – with the result that there are then customs checks between Great Britain and Northern Ireland – he may lose the support of Conservatives who care about keeping the UK together. The DUP would also have to go back on all its promises and talk of 30-50 Labour MPs voting for the deal has been heard before but never materialised.
Even if the Prime Minister gets a deal, he’ll need to ask the EU for extra time. So either he is planning to ask for a delay while furiously claiming he isn’t – or his talk of a deal is just a smokescreen for leaving without one.