Opinion｜Brexit: A Botched Job

So, here we are then. March 29, the date the U.K. was meant to leave the European Union, has been and gone—not with a bang, but a whimper. Theresa May’s Brexit withdrawal agreement has spluttered, staggered, keeled over and finally fallen flat on its face, three times rejected by British Members of Parliament (MPs). So much for this deal being “the easiest in human history,” eh?

An agreement made by EU leaders in Brussels on March 22 confirmed that Brexit is going to be delayed until at least April 12, giving MPs another couple of weeks to frantically find a solution to the riddle they have been trying to solve for the past three years. In the meantime, it is likely that May will head back to the continent, tail firmly between her legs, to try and secure an even longer delay.

While the future of the U.K. remains in limbo, the Prime Minister’s future is more certain. In an unprecedented move Theresa May—whose residence in 10 Downing Street has at no point felt strong or stable—attempted to bribe MPs into voting for her deal by saying she would step down as Prime Minister if it passed (which it didn’t). May’s position is now surely untenable, even for a PM whose dogged resilience has been her only redeeming characteristic. When she will go is unclear, but what it does mean is that a Conservative party leadership contest—the Machiavellian circus that no one asked for—is imminent. Oh joy.

Those of you who have been following the Brexit process closely (my sympathies, if so) have probably been startled by how turgid and cyclical the past few months have been. After breaking all the wrong records with her first rejected vote on January 15, it seemed obvious that the Prime Minister would have to make some significant changes to her withdrawal agreement in order for MPs to ratify it. However, obvious assumptions and “conventional wisdom” have long since been killed off by the Brexit behemoth.

After two more months of bluster, threats and faux-developments, May came back to Parliament for a second Meaningful Vote on March 12, with what was essentially the same deal (albeit a “polished” one, as one MP so tastefully described it). Needless to say, it was voted down again, with the issue surrounding the Irish backstop proving the sticking point once more.

While the immediate political future of the U.K. remains as bleak as its weather, there are very small signs of encouragement beginning to break through the Brexit fog.

MPs have only been able to agree on the sort of Brexit they don’t want to happen. This has been as bewildering as it has been absurdly monotonous; a Kafkaesque nightmare of the dullest proportions. However, in a rare and welcome bit of Parliamentary sanity, the chorus of “No’s!” from the Commons has also included a consistent rejection of the potentially catastrophic “no deal” Brexit. A vote on March 14 saw MPs reject no deal “under any circumstances,” and while these votes are not a legally preventative strategy against no deal happening (there are still ways in which the U.K. could crash out of the EU by accident), the agreements between the U.K. and the EU to delay Brexit mean it is becoming increasingly unlikely.

Protection against no deal was further bolstered last week as the British Parliament managed to wrestle the initiative away from Theresa May’s Conservative government. MPs secured the right to set out their own plans for Brexit in a series of indicative votes, a process designed to allow Parliament as a whole to come to a cross-party agreement on a realistic Brexit proposal.

The fact that all eight proposals were defeated by the commons on March 27 does appear to be superficially disheartening. However, Westminster insiders knew this was likely to be the case; the process of the indicative votes was designed to whittle down the Brexit deal “contenders” until they were left with something that a majority of the House could finally agree to. The winners of the evening included a public vote on the Brexit deal, which got the highest vote share (without securing a majority), while an agreement that would secure a Customs Union with the EU came a close second. MPs will get a second chance to debate and vote on the contenders tonight, Monday, April 1.

Outside of the Parliamentary charade—conducted with such elan by the world’s new favorite politician, John Bercow—the mood in the UK seems to have gone from exasperation to complete and utter apathy. People of all political persuasions are fed up with hearing about Brexit and want the whole thing to go away, one way or the other, not least so the government can start dealing with the myriad other issues facing British society.

At the same time, cheerleaders from both sides of the debate have been making their voices known, although the successes of their endeavors have been slightly different. The Remain camp, who are campaigning vociferously for a “People’s Vote,” organized a rally on March 23 which supporters claim drew around one million pro-EU protesters to the streets of London. Furthermore, an online petition which calls on the government to revoke Article 50 so that Britain remains in the EU has been signed by over six million people. On the other side of the Brexit divide, Nigel Farage and his pro-Brexit cronies set up the much less attended “March for Leave,” which was the definition of a damp squib.

Watching the whole Brexit process unfold from overseas has been pretty depressing. Having to try and explain why Britain has willfully decided to punch itself in the face to rightly baffled continental friends has been embarrassing, and for people who have made their families, friends and lives in the EU, the grave uncertainty caused by Brexit has been tortuous. The political conversation on both sides in the U.K. has tended to overlook the concerns of the great many British citizens living abroad and EU citizens living in Britain, even despite the best efforts of excellent organizations like British in Europe and The 3 Million.

We have already covered the vast majority of legal developments for Brits living in Spain and the steps you should take to prepare for it in our previous article on Brexit, however, there have been some notable reassurances since. The Spanish government’s Royal Decree, to be put in place if the U.K. leaves the EU without a deal, made on March 2, is the most significant of these. Among the important no deal contingency measures outlined, which include assurances on things like residency and customs procedures, there was confirmation that Brits will retain the right to free healthcare.

The U.K. government has stated that: “On healthcare, U.K. has offered to fund healthcare in Spain for U.K. nationals who would benefit from the S1 / EHIC schemes until 31 December 2020 on a reciprocal basis. The U.K. is also protecting healthcare for Spanish nationals in the U.K..”

While the immediate political future of the U.K. remains as bleak as its weather, there are very small signs of encouragement beginning to break through the Brexit fog. The support which is coalescing around a confirmatory public vote on any Brexit deal voted through by Parliament offers a glimmer of hope for those of us clinging to the idea of Britain remaining with our European cousins. Similarly, the ongoing indicative votes process does appear to offer a route through the immediate Parliamentary quagmire. The only problem is, at the end of the current mire lies an even bigger, much more gloomy looking bog.

Britain leaving the EU will not spell the end of Brexit; like it or not, it is going to dominate discourse in the U.K. for the foreseeable future. Even if the long term economic issues are not as bad as nearly all experts fear, the societal repercussions feel like they are already incurable. If Britain does choose to continue with this bizarre act of self mutilation, then the carnage and entropy we’ve seen so far is just the beginning.

Harry Stott is a regular contributor to the Barcelona Metropolitan covering Brexit, local political and social issues as well as the music scene. He recently received a B.A. in music from the University of Leeds, and now writes and produces radio content for a number of organizations in Barcelona and beyond. You can read more of Harry's articles here.