Saturday 20 October 2018

Boris Johnson Beats the Drum

The EU Is Treating Britain’s Constitution with Contempt

Oliver J J Lane
Breitbart London

The European Union is working to violate the very basis of the United Kingdom and even annex part of the country as an economic colony, high-profile Tory rebel Boris Johnson has said, in his continued assault against the Prime Minister’s soft Brexit plan.

Although one-time Foreign Secretary and former Mayor of London Johnson was widely seen to have bottled his chance of challenging Theresa May’s leadership when he stepped back from the brink at the Conservative Party conference where he even gave a craven message of support for the Prime Minister, he has continued sniping from the sidelines since.

In his latest intervention into the Brexit negotiation process — published in the Daily Telegraph even as latest talks between British and European Union negotiators collapse — Johnson blasted the EU for offering the UK nothing but humiliation. Contrasting the humiliation of having Northern Ireland — Ulster — remain in the EU while the home nations of Great Britain leave and the humiliation of the whole United Kingdom being forced to remain in the Single Market against its own wishes, Johnson wrote:
It is a choice between two exquisitely embarrassing varieties of humiliation. It is an entirely false choice. It must be rejected, and it must be rejected now… In that sense it would mean violating the Act of Union of 1800, and the very basis on which this country is founded.

If we were to allow this economic annexation of Northern Ireland, by a foreign power, we would be treating Northern Irish MPs as somehow second class legislators, deprived now and forever of any say in many of the laws operational in their own constituencies. Even if the rest of the UK were able to do free trade deals, Northern Ireland would not be able to take part.

…It seems that in the last few days UK negotiators have agreed that we will remain in the “customs territory” of the EU, an even stronger commitment than remaining in the customs union. It means that for trading purposes the UK is simply conceived of as part of EU territory, as though it were a departement of France. We will be outside the EU but run by the EU, in the sense that from next year we will, of course, have no one in the Commission directorate of external trade, no influence over tariffs, and no ability to decide what trade and commercial policies will be pursued IN OUR OWN COUNTRY.

Emphasising his opposition to the Prime Minister’s Brexit plan and calling again for a free trade deal commonly called a ‘Super-Canada’ settlement, Johnson said the Chequers deal and the agreed so-called ‘backstop’ which has handed the EU negotiating leverage over Northern Ireland should be scrapped.

The latest comments came only days after Johnson warned the way Brexit is presently turning out, with endless concessions from Theresa May’s government and no accommodation by Brussels, it is likely to be the “greatest national humiliation since Suez”.

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