Hello reality, my old friend

I have said many times in these posts, that the walls of reality were closing in on the Brexiteers and the PM. Last night it emerged that an agreement had been reached between the UK and the EU regarding the so called divorce settlement, or the financial settlement. Depending on which report or newspaper you read, the amount might differ, but it is in the area of £60 billion. It is important to point out that this is the same amount that would have been paid if Britain had stayed in the EU, so its not actually any new money being paid, just what during its time as a member of the EU Britain had agreed to fund.

Of course, Brexiteers have maintained that the money would not have to be paid, so that could be "spent" elsewhere, but the EU was never going to agree with that. Britain could have refused to pay, but then there would not have been a possibility of an agreement about trade, the EU would have just shut down talks. And the loss of trade for British businesses would end up being far more than £60 billion of course; so the choice was pay now or pay later.

This deal has to be "sold" to her party and Parliament, and it might be rejected, by those who don't think any money should be paid, and those who think paying this amount to make Britain poorer is pretty dumb. Which it is.

There is the final problem, that if there is indeed a deal and the EU have accepted it, will trade talks be able to start? Ireland have said without concrete assurances on the border need to be made by UK. But the effect of blocking talks at this point will mean an almost inevitable "no deal" scenario, as time really would be running out to go through this all again/ Not to say the border issue needs to be fixed, it does, so the stakes are high, and getting higher.

Today DD should appear before Parliament, or at least the Select Committee to explain yesterday's fiasco with the impact assessments, and Boris de Piffel Johnson might be charged under the Ministerial Code for misleading Parliament over the £350 million a week savings that he repeated this week.

Always interesting, and frightening too.