Brexit update

Having been on the road for six days, and off Twitter for the last two of those, I am rather out of the Brexit loop, as it were.

It has been good for my sanity for sure, but I also know that whether I follow the day to day, hour by hour updates, this clusterfuck is going to happen anyway.

I listened to the BBC new updates on the hour, looked at the newspaper's headlines, and there is nothing about Brexit. Like there is no focus now, the Government can get on with it in secret, without scrutiny.

As a remainer, I now have to accept, that unless there is a major unforeseen event, the UK will leave the UK on 31st January, though outwardly, I also know that there will be little effect, as the transition agreement kicks in, and things will stay the same.

So, Brexiteers will trumpet that all the doomsayers were wrong, all is good. But, this is not true, of course. The real proof of the (Brexit) pudding will be on January 1st 2021 when the transition agreement runs out and the UK will have left the sphere of EU influence.

Or will it?

No one really know, least of all the Brexiteers, who still can't agree among themselves as to what Brexit means.

But, from January 1st next year, the UK will be a third country to the EU, under international law, and subject to all the restrictions, regulations and obligations that entails, and the EU, under international law, will have to treat the UK the same as all other third countries.

Unless some kind of agreement is in place.

And remember, tariffs are the least of the UK's worries, though for farming, these will be onerous. It will be non-tariff barriers that will really make life difficult, and in particular, rules of origin.

On Friday, devolution returned to Northern Ireland after a three year break, and no Brexit will have to find a compromise between the GFA, the agreement that reopened Stormont and the WA. All is smiles for now, as Arline is 1st Minister again. But this year will be bumpy in I and the rest of Britain.

In other news, the Government is planning a Festival of Britain, dubbed festival of Brexit, for 2022. £120 million is going to be spunked on it. And as has been pointed out, the Festival has two years of planning, but Brexit itself, eleven months.

Go figure.