Distraction

At midnight last night, the opportunity for the UK to ask for the transition period to be extended closed.

The Prime Minister, instead, made an election speech full of inflated promises despite only having been elected 6 months ago.

The transition period will expire by the operation of international law on New Year's Eve, and a hard border will be erected around Great Britain. NI will have its own rules, and for many goods will remain inside the EU customs and trade areas.

UK laws can be changed, but international treaties take time and the willingness to change from the other side. The EU would only change this if it was in their interest to, and it might well be that it is as prepared as can be, so why delay the inevitable?

With the original A50 submission by the UK Government, the timeline meant that there would be 21 months to conclude and prepare for the fineal parting of ways at the end of the transition period. But as the A50 24 months was extended and extended, that ate into the transition, to the point where in the end, we had 11 months to clnclude the details and prepare.

It is now July 1st, and the UK is trying to row back on what it agreed to in December, there is a gaping hole where an agreement should be. But businesses and exporters need to prepare, and there is no clarity on what they are preparing for.

An entire new computer system needs to be up and running in 6 months capable of handling 400 million declarations a year, an army of agents, officer and inspectors to back that up, offices and truck waiting area in which to carry out said inspections and document checks. And nothing has been done.

Ferry companies have said that no truck without the correct documentation to enter the EU will be allowed on board, in which case HMRC will have to ensure only vehicles that are compliant make it to the Dover or the Channel Tunnel. A massive freight forwarding and clearance area needs to be built somewhere in SE England, and then others around the country.

The cost of COVID recovery has to be paid from somewhere, taxes from companies and employees who will be affected by the new customs reality. Cross-country just in time supply chains will break, companies only just surviving will fail.

A deal of some kind will have to happen, but it might take two weeks into January, or two months or two years, but in the meantime there will be considerable disruption to supplies. If EU truck owners think that their vehicles cannot leave the UK easily, then they will not send them here to deliver, and UK HGV drivers will only have a few hundred licences enabling them to drive and work on EU roads. Shortages are inevitable, even if the UK decides not to check or apply tariffs to incoming goods, the EU will.

And meanwhile Parliament passed the bill ending free movement. Not only for EU citizens to come and work here, but to end UK citizens right to live, work, study in 27 countries. A huge swathe of rights just abolished. Most UK people don't realise the loss of movement applies to them to, and those who retire to Spain might only be allowed to live in their retirement villas for three months a year.

I might need a work visa to work in each of the EU27 countries. We need travel insurance, Car insurance. Health insurance. Pay roaming charges on our phones again, all because the ideologically insane wanted to end movement into the UK.

None of this applies yet, but will do, it will come as a surprise to many here when January roles round and they want to travel, eat or fill up their cars.

Can't say they weren't warned.