The British Pound fell like a stone a couple of weeks ago, when British Prime Minister Theresa May announced that her Government would seek to trigger article 50 of the Lisbon treaty during the early part of next year. This would begin the 2-year legal process of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union and the re-emergence of the United Kingdom as a truly sovereign and independent state.
Brexit is in the news today as it is being discussed in the English High Court today. There are a group of lawyers mounting a pre-emptive legal challenge to any exit that might be effected without some kind of approving vote in the House of Commons, Britain’s democratically elected Parliament.
May actually campaigned in favour of a remain vote in last June’s referendum, and I had thought that she might seek to fudge the implementation of a British exit, going for an effective membership of the European Union in everything but name only, and delaying even that for as long as possible. The referendum vote has no legal standing, so it is theoretically possible for it to be disregarded.
It seems I am not the only one who has been surprised by May’s hard line, as the market sold the British Pound furiously, and the Remain camp received the news with its usual howls of protest and demands for the democratically expressed will of the British people to be set aside.
As it is now clear that the Government will seek to implement an exit quickly, attention turns to possible mechanisms through which the exit plan might be sabotaged.
The first thing to note here is that it seems clear that the Government will want to exit without holding an express vote, and is currently promising only that Parliament will “have a say” in the process.
Why so coy? Essentially, it is because solid majorities of both Houses of Parliament strongly oppose an exit from the European Union, especially the “hard exit” which the Government has declared it wants. Could the Government be sure of winning such a vote? Would Members of Parliament defy the largest democratic mandate ever given by the British people? Even if they balked at such a concept, could enough of them bring themselves to actively vote for something they see as a highly dangerous and destructive move?
If the Government failed to win such a vote, it would almost undoubtedly feel compelled to resign and call a new General Election. The governing Conservative Party would find itself campaigning on a platform that the party itself has no Parliamentary majority for, which would be a recipe for chaos and bitter infighting.
The Government faces a further tactical dilemma in that the exact terms of any exit will be a matter for very hardball negotiations with the European Union. Securing a Parliamentary vote approving any terms before they are agreed would leave the British government very vulnerable to any bad faith that might exist on the side of the European Union.
The Brexit story is far from over yet. I believe a real vote in the House of Commons would fail to achieve a majority for Brexit, and would lead to political chaos with accompanying market turmoil.
