Mrs May’s misnamed Withdrawal Agreement was defeated in the House of Commons on 15th January 2019 by 230 votes, on 12th March by 149 votes and on 29th March by 58 votes. But now we witness the triumphal return of Mrs May’s undead Withdrawal Agreement (see my 4th September article and 5th October letter, both exclusively in Independence Daily).
It has returned disguised as Boris Johnson’s Revised Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration, eagerly agreed by EU leaders in the European Council on 17th October 2019. Anyone can read it online. It was agreed by the Commons last Friday.
Only the protocol on Northern Ireland, known as the backstop, has been significantly changed from Mrs May’s agreement. Instead of the United Kingdom border with the European Union being between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, it is now in the Irish Sea between the UK and Ireland.
So Boris Johnson’s ‘oven ready deal’ concedes the EU’s bygone stipulation of a united Ireland as a single EU region, and effectively cedes Northern Ireland to the EU. But this backstop has always been only a decoy to attract attention away from what’s worse in this falsely named Withdrawal Agreement.
EU bureaucrats smuggled in the EU Constitution disguised as the Treaty of Lisbon, after it was voted down in referendums in Holland and France. Likewise the Eurocrats have smuggled in Mrs May’s misnamed Withdrawal Agreement, disguised as Boris Johnson’s supposedly new ‘oven-ready deal’, although the only disguise is the amendment to the backstop that cedes Ulster to the EU. Nothing else has changed except the numbers of the pages and articles and clauses shifted around.
As before, Articles 164 to 166 of the ‘New’ Withdrawal Agreement set up a joint committee to alone interpret and apply the ‘new’ Withdrawal Agreement in the transition period of Britain’s departure. This committee will have equal numbers on the EU and UK sides. As the articles make clear, this committee will have sole control over the relationship between the EU and the UK in the transition period, however long that transition period lasts. That relationship between the EU and UK will include most things that matter.
Clause 2 of Article 166 on page 269 says that the decisions of this joint committee will be ‘binding’ on the EU and UK. So this unelected joint committee will overrule the elected British government. Clause 1 of Rule 10 of Annex VIII on page 516 says that the meetings of the joint committee will be confidential. Consequently this committee’s meetings will be in secret (‘confidential’ means private, and therefore secret).
Then only these private people on the UK side of the confidential joint committee can stand up for Britain against the EU in the transition period, if they choose to. Article 168 (Exclusivity) says that all disputes between the EU and UK sides on this confidential committee must go exclusively to the arbitration panel set up in Articles 171 to 181. There can be no appeals by the UK side to international law outside the EU against the joint committee’s decisions.
As the joint committee (not Parliament) interprets and applies the Withdrawal Agreement, Whitehall has tacitly accepted that this Withdrawal Agreement is part of EU law, not international law. But agreements between sovereign states are part of international law, not part of the law of a federal state or federation of states.
By accepting that the UK can only appeal against the decisions of the joint committee to EU bodies, Whitehall has surrendered UK sovereignty and accepted Britain’s status as a province in the EU empire. This new Withdrawal Agreement will reduce British provincial status to colonial captivity.
As before Clause 1 of Article 174 says that where a dispute submitted to arbitration raises a question of EU law, then the Court of Justice of the EU will make a decision binding on the arbitration panel. That clause means that the UK members of the joint committee will always be overruled by the EU side.
As the Withdrawal Agreement is an EU legal document, all disputes arising from its interpretation and application can be seen as legal disputes subject to the rule of the Court of Justice of the EU. Clause 1 of Article 174 makes the rest of the Articles 167 to 181 in Title III (Dispute Management) redundant. And it makes the UK side of the joint committee redundant also.
Article 132 in the 14th November 2018 Draft Withdrawal Agreement allowed the joint committee to extend the transition period to ‘31st December 20XX’. So the transition period would be extended to the 31st December 2099. That has been the purpose of the Withdrawal Agreement from its first appearance on the scene.
That ‘20XX’ clause is apparently missing from the ‘new’ Agreement. The ‘20XX’ clause made the intentions of the bureaucrats too obvious. But what if the EU side of the joint committee proposes to extend the transition period to the 31st December 2099 anyway, and the UK side disputes that? The Court of Justice of the European Union will decide who wins that dispute.
There is hardly any change in Boris Johnson’s Withdrawal Agreement from Mrs May’s, apart from the surrender of Northern Ireland to the EU. As the WA has now been passed by the Commons, the Eurocrats and Whitehall mandarins have achieved their aim of suspending democracy in Britain. Our elected Parliament will be overruled by an all-powerful secret junta known as the joint committee.
That joint committee will control the relationship between the European Union and the United Kingdom. That committee is free to turn Britain into a captive colony of the EU, in a transition period that never ends. That withdrawal of democracy is Whitehall’s response to the Leave victory on 23rd June 2016 which showed that British people cannot be trusted to submit to EU rule.
Murkier and murkier – The BBC states that Withdrawal Agreement Bill includes the repeal the European Communities Act, which took the UK into the EU, but then reinstates it immediately until the end of 2020 when the transition period ends.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-50125338
“How many of those ordinary folk will read and understand the whole of it?” writes Badger.
What do we not understand here, or, on the other hand, what do we understand only too well?
Ralph Prothero writes:
“As the joint committee (not Parliament) interprets and applies the Withdrawal Agreement, Whitehall has tacitly accepted that this Withdrawal Agreement is part of EU law, not international law”
The UK has not accepted that the WA is part of International Law.
Further, he writes:
“The ‘20XX’ clause” now missing “made the intentions of the bureaucrats too obvious. But what if the EU side of the joint committee proposes to extend the transition period to the 31st December 2099 anyway, and the UK side disputes that? The Court of Justice of the European Union will decide who wins that dispute.”
But we are to leave on the 31st January and UK law will hold. Does that not mean that the WA as part of EU Law has no power over us?
Torquil Dick-Erikson reiterates that:
“Making it mandatory for the “Transition period” to end on 31st December 2020.”
This may sound like acquiescence on my part, to the “bummer” of a WA deal as described by Martin Cruttwell. It is not. I am trying to figure out what we may be missing.
I, as I suspect, many others, are confused.
We have to ask ourselves, what is meant by ‘leaving on the 31st January 2020, and what is meant by ending the Transition period on 31st December 2020? Could it possibly mean that those two intentions, to be set in UK Law, plus the assertion that the WA is EU Law, and not International Law, make this WA ‘not worth the paper it is written on’?
The overthrow of Europe has been achieved by the descendants of the Fascists, by stealth, treaty, debt and collusion. But in the end it is bureaucracy and argument not guns and bullets are winning against nation states and democracy. Some, including me, believe those descendants are themselves Fascists.
Will the WA be a reversal of Chamberlains bit of paper. But who will be laughing then? Perhaps we should keep ‘mum’?
Maybe someone needs to be the ‘devil’s advocate’.
There will be some acid tests like the issue of the Armed Forces, Immigration and HS2.
Otherwise “when the dust settles”, Norman, will there be an “uprising”, Jack Thomas?
That’s the problem LJ people feared the Corbyn disaster more than the e.u superstate and that’s why Boris at the moment is number one, because ‘their’ interests were threatened. It’s only when the dust settles that they will come to recognise that once again they have been had. How can you have exited when you don’t control your boarders or military , I wonder how long it will take for people to wake up , not for some time I would wager.
Yes, Norman. There is so much euphoria now, palpable relief that we have escaped Corbyn. But no-one seems to be addressing the fact that BJ’s ”deal” is almost exactly the same as May’s – that is, the one that they were voting against a few months ago, with a few tweaks. It’s not that they don’t believe we’ve noticed – it’s because they don’t actually CARE now that they have their majority.
When will it begin to unravel? When will people notice they’ve been conned? Or will a few pennies off their tax payments be enough to silence them? It is disheartening and depressing how easily people are bought, how ready they are to rejoice at being thrown crumbs – but that’s what politicians count on after all.
Norman I am sure it is unconscious, but have you hit upon a truth?
You write “when you don’t control your own boarders” -obviously you actually meant “borders”, but by boarders you might have implied those pirates actually invading our borders, as I am sure many of the economic opportunists actually are.
Having been an opponent of the EC/EU since the 1970s, on several occasions I offered to explain to your readers what is going on and that the “party system (all of it) is the revolution against the constitution”. In my article I explain the threats which drive these people to do what they do. You kindly included my e-mail address .
Over the months only 3 people contacted me. So, I hope your readers have a happy time commiserating. The chance to DO something has just gone. I don’t know how many wyas the anti-EU vote was split but at least 4 by the “divide and rule” part system.. English Democrats; For Britain; UKIP; Brexit Party. even BNP? which Farage boasted on several occasions on TV that he single-handedly destroyed. With friends like that who needs enemies?
I asked previously, when did Nigel Farage know that Johnson’s deal was a bummer? Before or after he pulled the 317 candidates? My article epxlains how Heath got way with his betrayal. It appears we have learned or understood nothing in 45 years. john.cruttwell@sfr.fr .
Martin,
Such change requires a large number of people and a huge amount of money to field candidates. Let’s just focus on getting out of the EU first which will of course not be as easy as people think. We will see soon enough if Boris is to be trusted, or can be forced to do the necessary.
What Ralph Prothero is saying here is actually true.
The text of Boris’s “Withdrawal” Agreement is the same as Mrs May’s. So are we headed for permanent servitude under EU rule, via the “junta”?
The WA contains dangers which I warned against in a piece of research I published on the Bruges group website last year having read the text of the WA, (as I see Mr Prothero has also done)::
https://www.brugesgroup.com/blog/dangers-to-national-security-and-individual-freedom-in-mrs-may-s-withdrawal-agreement
Have the powers that be heeded these warnings?
Well, it does need to be said that the window of opportunity during which we shall be utterly subservient to the will of the junta has been reduced from 80 years (with the original 20XX time horizon) to just 11 months with the legislation currently going through Parliament, making it mandatory for the “Transition period” to end on 31st December 2020, even if no Free Trade Agreement has been reached, as we read in the papers.
There are still dangers, as I pointed out in another piece published on the Bruges Group website, and reproduced on this website:
https://independencedaily.co.uk/how-to-preserve-british-sovereignty-during-the-transition-period/
It still remains to be seen if the government will proceed to revoke the measures with which T May signed us up to the amalgamation of the UK’s armed forces with a nascent EU army, to reform the European Arrest Warrant so that British courts can demand to see and to assess evidence of a prima facie case to answer before granting extradition, and to repudiate Mrs May’s announcement, when she was Home Secretary, that she would “of course” ask for assistance of “special intervention units” from our EU allies if needed.
The essential point is that under no circumstances whatsoever must we allow EU paramilitary boots to set foot on UK soil.
Should this be attempted, by decision of some “junta”/joint committee to enforce some decision of the ECJ, then the unalterable bedrock provision of our own constitution could, and would have to, be brought into play. This says that No Parliament Can Bind Its Successors. Parliament would in that case have to repeal the Withdrawal Agreement, unilaterally, thus removing any legal power from the junta’s grasp, and cancelling at a stroke any jurisdiction of the ECJ on our islands.
We have to hope that if such a situation arose during the 11 months of our “servitude”, Boris would summon up the intestinal fortitude needed to take the right decisions.
.
Torquil Erikson : Re EAW, the following was reported in Debbie’s news roundup on Friday 2 days ago, which may be of interest ; : “The UK is set to be thrown out of the European Arrest Warrant system after Brexit, the Queen’s Speech admits, triggering a warning it will become “a haven for Europe’s worst criminals”. Boris Johnson has unveiled plans for an extradition bill, to ensure “a person wanted by authorities in a trusted country for a serious crime is arrested quickly”. The measure will also give the police powers to arrest someone wanted for a serious crime in a non-EU country “without having to apply to a court for a warrant first”.
What else can the words “are binding” mean? Clause 2 of Article 166 in the WA means that in the transition period a secretive junta known as the Joint Committee overrules Parliament and is beyond democratic control. Yet there has been no mention of this in the mainstream news media.
The bias of the media, and particularly the BBC, has prevented a large enough number of ordinary folk from understanding that we have been betrayed yet again. The article above shows why this is so. How many of those ordinary folk will read and understand the whole of it? I am not saying people are stupid, just that most of them don’t have the time to be reading semi-technical articles, quoting from legal documents. It take a lot of trouble. What was needed was an effective advertising campaign concentrating on a skillful blend of slogan and fact. The media denied us that, it has been largely hostile to leaving the EU anyway.
Yes Badger, sometimes I wonder about the broadcast and press media,
Over a year ago I downloaded Mrs May’s draft Withdrawal Agreement of 14th November 2018 and started to skim through it. A while after the “20XX” in Article 132 came the Joint Committee from Article 164 onwards. This JC had sole responsibility for the interpretation & application of the WA in the Transition Period.
Then came the news that JC’s decisions will “be binding on the Union and the United Kingdom” (Article 166). This JC will overrule the British government.
Then Article 174 which enables the EU side of the Joint Committee to defeat the UK side in every dispute between them, through arbitration by the Court of Justice of the EU.
Then there was the Annex dealing with the Joint Committee, Annex VIII, and in it clause 10 which said that the “proceedings” of the Joint Committee will be confidential. (Bojo’s Withdrawal Agreement says its “meetings” will be confidential).
I could hardly believe what I was reading in Mrs May’s draft Withdrawal Agreement over a year ago. I was sure that there would be a huge public uproar about the Joint Committee in the press and Parliament. Instead the silence has been deafening.
The “20XX” clause did disappear, as far as I could see, from the 25th November 2018 Withdrawal Agreement approved by the EU leaders in the European Council.
But the Joint Committee remained in the 25th November 2018 Withdrawal Agreement. And this future junta is still there in Boris Johnson’s Withdrawal Agreement voted through the House of Commons last Friday. And the media silence about it is DEAFENING.
Yes ralph i tried reading that document too. I wonder how many MPs have actually read the WA? or journalists? It’s not 500 pages of legalese for nothing.
Yeh, I know Matt. But the New Withdrawal Agreement, approved on the 17th October 2019 by the European Council, is 541 pages long. Whereas the WA of 25th November 2018 was 599 pages long. So it has got shorter.
Anyone can read it online, just google “New Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration”. I probably spent more time on the side bar, scrolling through the 585 pages of the Draft WA of the 14th November 2018, when it came out, than on other WA’s since. They’re not much different from the Draft WA. Shortly afterwards, about mid November 2018, it was demolished in a Telegraph article by Suella Braverman MP, in which she wrote about that 20XX clause in Article 132.
Scrolling on down from Article 132 you get to Article 164 about the Joint Committee, which woke me up. I couldn’t believe clause 2 of Article 166, I almost fell off my chair. I don’t care about the tedious trade stuff in the WA, but I do care about who gets the power, and the WA definitely gives all power to the EU and its Court of Justice. Meanwhile the WA keeps the UK powerless in a transition period, which the Joint Committee can extend at its leisure …..
I’ve tried copying & pasting the WA’s, but they won’t let you, you can hold your finger on the text as long as you like, but the blue background never turns up. So I tried taking photos of the text on the computer screen in the library, but that was a dead loss too.
MPs don’t have to keep scrolling, because HMSO has printed copies for them of the WA’s in books, to read whenever they like. Perhaps they like what they read on those pages. They probably do, as three quarters of the Commons campaigned for Remain before 23rd June 2016.
“I’ve tried copying & pasting…”
I found it easy to download as a .pdf from which any selected text may be copied elsewhere.
https://standup4brexit.com/
”to commit to leaving the EU …. and abandoning Theresa May’s Withdrawal Agreement as dead.”
Take a look at what they all pledged. Do they understand the meaning of the word ”pledge”? Or ”abandon”, or ”dead”?
Do they really think that we’re all so stupid and ill-informed that we don’t realise that BJ’s NEW deal most certainly IS May’s old WA?
Think of all those who voted against her WA – some of them all three times. They all know full well that it’s the same treaty, barely changed – let’s have a guess what has made them change their mind.
It was always a near certainty that Johnson’s agreement was a BRINO. What’s important is making people aware of it. At the moment the entire system is massively engaged in creating a cognitive dissonance where what people want to think – that we are leaving – is taken to be true and anything pointing to any other conclusion is dismissed. BP was supposed to bear the burden of pointing this out but even Farage (and David Starkey too) now seem to be helping the cognitive dissonance along. Starkey says he misunderstood Boris. Before evidence of it is even in. At the moment all we have is promises.
Starkey seems to think Boris is a new Disraeli. I think he’s a sham Disraeli. The Sun says it’s been told by a Tory source that Johnson’s support is a mile wide and an inch deep.
I watched the Starkey youtube re his feelings re the election result ,from which I concluded that he is just another mainstream mouthpiece.
Thank you for that explanation; it needs to be posted far and wide. Boris was never to be trusted which was why we needed a significant presence of TBP in the HoC. Now it seems that an uprising may be the only way to get out of the EU, but a better way would be to work with like minded people in the countries of the EU to bring about its destruction; something I have long argued for to protect our descendants.
When reading the article, my thoughts were, yes we have heard all this before. Agreed, it is a stitch up,
BUT what can we tangibly do?
So I agree JT that this needs to be disseminated to all and sundry. But how? These flaws have already been distributed for months and months and still dont get any ‘takers’.
The other thing is an uprising. I’m up for that. But ‘strictly come baking’ is on the TV that day and I dont want to miss it . . .
Unfortunately I dont think anything will happen until the population wakes up to the fact we are not leaving – BRINO. When we are forced to adopt alien policies with no redress, such as using the you-row and our youngsters are conscripted, it may happen. Not before.
So as much as I agree, I dont see anything happen for a few years. And only then if ‘dancing under the hammer’ or ‘the motorbike trail to antiques’ is not on TV.
The reason for no takers Biscotte is that people don’t like challenging an overwhelming orthodoxy. Too many interests involved. But eventually the strain causes a sudden collapse like with building sandcastles. What Thomas Kuhn called a ‘paradigm shift’. I don’t think it will take that long. It just needs the collapse seeding by some event or statement by someone and suddenly it’s safe to come out. I think the most likely catalyst is immigration which is at the heart of the reason for betrayal. Also the flaws have indeed been pointed to but are purely theoretical so far.
My prediction re immigration : The UN Global Migration Compact, will kick in soon. This will eventually open the floodgates; migrants will come in planeloads . (first planeload was in Germany recently, per “Voice Of Europe”). However I predict EU/Govt might play it softly -softly at first so as not to frighten the horses yet . Life after Vassalage- BRINO will generally be hell, but the Tories will shift the blame on to “Brexit.” so that we will regret “leaving” and agree to “rejoin.” Was that not always the plan?
Yes, indeed, Biscotte. It feels as if we’re shouting into the wind. We feared the damage Corbyn would do – now we’re back to fearing what the EU will be ALLOWED to do by our own Government to make us suffer.
I agree that it is a difficult task. My sister is one of those who has swallowed the EU/Government lies and the Climate Change Scam hook line and sinker. She is retired and clearly has the time to research these matters but steadfastly refuses to do so. It is impossible to initiate any sensible discussion with her; any attempt to do so triggers a tirade of abuse in respect of Boris and Trump.
There must be many more like her. Add those who follow sports to the exclusion of anything else and we have a huge number of people whose eyes, ears and minds are closed to all other matters. Also a large number of the indoctrinated who have recently completed their “education”, such as the Thunberg girl, and there is a huge issue in initiating any meaningful discussion.
“it needs to be posted far and wide.” So true, and I intend to do my bit.