UK in a Changing Europe: Government faces a number of tough choices in next stage of Brexit, new academic report finds
04 February 2020
The government faces several challenges after Brexit, including the negotiation of a new trade deal with the EU, devising and implementing a whole raft of new policies, reshaping the economy and holding the Union together, a new report by academic think tank The UK in a Changing Europe finds.
The report, Brexit: what next? finds the government has not only set itself the mammoth task of negotiating a new relationship with the EU, in just 11 months, but also has to:
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Develop and implement its own immigration, agriculture and environment policies, alongside its new trade policy. These will all require trade-offs between competing interests – and pose major administrative challenges
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Devise a coherent and comprehensive strategy to reshape the British economy after Brexit – in particular to mitigate the fall-out from a more distant trade relationship with the EU and deliver its promises to level up
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Set up new bodies to take on responsibilities from the EU – like the proposed new Office for Environmental Protection – and the independent body to oversee the implementation of the agreement on citizens’ rights
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Keep the Union together in the face of pressures which are putting existing arrangements under strain: Westminster pushing through legislation against the wishes of the devolved assemblies and Scotland and Northern Ireland chafing at the economic consequences of the government’s Brexit deal.
The trade deal itself will be exceedingly challenging. The authors predict that the government’s unwillingness to countenance an extension means it will be hard to agree anything other than ‘the barest of bare bone deals’ in the next 11 months.
The government’s decision to prioritise the right to diverge from EU regulation in the future will limit what can be agreed: it will mean new trade friction for agriculture and manufacturing; and significant new barriers for service exports.
Whatever can be agreed on security will mean less access than now to the EU’s law enforcement and judicial cooperation tools. The EU will not allow a non-member state outside Schengen to the European Arrest Warrant, the Schengen Information System and the European Criminal Record Information System. [...]
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