The Brexitiers want to seize back national sovereignty. The Remainers want to hold on to the UK’s place and infuence in the EU. A soft Brexit will frustrate both. The UK will be subject to the law and insitutions of the EU but without having any right to participate in deciding what those laws are or how those insitutions act and develop. It follows that, faced with a soft Brexit, the Brexitiers, who value sovereignty, and the Remainers, who wish to preserve our influence, should join together in seeking revocation of the Article 50 notice. The alternative is that they tacitly approve an arrangement that neither they nor anyone else wants and which the Brexitiers have characterised as rendering the UK a “rule taker” and a “vassal state”.
Dogs in Mangers
Published by Peter G Harris
Peter G Harris is a barrister and was a senior civil servant responsible for advising ministers in the UK on policy and legislation for reforming the civil law and civil justice system. He is now based at Exeter College in the University of Oxford where he teaches and continues to think about the law as an instrument of public policy. View all posts by Peter G Harris
