Finishing a book about Brexit in 2018 has its plusses and minuses. On the one hand I don’t know how the story will end, and the only safe prediction is that whatever I predict will be wrong. On the other hand there are pedagogical advantages to this. In ten years’ time journalists and academics will be able to explain why it was that we ended up where we did, and they may succeed in making the final outcome seem inevitable. But today there is a thicket of possible futures branching out ahead of us and nothing is certain. This is what history feels like while it is being made.
The first area of uncertainty concerns whether, and to what extent, the EU will facilitate Mrs May in her search for reassurances that the UK will not be ‘trapped’ forever in the backstop. Perhaps the Union will provide more clarification, but it is difficult to see them being willing to offer legal guarantees that would mean, from their point of view, that the backstop was no longer a backstop. That would mean abandoning a member state on an issue of fundamental national importance because of the intransigence and bad faith of a third country, and would hardly be a positive advertisement for the EU. On the other hand, if the Union holds firm it will show that EU solidarity means something, and that the EU is an umbrella that can protect the interests of all its members no matter how small. So it seems highly likely that British MPs will end up voting on the existing Withdrawal Agreement, backstop and all.
If the House of Commons votes against the Agreement then the only logical alternatives would appear to be no deal and no Brexit. (The Labour Party hopes that a general election might in such circumstances return it to power, but even if that happened the country would still face the same three alternatives; the ‘Norway plus’ option requires leaving on the basis of the existing Withdrawal Agreement.) The Withdrawal Agreement offers Brexiteers the certainty that the UK will leave the EU on 29 March 2019, and Remainers the certainty that nothing will change for up to almost four years. But many Remainers seem willing to risk a no deal Brexit in the hopes of getting a second referendum, while many hardline Brexiteers seem willing to risk a second referendum in the hopes either of obtaining a new Withdrawal Agreement, or of exiting the EU without a deal at all. And so as of today, 19 December 2018, it still seems likely that the Commons will reject the deal, and that the choice will then be between no deal and a second referendum of some kind. But it is too soon to rule out the possibility that the deal will, against all expectations, be approved, and that the UK will leave the EU on 29 March 2019, on schedule and in accordance with the rules of the Union.
If parliament accepts the deal that is not the end of the uncertainty, for the future trade relationship with the EU will still have to be negotiated. This will require the UK government to decide how close it wants the relationship between Britain and the EU to be. If parliament rejects the deal then a host of other issues arise. If the House of Commons decides that a second referendum is required, what question or questions will voters be asked? Since that choice may help to determine the outcome of the referendum, will parliament be able to agree on what to do? And if MPs decide that voters need to be given the option of leaving without a deal, what will the reaction of the EU be? All 27 remaining member states would need to agree to delay Brexit, in order to give time for a second referendum to be held: how keen would they be to facilitate a possible choice on the part of the UK to walk away in default of its legal obligations towards them? If there is a second referendum what will the result be, and what will be the political consequences, whichever way the vote goes?
And what of the possibility that the UK might crash out of the EU on 29 March 2019 without a deal? Most MPs are believed to be opposed to this, but crashing out is the default outcome that will apply unless they can agree on some other course of action. Will they be able to do so? Or will the country that once conquered half the world ‘in a fit of absence of mind’ find itself embarking on a no deal Brexit by mistake, as it were? And what would happen then, not only in the UK but in Ireland, whose economy would face severe disruption, and where border controls would have to be re-established along the Irish border?1 How would the UK discharge its responsibilities, which are not only economic but also political, to manage this border in the interests of the people of Northern Ireland? And what would the reaction be, not only in Ireland but in Northern Ireland and Scotland as well? The only safe prediction about a no deal scenario is that it would be a hugely informative, if costly, civics lesson for the people of Britain, Ireland and the rest of Europe.
These are just some of the possible outcomes ahead of us. More likely is one I haven’t thought of yet. Might the UK leave with the Withdrawal Agreement in hand and then refuse to implement the backstop? And what would happen then? Could the UK leave and then decide it had made a mistake, and if so how long might this learning process take? Will the Conservative and Unionist Party, whose Liberal Unionist component was born because of Ireland, split up largely because of Ireland?
And there are wider questions that arise too, such as: Will Brexit and Russian-backed populism in other countries weaken Europe at a dangerous time? Or will the departure of a recalcitrant member make it easier for the European Union to deepen economic, political and security cooperation among its remaining members? Conversely, if Remainers succeed in winning a second referendum will this strengthen or weaken the European project?
As 2018 draws to a close we don’t yet know how this story will end. But Brexit has always been about borders. The British decided in 2016 to take back control of theirs; the Europeans have insisted on retaining control of theirs; and the Irish are determined to avoid one on their island. And so it is perhaps not surprising that wherever Brexit is ultimately headed, the Irish border issue will have been central to the process of getting there.