It’s taken a while, but finally the truth is out there. After all the false pretence, official leaks and political theatre, we now know exactly what the European Union’s priorities are as far as any Brexit negotiation is concerned.
It’s all about the money…it’s always been about the money.
It has to be about the money, because the truth that dare not speak its name in polite politics is that the European Union is in fact one colossal wealth redistribution engine. Not so much a welfare state as welfare for states, and Brexit represents a de facto tax strike.
It’s still not clear exactly how much of the average UK worker’s wage packet Brussels believes it’s entitled to, but we know it’ll more than enough to keep Juncker and the rest of his unelected inner circle in comfort and cognac for the rest of their days. The fact that the EU has been obsessing about the Brexit bill being settled in advance of any trade negotiations shows just how vital the UK’s contributions are in propping up the increasingly rickety superstructure of this increasingly embattled superstate.
Only this morning the press is reporting that Poland and France have weighed in with an extra demand for still greater contributions to support the hated Common Agricultural Policy. Quelle surprise!
At first glance it would appear that the European Union is single minded in its ambition to shaft us one last time before we finally slam the door on this unhappy marriage, but that unity is just a little too polished a little too well rehearsed to be entirely authentic. Since when did all the member states agree anything in 4 months, let alone 4 minutes?
The truth is that the Brussels bureaucrats are facing an existential crisis, and they know it. One member state has already decided to quit the bloc, and the remaining twenty-seven will inevitably turn on each other and Brussels as recipients become contributors and the age of acquiescence bought with confiscated cash finally comes to an abrupt and painful end.
George Osborne was right during the referendum campaign when he said that Brexit would cause a profound economic shock…but it won’t just be for us.
This looming and inescapable crisis explains why Brussels is so insistent on treating the UK as a supplicant state rather than the union’s second largest economy.
We should get used to this kind of abuse and grandstanding, because it’ll drone on for years before we go and long after we’ve left. Once the European Union collapses under the weight of its own hubris, naturally it’s the Brexiting British who will be blamed. The next Greek debt crisis, blame Brexit. The rise of nationalism, Brexit. Conflict on the Korean peninsula, Brussels will doubtless find a way to blame Brexit for that too. Just look across the ocean to where an increasingly unhinged Hillary Clinton has blamed everything from misogyny to voter stupidity, and even some Machiavellian Russian plot to disguise her own colossal, epoch defining ineptitude and corruption. So will it be with Brexit.
The European Union may appear to be an immovable object, but the nations upon which it has imposed itself are far less interested in penalising one reluctant member state than they are with providing jobs, trade and prosperity for their own voting and taxpaying citizenry. Sooner or later, they will find themselves in direct conflict with Brussels as economic pragmatism collides with the inflexible zeal of the EU’s ideologues.
There is much talk among the pundit classes of a possible future breakup of the EU, but I would say that Brussels’ growing obsession with scoring one last shot of UK cash suggests that process is already underway. Last orders have been called and the tab’s being tallied.
The party’s over.
