Olly Robbins of the Chequers Deal infamy, is going on walkabout around Brussels again with more Brexit work to do.
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So, Olly Robbins has surfaced again.
The civil servant who is the government's Brexit co-ordinator is off to Brussels once more.
His job is now to find out the possible scope of any changes we can make to the non-binding political declaration and how long it would take to get those changes agreed by the EU, just in case Labour and the Tories are able to cobble a deal together.
And one supposes of course that the issue of a customs union will be on the table.
So doubtless Olly Robbins will be back to pass on the instructions from the Eurocrats on what we are and what we are not allowed to ask for, so setting the parameters for the Tory / Labour talks.
The trouble is that he may well be wasting everyone's time, because it doesn't look like those inter-party discussions are going anywhere soon.
And the heightened talk that Theresa May needs to go sooner rather than later and speculation that Boris Johnson might be the man, has raised suspicions with Labour MPs that any agreement they might come to with Mrs May would be dropped in the bin by Johnson if he became PM.
That will not help the talks along one little bit.
But Boris has his own concerns, as a crowd-funded private prosecution has been brought against him by a Marcus J Ball and it had its first day in court today.
Ball is accusing the former foreign secretary of abusing public trust in his offices of Mayor of London and a member of parliament by intentionally misleading voters with claims of how much the UK gives to the EU – you know, the £350 million on the side of a bus.
Ball has managed to raise over £370,000 to fund his case and his aim is to stop politicians telling lies, and he's extremely serious about it.
He said:
"My backers and I aspire to set a precedent in the UK common law making it illegal for an elected representative to lie to the public about financial matters. This would be the beginning of the end of lying in politics in the UK. Because of how the English common law works it’s possible that such a precedent could be internationally persuasive by influencing the law in Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Canada and India."
The case has to be heard by magistrates first and if they allow it to proceed it would become a full criminal case.
That may sound very beguiling, but it might end up causing the whole system to close ranks and start slapping secrecy requirements on government financial matters. We may end up with no information at all, rather than dodgy figures that we can challenge using Freedom of Information procedures or digging into the numbers ourselves.
But it could also shut down government and councils across the land as the police are sent in to investigate claim after claim after claim against politicians at all levels by those that wish to stir things up – and there are plenty of those about who would work out a way to make this possible new law operate in their favour!
I reckon the Chancellor and treasury ministers at the very least, whoever they were or of whatever political persuasion, would be taking up permanent residence in the dock trying to defend themselves against numerous spurious and malicious claims.
Not a good look for UK PLC is it?
Now, I never thought that I'd see a politician in the UK today come up with that tired old mantra that failed David Cameron so badly.
Tom Watson, the Labour Party deputy leader, says not only that we need a second referendum but also that his party is a 'Remain and reform' party.
But a second referendum would end up being one of the most divisive political events in the history of the UK and there is no such thing as reforming the European Union – unless by reform it, you mean more EU control over domestic affairs. And maybe that's what Tom Watson means by it – perhaps he means, that he wants the UK to remain in the EU and reform itself into being a parish of the EU?
David Cameron spent months before the referendum trying to get the EU to budge just a littler bit so he could show people how he'd 'reformed' it and then hope to win the referendum. But he came back from the EU capitals empty handed after being roundly ignored.
You can see it now can't you? The likes of Watson keep us in the EU, then go across to Brussels and start talking about reform.
You can imagine someone like Guy Verhofstadt gleefully saying "Yes, Yes, Yes! Of course we can reform – so how much more sovereignty are you handing over to us to get the reforms done. And if you reform your border policy to become part of Schengen and reform your monetary and fiscal policy to take on the Euro and EU tax policies, then that will go a long way to reforming the EU".
You get the idea?
The answer Eurocrats always have to every single problem, is more control for Brussels, the taking of more power away from its member states and their citizens. And this will never end while the EU exists.
Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/13/labour-remain-reform-eu-tom-watson
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48262338
https://www.thenational.scot/news/17637239.boris-johnson-in-the-dock-can-he-survive/
