The UK must be trying to pick off certain countries to block it
To quote from the blog of David Alan Green “All because Article 16 is a thing you can trigger, that does not make it a gun”.
Triggering article 16 will not really do anything. You can’t rewrite the NI protocol with article 16 (since it is a part of the NI protocol). The UK government threatening to suspend the NI protocol is not really realistic and has nothing to do with article 16.
This is just some noise from the gov to cover the standards reform fiasco. BoZo doesn’t have it in him to start a proper trade war I don’t think.
Most of this is all bluster from Connelley’s source.
The EU are desperate not to get an independent panel to scrutinise the UK’s proposal, so they’re threatening to terminate the TCA or find “Radical” responses, as in not via the correct mechanism.
The correct response is to go via the arbitration panel and in the meantime place tariffs of a proportionate value as a response.
It’s clear this is rubbish, A16 will be triggered, and the end result will be negotiations while trade between NI-GB is frictionless under A16.
The triggering, before Jan 1st, is down to the need for the UK to ask for extensions again. This is the UK basically saying we’re not going to carry on needing to ask for extensions, it needs sorting once and for all.
7 comments
Some other information
> [Article 16 update: growing expectation that the UK will trigger. Much more intense discussion in the European Commission about how the EU shd respond](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548863167373346?t=XNnqdMl0dsFqorc2E2ETig&s=19)
>
> [2/ While the Commission has avoided detailed discussion till now with member states, preferring to regard it as hypothetical, there are more contacts now with capitals](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548865260331018)
>
> [3/ There’s a belief that the UK may be miscalculating the EU’s response, ie that we’ll get into a slow period of legal action in which the UK suspends its Protocol obligations and things will then drag on thru a process](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548866904498185)
>
> [4/ However, the view is that the EU’s response could be much swifter and more “radical” than expected.](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548868582219776)
>
> [5/ This *could* include termination of the TCA, or a suspension, which would require respectively 12 and nine mths notice](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548870171861018)
>
> [6/ This reflects growing exasperation among member states at the UK tactics, and the need to draw a line under the issue. Some capitals already believe the
> @MarosSefcovic
> package of measures goes too far](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548871744724993)
>
> [7/ Any big EU response would probably require an emergency EU summit – shd be stressed, however, that this is all still in the realm of discussion/preparation](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548877067296778)
Do it already.
>[4/ However, the view is that the EU’s response could be much swifter and more “radical” than expected.](https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1456548868582219776)
This would need unanimous consent, no?
The UK must be trying to pick off certain countries to block it
To quote from the blog of David Alan Green “All because Article 16 is a thing you can trigger, that does not make it a gun”.
Triggering article 16 will not really do anything. You can’t rewrite the NI protocol with article 16 (since it is a part of the NI protocol). The UK government threatening to suspend the NI protocol is not really realistic and has nothing to do with article 16.
This is just some noise from the gov to cover the standards reform fiasco. BoZo doesn’t have it in him to start a proper trade war I don’t think.
Most of this is all bluster from Connelley’s source.
The EU are desperate not to get an independent panel to scrutinise the UK’s proposal, so they’re threatening to terminate the TCA or find “Radical” responses, as in not via the correct mechanism.
The correct response is to go via the arbitration panel and in the meantime place tariffs of a proportionate value as a response.
It’s clear this is rubbish, A16 will be triggered, and the end result will be negotiations while trade between NI-GB is frictionless under A16.
The triggering, before Jan 1st, is down to the need for the UK to ask for extensions again. This is the UK basically saying we’re not going to carry on needing to ask for extensions, it needs sorting once and for all.
Some good additional information here
https://twitter.com/RaoulRuparel/status/1456564238584061955
Couldn’t that destabilise the situation in Northern Ireland? We don’t know how the EU would respond.
If it does, wouldn’t that theoretically put UK citizens at risk?