[pip08456]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

No, it has not been discussed and rejected - where did you get that from? All along, it has been TM's plan to get the Withdrawal Agreement done and dusted. Article 24 was the idea the ERG came up with, and it seems to me the Government has given this scant attention so far as they wanted to concentrate on getting the WA through.

Given that this has clearly failed, the attraction of Article 24 is that it does away with an agreement that Parliament would not sanction and gets us into the next stage - the trade agreement - at a stroke, so to speak. Let's concentrate on that now, and with a 10 year protection period available, that is way more time than the EU has already admitted it needed to resolve the backstop issue.

Where's the disadvantage to that?

---------- Post added at 15:05 ---------- Previous post was at 15:00 ----------



The EU is on record as saying that the backstop would be most unlikely to be needed within the existing timescales. So if they had a much longer period to resolve it - 10 years in all - why would they not agree it, given that it also provides for no tariffs while negotiations contiinue?

You're not accusing the EU of acting in bad faith, are you?

I will. The division in this country is partially down to them. They want to keep us in by whatever means.