Chris

The EU’s position is odd. They insist on advance agreement of a technical solution for a problem that may never arise, despite abundant evidence that it is politically impossible for the British to accept it, and at the imminent risk of actually creating the border problems they claim to want to avoid.

It’s almost as if there’s a greater prize to be had in getting the British side to agree to a mechanism that it cannot later exit without the EU’s permission - permission that would be being sought right about the time each side was trying to get the best concessions out of the other in a permanent trade deal. I wonder, to what extent the EU side is still trying to assess how likely we are to push the nuclear button and leave on 31 October, before making a final judgment about what it wants most - an actual shed-load of real headaches on their desks about 6 weeks from now, or a 2 year break in which the border problem can be solved along with everything else.