Now that the UK has decided to leave the EU the debate switches to how we do it. One of the options would be an EEA Norway type deal. This would involve retaining access to the single market (and freedom of movement) but returning sovereignty in certain areas, such as fishing, agriculture and trade with non-EU countries. There are a number of reasons why this seems a likely outcome.
1. EU leaders have to stop contagion. They want Brexit to be resolved quickly and to demonstrate that leaving the EU has consequences. It is inconceivable they would reward the UK by simply agreeing a free-trade deal. The EU seem likely to offer a Norway type deal and ask the UK to take it or leave it. The model for such an arrangement already exists and they do not want negotiations to drag on. The position could become clear within the next few weeks.
2. The Conservative Government is also motivated to resolve the situation quickly to avoid a recession, which would damage its future electoral chances. An EEA Norway type deal has a number of drawbacks, including a requirement to make contributions to the EU budget, being subject to many EU laws (without any influence at all in how these are made), and requiring free movement of people (assuming of course you think this is a drawback). However, it would have one very important advantage over the status quo, namely the freedom to negotiate free trade deals with non-EU countries.
3. The latter is very significant because free-trade is much more important to Conservative party Eurosceptics than UKIP, which is much more concerned with immigration. This would allow the Conservatives to rally around a common position on Europe. Although the Eurosceptic wing of the Conservative party may not completely disappear, it would certainly be much smaller.
4. Under a Norway type deal, the UK would no longer be part of the EU parliament. This would hugely marginalise UKIP over the longer term as their representation in the EU parliament is currently their main form of legitimacy. This would benefit the Conservatives.
5. Some Eurosecptics (e.g http://peterjnorth.blogspot.co.uk) have long been advocating a Norway type deal as a stepping stone to full sovereignty. The argument is that the UK cannot simply achieve full sovereignty in a single leap as the…
PhilH, I wrote nothing of the sort, nor did I imply it, nor could anything I wrote be reasonably interpreted that way.
I must thak you however for providing a very good demonstration of the point I made in that post when I wrote that the word "racist" has now become a Pavlovian command demanding that comon sense has to be suspended.
