British court delivers blow to E.U. exit plan, insists Parliament has a say

By Griff Witte, Washington Post, November 3, 2016

LONDON–A senior British court on Thursday dealt a severe blow to Prime Minister Theresa May’s plans to begin the process of exiting the European Union early next year, ruling she must get Parliament’s approval before she acts.

The decision greatly complicates May’s stated plan to trigger Article 50–the never-before-used mechanism for a country to leave the European Union–by the end of next March at the latest.

Most members of Parliament opposed Brexit in the lead-up to Britain’s June referendum, when voters opted for an exit by a 52-to-48 margin.

May’s lawyers argued that she had the right to begin the Brexit process without first getting Parliament’s consent. But a London-based High Court sided with a group of plaintiffs who contended that Parliament must first weigh in.

May will now have to decide whether to appeal to the Supreme Court. If she does, the proceedings could extend well into next year.

The court’s decision stunned British political and legal observers, who until Thursday had expected a ruling in the government’s favor.

It sparked an immediate rally in Britain’s beleaguered currency, the pound, as traders reacted to the possibility that Britain’s E.U. exit could be significantly delayed–or even blocked.

The pound has been battered since the referendum, and has been one of the worst performing currencies anywhere in the world this year. London’s FTSE exchange remained down slightly despite the announcement, but other markets, including France’s CAC, were higher in midday trading.

The court ruling–assuming it is not overturned on appeal–sets up a crucial decision in Parliament. Members of the ruling Conservative Party were almost evenly split on whether Britain should stay in the E.U. or leave when the country voted June 23. But solid majorities of the other major parties in Parliament–including Labour, the Scottish National Party and the Liberal Democrats–all opposed an exit.

May, who took office in July following the resignation of David Cameron, has only a narrow majority in Parliament and could struggle to pass legislation authorizing the start of Britain’s departure.

Thursday’s ruling is only the latest setback for pro-Brexit forces in Britain.

May’s government has struggled to put together coherent strategy for the tough negotiations to come with Europe if Britain goes ahead with departure plans. European leaders, meanwhile, have been fairly united in their insistence that Britain will not be given a special deal.

The negotiations are likely to focus on the trade-off between Britain’s desire both to control E.U. immigration into the country and to retain access to the E.U.’s common market. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, a leading Brexit proponent, has said the government’s objective in the talks “should be having our cake and eating it.”

But European leaders have said that won’t be possible, and that Britain will have to allow immigrants if it wants to maintain the market access that is at the core of its trading relationships with Europe.

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Brexit is not just Europe’s problem. It highlights a crisis in democracies worldwide.

By Dan Balz, Washington Post, June 27, 2016

LONDON–Britain’s political system remained in turmoil Monday, virtually leaderless and with the two major parties divided internally. But the meltdown that has taken place in the days after voters decided to break the country’s ties with Europe is more than a British problem, reflecting an erosion in public confidence that afflicts democracies around the world.

Last Thursday’s Brexit vote cast a bright light on the degree to which the effects of globalization and the impact of immigration, along with decades of overpromises and under-delivery by political leaders, have undermined the ability of those officials to lead. This collapse of confidence has created what amounts to a crisis in governing for which there seems no easy or quick answer.

The debris here is clear. The Brexit vote claimed Prime Minister David Cameron as its first victim. Having called the referendum and led the campaign to keep Britain in the European Union, he announced his intention to resign the morning after the vote. The results also now threaten the standing of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who faces a likely leadership election after seeing more than two dozen members of his leadership team resign in the past two days.

Alastair Darling, a former chancellor of the exchequer, outlined the extent of the crisis here during an interview with the BBC’s “Today” program on Monday. “There is no government. There is no opposition. The people who got us into this mess–they’ve gone to ground,” he said “How has the United Kingdom come to this position? We have taken this decision and have no plan for the future.”

The seeds of what has brought Britain to this moment exist elsewhere, which makes this country’s problems the concern of leaders elsewhere. In Belgium and Brazil, democracies have faced crises of legitimacy; in Spain and France, elected leaders have been hobbled by their own unpopularity; even in Japan, where Prime Minister Shinzo Abe faces no threat from the opposition, his government has demonstrated a consistent inability to deliver prosperity.

Anthony King, a professor of politics at the University of Essex, said the underlying factor is that many people no longer believe that, however imperfect things are economically, they will keep getting better.

In the face of that change in public attitudes, he said, much of the political class “is behaving the way it used to behave, the old arguments, the old fights, the adversarialism.” That has created what he called “the palpable disconnection” between political leaders and ordinary people. “That is true across much of the democratic world,” he added. “How do you put that right?”

The problem is especially acute here at the moment and threatens to grow worse in the near term. A longtime analyst of politics here, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of his position, said: “If you thought your [American] politics were a mess, we can outdo you any time. I’ve never known it in any way, shape or form as bad as this.”

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