Before the article 50 court battle, there was May vs Merkel | | | With the judgment still some way off, we look at the week's other Brexit developments and spats, of which there was no shortage | | |  A pro-EU protester outside the supreme court in London on Monday. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA
| | | Jon Henley and Peter Walker
| | | Welcome to the Guardian's weekly Brexit briefing, a summary of developments as Britain moves towards the EU exit. If you'd like to receive it as a weekly email, please sign up here (and check your spam folder if you don't see it in your inbox). A heads-up, also, that the Guardian is launching a new Brexit podcast: Brexit Means … The first episode offers a brief history of Brexit, from David Cameron's fateful promise to hold an in/out referendum to Theresa May's tautologous mantra that "Brexit means Brexit". You can listen to it here. And a plea: producing the Guardian's thoughtful, in-depth journalism is expensive – but supporting us isn't. If you value our Brexit coverage, please become a Guardian supporter and help make our future more secure. Thank you. The big picture This week all eyes are on the supreme court, where for four days Britain's 11 most senior judges are hearing a raft of highly intricate legal arguments before deciding whether the government has the authority to trigger article 50, the EU's two-year divorce procedure, or whether it must get parliament's approval first. | | | With feelings running high – leave campaigners and newspapers have variously called those behind the case "arrogant federalists" intent on blocking Brexit, and those judging it "enemies of the people" – on Monday the court heard the attorney general, Jeremy Wright QC, argue that the government was ... well, right, basically. But judgment in the case, one of the most constitutionally significant and politically sensitive in decades, is not expected until early in January, and we'll doubtless hear a great deal more about it before then. So let's instead look back at last week, which saw an altogether more straightforward spat. It began with a report in Politico claiming that when Theresa May saw Angela Merkel in Berlin last month, the prime minister tried to seal a quick informal deal on the rights of British citizens living on the continent and EU citizens living in Britain, but was rebuffed because, as the EU has long said, "No negotiation without notification." It continued with May's spokesman saying she was pushing for an "early understanding" on reciprocal rights nonetheless, and escalated when Donald Tusk, the European council president, told British MPs looking for the same deal that their argument was "interesting … but has nothing to do with reality" – whereupon some of them accused the EU of putting "process before common humanity". | | | Theresa May and Donald Tusk in September. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA
| | | Labour's shadow Brexit spokesman, Keir Starmer, then upped the ante by saying May should unilaterally pass laws securing the right of up to 3 million EU citizens to stay in Britain, prompting the prime minister to hit back that it was a jolly good job she hadn't, otherwise British citizens in the EU would – here she invoked Tusk's letter – have been left "high and dry". One lesson of this deeply unedifying multilateral squabble is that the EU 27 and Brussels institutions are entirely serious about not opening talks on anything at all Brexit-related until article 50 has been triggered, and that the government is either trying its luck or does not believe them. | | | In fact, in this and in other aspects of Brexit, the policy of Her Majesty's government could well be "have cake and eat it". There was even a handwritten note – photographed in an aide's hand in Downing Street, apparently from a meeting at the Department for Exiting the European Union – to confirm it. Another lesson might be that if you leave people in almost complete ignorance of what your main objectives actually are, they will fill the vacuum with whatever nonsense comes along. The view from Europe A string of EU diplomats and officials lined up to criticise the UK's opaque Brexit strategy – but also pointed out that Europe's position has remained unchanged since the referendum: no negotiation without notification, and no possibility of tariff-free single market access without free movement and budget payments. Sandro Gozi, Italy's Europe minister, summed up the mounting irritation that was expressed last week by senior figures from the Netherlands, Malta, Germany and France, who all complained of London's unwillingness to accept that what it appears to want from Brexit is not actually on offer: The situation seems to be far from clear in London. We don't know what the starting basis will be in negotiations. We really don't understand what the real strategy is. It is very unclear what kind of Brexit they want. It seems there are disagreements and divisions in the cabinet. There are many uncertainties. Even Norway, a non-EU member, said Britain really had to understand that there was no "silver bullet" for Brexit that would permit single market access without paying into the EU and being bound by some of its rules. | | | Norway's foreign minister Børge Brende. Photograph: Mark R. Cristino/EPA
| | | Meanwhile, the European commission's chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, reportedly briefed EU government officials in a first three-hour session with them that his aim was to ensure that Britain did not end up with a soft transitional deal that would allow single market access on easy terms once it has left the bloc. Meanwhile, back in Westminster …
Westminster last week was mainly focused about 10 miles to the south-west on a slightly draughty sports hall that saw, in the early hours of Friday, one of the bigger post-Brexit political aftershocks. This was the Richmond byelection, which saw the Liberal Democrats overturn a massive 23,000 Conservative majority by shaping the vote as an informal plebiscite on whether or not May should pursue a so-called "hard Brexit". The result had "sent a shockwave through this Conservative Brexit government", claimed the victorious candidate, Sarah Olney, who happily admitted she had little idea what being an MP involved, having not really expected to win. | | | In truth, Richmond was a more complex picture. The byelection was triggered by the sitting Tory MP Zac Goldsmith resigning in protest at the planned expansion of Heathrow airport nearby. He stood again as an independent on the Heathrow issue, only to see the Lib Dems hijack the debate for Brexit – Goldsmith was a pro-leave MP in one of the UK's most strongly remain areas. Will Richmond keep May awake at night? Possibly not. But it's interesting for two reasons: it shows that at least some of the 48% of remain voters are not about to accept any form of Brexit without protest; also that tactical voting, or even some form of "progressive alliance", could help shape future elections. | | | Elsewhere, the main Westminster Brexit noises were largely familiar and as loud as ever – and as contradictory. On Thursday, the chancellor, Philip Hammond, and the Brexit secretary, David Davis, said Britain could end up paying the EU for access to the single market, prompting much discussion of the "Norway model". Clear? Well, yes – until the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, dismissed the suggestion on Sunday as "pure speculation". You should also know: Read these: In the Guardian, Martin Kettle suggests four ways to stop Brexit: During Rome's long wars against Hannibal, Cato ended every senate speech with the words: 'Carthage must be destroyed.' 'Brexit must be stopped' is unlikely to last as long. But it focuses the mind. Those who think Brexit must be stopped are not the majority. But they have a case and a cause, and they are right. So how might stoppage be achieved? | | | Sarah Helm takes aim at the Daily Mail and others' attacks on the British judiciary, arguing that on behalf of the people, the supreme court must push back in the article 50 case it hears this week: The attorney general complained that the high court rendered Brexit itself a footnote. That is indeed how the supreme court should view the week ahead, for the stakes are now so much higher than Brexit. As they rule, one hopes the judges' words will demonstrate the true position. The independent judiciary is far from being the people's enemy. It is – in fact – the people's protector: our truest friend. In the New Statesman, the MEP Richard Corbett says a string of recent blunders by British ministers shows the government is failing spectacularly to understand that once article 50 is triggered, Britain will be negotiating with 27 different partners: With such an astounding level of Tory hypocrisy, incompetence and inconsistency, is it any wonder that our future negotiating partners are rapidly losing any residual goodwill towards the UK? It is beholden on Theresa May's government to start showing some awareness of the scale of the enormous task ahead, if the UK is to have any hope of striking a Brexit deal that is anything less than disastrous for Britain. Tweet of the week: Indeed. | | | | |
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