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Monday, September 14, 2020
The British Parliament voted in favor of the controversial Brexit amendment at first reading. This is a new internal market law that would unilaterally change the agreement concluded with the EU in January. However, several obstacles remain to be resolved.
In a first vote, despite all the warnings, a clear majority in the British House of Commons voted in favor of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s controversial home market law. 340 of the MPs voted Monday night in favor of the law with which Johnson wants to change parts of the current Brexit agreement. 263 voted against. An opposition motion to end the law had previously been rejected by a majority.
The vote is a barometer of the state of mind: the debate on the bill will continue in the next few days and the decisive vote will not take place for another week. After that, the law still needs to pass in the House of Lords. But already on Monday the emotions in parliament were boiling: “What incompetence! What a failed government!” There is only one person responsible for all of this: Johnson himself. In the debate, however, he again defended his law as the “safety net” necessary to protect the relationship between Northern Ireland and the rest of Great Britain.
Johnson has an 80-vote majority in the House of Commons, his ruling faction had a 77-vote majority in the vote, despite the fact that several party leaders, including former Conservative prime ministers such as David Cameron and John Major, had previously been free from the law. he had distanced himself.
Death to the trade deal?
In an initial reaction from the British media, the BBC station stated on its website that the corona pandemic had dominated the news this year, but that Brexit was “back on the agenda.” The “Telegraph” warned Johnson that he was facing “an entirely new Brexit battle” with the law. And The Guardian headlined that Johnson won the vote on a controversial law that “will violate international law.”
With the Internal Market Law, the Prime Minister wants to change the exit treaty agreed with the European Union in 2019 in essential points. Specifically, these are special rules for British Northern Ireland, which are intended to avoid a hard border with the EU state Ireland and further hostilities there.
For the EU, Johnson’s move is a violation of the law. Brussels therefore asked London to surrender at the end of September. Critics fear that the proposed law could be the death sentence for the business contract that will regulate future economic relationships. Once the transition phase of Brexit is over, there is a risk of a break with tariffs and high no-contract trade barriers.
Former Attorney General Geoffrey Cox accused Johnson of damaging Britain’s image. The planned introduction of the internal market law is unreasonable, said the conservative deputy of the “Times”. There is no “doubt” that the “unpleasant” consequences of the Brexit deal were known when Johnson signed it.
