https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/indepth/features/boris-johnson-uk-prime-minister-190727194445201.html While what Johnson said of Scotland in the past is offensive, I don’t think it’s a reason for Scotland to leave the union. It seems to me Scotland is going to be used by British liberals every time they don’t have something their way. I don’t think another voting on Scottish independence is warranted in the next ten years, but who knows where all of this is going to take them.
The SNP : The majority of Scots voted against Brexit and it would be massively costly and disruptive to leave the EU. Also the SNP : Scotland should leave the UK!
Scotland and Northern Ireland do not want to leave, England and Wales do. Each of them will likely get what they want without a break up of the UK. Boris Johnson knows Brussels better than anyone. He’s not bluffing about no-deal. Britain is leaving the EU on 31 October. Among Brussels officials, there is still a lazy assumption that the new prime minister will be, as they see it, chastened by reality. The United Kingdom, Eurocrats believe, will not leave without a deal, however harsh and unreasonable its terms. Three years of dealing with Theresa May have convinced them that Brits always back down in the end. The new PM, they tell one another, faces the same constraints as the old one. He, too, will be boxed in by a Europhile Parliament and a civil service that is dead set against rupture.
The overwhelmingly dominant issue with brexit, and therefore with Johnsons immediate Prime Ministership, is the land border in Ireland between the departed UK and the EU. Johnson has suggested a technological solution which won't work in practical terms due to geography and topography and the non existence of the technology anyway, and in dealing with transgressions in this fantasy scenario he will break the Good Friday Agreement. The EU know this is the problem caused entirely by the UK, that the UK has to sort out. There are solutions, but none of them are acceptable without the likely destruction of the United Kingdom as an entity. The Irish Border is the front and centre issue in British Politics by a huge margin.
The best solution is probably for NI to leave the UK and join the South, but it may be some time before that happens. The Scots had their chance at independence and turned it down so it's difficult to see how they'll get another chance.
No it ain't. The UK does not want a border, the Micks don't want a border and the EU does not know what it wants but won't be able to do anything about it anyway. With a bit of luck and a following wind the UK will leave the EU by 31 October 2019 and simply leave the border as something for the Irish and their masters in Brussels to worry about.
Best for who? It certainly may have the vote of the majority if England leaves the EU and without question leaving on a No Deal but that does not mean that can be achieved without violence. I think you would find that the Scots would argue that what got the vote to stay was the propaganda that the only way to stay in the EU was to stay in the Union. The Scots will leave the Union when they choose to do it. They are not belongings of anyone else.
I believe you are missing the most significant point. 17.4 million people voted for a border. So it may well be that the UK establishment do not want a border because they know what damage it will do, but that same establishment promises to enact 'the will of the people' as expressed in the referendum. In the referendum people voted 'leave', not stay joined. That is the dilemma facing Johnson, whether to enact the will of the people as expressed in the referendum result, or to 'betray brexit' as they put it.
The leave campaign slogan was that the UK will get back control of its border. Perhaps you could explain how that will be achieved if there is no border?
A border doesn’t have to be an obstacle to trade. Look at Canada-US border. Extremely easy to cross, done that myself.
No, 17.4 millions voted to leave the EU which hopefully we will do by 31 October 2019. After that no one on the mainland will give a toss if the Paddies smuggle a few bacon sarnies across the border.
There was nothing about trade on the ballot paper that expressed the will of the 17.4 million. The word was 'leave'.
Leave the EU does not translate into heavily militarized border with NI. Again, look at Canada and the US - both are independent countries and have a long border that is easy to cross from both sides. There is absolutely no reason to put military there. I think that’s the version of the border most Brit’s would prefer.
So the UK will have no control of the border after Brexit - anyone will be able to come and go at will with no checks?
"The 3000+ people who died certainly would have given a toss" From eating dodgy sarnies? I dare say, but the UK will have left the EU and that is the only bit that matters.
A border is a border. There is some way to counteract transgressions on the US/Canada border is there not? There will either be a way to counteract transgressions on the land border between the UK and the EU, which may be a heavily militarised one, or a physical structure or some other preventative method that includes sanctions or there won't be. If there is, it conflicts with the Good Friday Agreement, if there isn't there will be no brexit.
No. When you cross Canada border the highway lines split and you drive up to the booth. You show your passport, they quickly scan it and let you through. You don’t even get out of the car. For locals it’s even easier, they are issued some electronic devices they have in their car that allows them to zip through the border without even stopping. I think to avoid agitating the Irish the Brits will need to try to make that border as seamless as possible and the US-Canada border is a great example.
The Leave party continue to ignore this even though the UK border control was one of their main campaign pledges
Everything conflicts with the Good Friday Agreement. If Varadkar wants to set up a hard border and have Jean Claude Juncker standing ready to throw empty cognac bottles at the bacon smugglers then that is his choice. But Boris does not want one so I can't see the UK setting anything up.
Not everyone uses a road to cross the "border" and how will you know who is in the car as they zip through the border