15th March 2023
There are many things which were not true about Brexit.
Brexit was never going to be quick and easy: indeed, we were still this year re-negotiating the exit deal.
Brexit was never going to lead to a rush of new free trade deals.
Brexit was never going to make it easier for the United Kingdom to control its borders.And Brexit was not about reclaiming sovereignty: we had sovereignty all along, and that is how we were able to make the Article 50 notification.
But the untruth about Brexit which perhaps is the most irksome from a law and policy perspective is that it was about the Westminster parliament (re)gaining power from Brussels.
For what has happened instead is that Whitehall – that is ministers and civil servants – used Brexit as a pretext for its own power-grab.
There is a version of Brexit – unrealistic, of course – where parliament is given maximum powers over new trade deals and where parliament decides on a case-by-case basis which of the retained European Union laws it keeps or replaces.
A Brexit which was used to empower Westminster and our democracy.
In some ways – and this will annoy some of you – that would not have been a bad Brexit.
But the rhetoric of “taking back control” instead cloaked an increase in discretionary and unaccountable power by the government.
The Westminster parliament seems as powerless as ever against the executive.
Whitehall has become the new Brussels.
And we may have to “take back control” all over again.
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This is an important point that has not received the attention it should.
‘Brussels’ with all its faults, was a system of elaborate checks and balances installed to prevent foreign (to five out of six of the original member states) bureaucrats imposing rules by stealth. They weren’t perfect rules but they largely worked, most of the time.
The UK Civil Service, as I understand it, is largely constructed around the ‘Good Chap’ theory of government, which assumes that nobody in a senior position could possibly want anything but the best for all concerned. It can work … sometimes … but is very weak at resisting the pressure put on by a few ‘Bad Chaps’ in significant positions.
You share a popular misconception of the “Good Chap” theory. The principle does not assume that people serve the public good, it trusts that they do.
It is a criminal offence to abuse the public’s trust, with a maximum sentence of life.
Brexit was always condemned to be a mess, given that it was supported and advocated by a range of individuals and interests with differing and often contradictory views of what a post-Brexit Britain should look like. No one view of post-Brexit Britain could anyway ever have won a majority in 2016.
As far as I know, nobody has properly considered the idea that the electorate actually did understand the function of an advisory referendum in a parliamentary democracy and voted accordingly.
Were that the case, the only reasonable interpretation of that result is that parliament was very badly out of touch and not fit for purpose, in which case it couldn’t even begin to imagine that it was in a fit state to oversee such a massive constitutional adventure as to leave the European Union.
A parliament coming to that conclusion would then have to face the accusations of betrayal they would face for failing to keep to the promises that some of them had made.
They would really have their work cut out to regain the trust of the public, and would need to pull out all of the stops to do it.
But what kind of democracy would we have if it was built on the idea that the electorate does not trust their government, instead of they system that we have, where the electorate’s trust is deemed to be absolute, irrespective of what grounds the government gives them to have none whatsoever?
What kind of election slogan is “Don’t trust us”?
Aren’t you forgetting the attraction of having/eating cake?
There were many of us who work or have worked in the field of socio-economic regeneration, more popularly known as Levelling Up who predicted Brexit would mean Whitehall taking back control of the funds disbursed to the nations and regions by Brussels that were spent mostly, according to local priorities.
And, oh, the irony, it came to pass with Dominic Cummings’ United Kingdom Shared Prosperity Fund.
And it is noticeable that Sir Keir’s Take Back Control made no mention of both scrapping the UKSPF and substituting for it a like for like replacement of the European Regional Development Fund in its entirety, including the same level of funding and local decision making.
I agree with the idea that ministers may have used Brexit as a pretext for a power-grab, but I am surprised that you suggest civil servants have also done so.
Civil servants and ministers almost seem to be in opposition to each other – we have seen ministers frequently demeaning civil servants.
So I’m curious as to what kind of power grab you think civil servants are undertaking.
In my experience civil service attitudes to Parliament used to vary enormously between departments depending on organisational culture. Some wouldn’t give it the time of day, while others were more respectful.
Much depended too on how much of a department’s legislation gave power to ministers to do things either without legislative approval or by negative resolution secondary powers.
And of course ministers’ views on the matter and their relationships with officials were also important.
“I asked young Bernard what he makes of our new Minister. Bernard is happy. So am I. Hacker swallowed the whole diary in one gulp and apparently did his boxes like a lamb last Saturday and Sunday. He’ll be house-trained in no time.
All we have to do is head him off this Open Government nonsense, I remarked to Bernard. Bernard said that he thought that we were in favour of Open Government. I hope I have not over-promoted young Bernard. He still has an awful lot to learn.
I explained that we are calling the White Paper Open Government because you always dispose of the difficult bit in the title. It does less harm there than on the statute books.
It is the law of Inverse Relevance: the less you intend to do about something, the more you have to keep talking about it.”
“..A Brexit which was used to empower Westminster and our democracy.
In some ways – and this will annoy some of you – that would not have been a bad Brexit…”
Fully agree.
However, we’ve had a spectacularly poor government(s) supported by a civil service ( who genuinely didn’t want Brexit for reasons I can understand including notional technocratic superiority with social democratic leanings).
I and a few others always saw Brexit as a process and that the government of the day alongside the civil service would re-learn the art (science) of democratic governance. It hasn’t been the case since Covid/Ukraine.
We knew it wouldn’t be easy – using power for the better governance of the country was/is as always going to be difficult – New thought processes, new critical thinking was probably too big an ask in the early post 2021 era.
“Whitehall is the new Brussels ” is a really good heading with good intent – plus, with quality & competent government there’s all to be gained from having a demos close the population.
The challenge for the UK , in my view, is for the nation ( apologies to those who detest the nation state) to regain a level of confidence where we can work with the supranational EU in close collaboration especially on trade but without the political integration dogma that kinda spoils the democratic party.
“The challenge for the UK , in my view, is for the nation … to regain a level of confidence where we can work with the supranational EU in close collaboration especially on trade but without the political integration dogma that kinda spoils the democratic party”
Do you know, that’s the most persuasive argument for Brexit I’ve heard yet. The UK’s proto-democracy combined with the accumulated bad habits of centuries has meant that it is incapable of engaging with the EU because voters (rightly) don’t trust the state to represent their interests abroad (the fact that they rightly don’t trust it at home either is immaterial).
And the only way to cure that is to disengage, repair and re-engage. Well done, I’m persuaded!
Looking forward to seeing you back sometime, hopefully with enough confidence to realise that you will be able to resist the dogmatic designs of others in the EU, especially as they are no more than a tiny but vocal minority.
Vive la Revolution.
“…Looking forward to seeing you back sometime ..”
Suspect this wil be a while.
Much depends on the strategic objectives of the EU and those of the UK.
The EU gives strong hints at much greater & tighter integration which is fine for them & absolutely necessary for the sake of economic & monetary union.
Not apparent that UK is ready for deeper integration with the EU or necessarily the Eurozone.
Aligning objectives on trade is a great idea in theory – in practice it still involves ‘sharing power/decision making’ or ‘pooling sovereignty ‘ with a hard look at undoubted costs & benefits.
Whilst there is a half finished Euro monetary system (EMS) l the UKs ability to influence over arching EU decision making is severely compromised – hard to see this how this increasing democratic deficit can be resolved in the short – medium term.
We’re all dead in the long term.
« I and a few others always saw Brexit as a process and that the government of the day alongside the civil service would re-learn the art (science) of democratic governance »
Did you make it clear to these ‘few others’ that Britain would be substantially poorer until the end of that particular rainbow had been found? Or were you a ‘sunny uplands’ believer?
Regarding ‘taking back control’, this story on UK changing tax policy on Malaysian palm oil o join a trade alliance on the other side of the world received little coverage:
https://www.ft.com/content/eb8b75aa-2608-4d20-a556-08b6b19af8aa
In theory I follow the Brussels to Whitehall reasoning . None of us get to live in the country of theory and this is the problem.
Having voted for and implemented Brexit people now have to own it which is core to all of this.
There is no such thing in life as a free lunch (or childcare). Internationally no one will do you a favour for nothing.
What is ‘Westminster’ and what is ‘Whitehall’. An analogy I like is to think in agricultural terms. Of Westminster as the ‘Home Farm’ with the landowner in a big house with adjoining buildings and Whitehall as the cattle and associated yokels. MPs being ahem the cattle, easily controlled with a wisp of hay and the yokels doing as they are told.
Having cast off the EU yoke it seems no surprise the ‘farmers’ and landowners etc have followed their best interests. Get rich quick schemes, fancy wallpaper to make Louis Quatorze blush and a focus on chateaux prices. I liked being in the EU, our government usefully constrained – they couldn’t do anything too stupid.
The difficulty is that the scientists have exhausted the easy wins of previous centuries. Whilst £5Bn sounds a lot for the military such a sum is a very small fraction of a semiconductor plant or a electric car battery plant. The deep snag is as ever an insufficiency of gold coin coming into the Treasury and what few profitable ideas there are we have to share. There being almost no worthwhile secrets any more.
My understanding is that the £5 bn for ‘defense’ will be nearly entirely soaked up by the nukes.
The conventional Forces will have to absorb huge real-world cuts (in spite of Vladimir Vladimirovic).
Whitehall/ the executive taking over the functions of ‘Brussels’ shouldn’t be a surprise. It was always going to be the case.
But it will only be for the areas where ‘Brussels’ had ‘competence’, which, inspite of the use of our so called ‘Brexit freedoms’, was not as extensive as claimed by many Brexiters
The question is whether they are better or worse at it than ‘Brussels’ in these areas.
There is likely to be less continuity of policy – it will be more driven by the party in power and therefore likely to change more.
This can be both good (more responsive to voters – sovereingty!!!!!!) and bad (less certainty for businesses and, to a lesser extent, indivuals).
Whether that is better or worse, time will tell
I couldn’t agree more with the closing proposition, that we may have to take back from the Executive some (most? all?) of the discretionary power it’s taken to itself since 2016 (some of us, given we’re talking about ‘Westminster’, might say 1707) .. and return that power to Parliament. But .. a) by what means might we actually do that, not least when the Executive controls the House’s business agenda, and b) if we continue with an electoral system designed to deliver single-party government (and which both the biggest parties prefer) and if political parties continue to give ever more power to their own ‘executive’ centres, with MPs ever more passive and unthinking … then are we really changing much?
The trouble with the Civil Service is that you have powerful people making profound decisions in very quiet and dark places, i.e. the switch to wind turbine energy in the face of other possible options.
Their successes do not receive any limelight, suggesting that there aren’t any or that they are of the scale that is expected of someone in that position.
Most telling is that only a minority of government projects come on time, to budget and to specification, yet there is no visible action taken to improve this state of affairs.
There has also been a huge increase in the use of external consultants since the time of Margaret Thatcher, while the civil service is there to advise, possibly giving options that the minister does not agree with, Consultants will always say yes and ask what result you would like to see. It is perceived that this has led to a reduction in in-house capability within the government.
Another problem is ‘pass the parcel’ where civil servants are promoted every 18 months or so, as a means of getting a pay rise. This leads to a number of issues, the Peter principle, the loss of immediate capability until a replacement is found/allowed, as well as making it harder to pin down responsibility on large projects, especially when they fail.
Perhaps, the Civil service needs to undergo the constant development and scrutiny that Doctors in the NHS do, they can only kill one person at a time, austerity killed 300,000 over ten years…..
It’s the role of civil servants, accepted stoically by most, that they take take the blame when things go wrong, while ministers take the credit when they go well – not that much of that has happened in the last few years.
You say there’s a version of Brexit – “unrealistic of course” – in which Parliament assumed new powers. But your aside is the point. There was never any *realistic* possibility of such a development.
Our Parliament was already culpably weak when we were within the EU: failing to hold Ministers properly to account for positions they took in the European legislative process; failing to engage seriously with the EP; making no attempt to influence emerging EU legislative proposals upstream; and leaving EU Scrutiny to the tender mercies of Eurosceptics like Cash instead of attempting constructive engagement.
Our Parliament, in short, made no effort to ensure (or to communicate to voters) that the EU was “Us” not “Them”, and that EU regulation was ours – not something imposed upon us.
It was entirely predictable that Brexit would provide cover for an executive power-grab (with the judiciary, the Civil Service, the House of Lords, the Electoral Commission, the BBC and other parts of our democratic infrstructure also in the firing line). By selling Brexit as the elimination of a ‘check on UK independence’ the Brexitists have enabled a sustained assault on all checks and balances within the UK, and on the institutions which apply them.
The EU Retained Law Bill and the illegal Migration Bill are particularly egregious examples – but as Hannah White has pointed out (in a recent Institute for Govt comment piece) – it is now becoming routine for Bills to be rushed through Parliament without what – even ten years ago – would have been considered a “normal” level of scrutiny.