Brexit: asking the improbable

By Pete North - August 20, 2020

Brussels has rejected UK demands for extended rights for British truckers to operate in the EU. This is wonky for two reasons.

The UK contingent has persistently argued that it is not seeking any single market access therefore does not warrant the so-called level playing field provisions, yet here it is asking for precisely that kind of access. They continually bleat that we are only seeking a Canada style agreement, but haulage rights are not included in CETA for fairly obvious reasons. And then we are told that proximity doesn’t matter.

Secondly, it’s something of a weird request in that enhanced operating rights really go hand in hand with the rest of the single market and of itself is of limited use. One wonders if the UK is pushing for this knowing full well it can’t be granted just to created another sticking point in negotiations and to make the EU look unreasonable. We can only speculate.

If, though, the government is serious about this, it surely can’t be any surprise to them that losing such market preferences was a necessary consequence of leaving the single market. This was spelled out in the earliest Notices to Stakeholders.

More to the point, if we’re asking for this kind of access it would have to be reciprocal, in which case Brexit is no remedy to the haulage industry’s chief complain about EU membership. Drivers from Eastern Europe are brought to Western Europe to drive, they receive an hourly wage as low as EUR1.70, they have to sleep in the cab of the truck for up to eight months at a time, they wash and cook in car parks, they have limited access to toilet facilities, and are given fake papers to evade authorities. All the while they transport goods for some of the most successful and profitable multi-national companies in the world. Level playing field it is not.

The thing about the single market, which has never truly been absorbed, is that there is no real middle way between membership and non membership. If you want the rights then you accept the obligations. The moment you start cherry picking the integrated system ceases to function. Theresa May didn’t understand this and nor does Johnson.

Being then that we have decided to quit the single market then we accept a whole raft of consequences along with the potential gains. There are no selective opt-ins. There is, of course the highly messy Swiss model (if it can be called such) but it’s far from a reciprocal arrangement and nothing about it is clear cut. The opt-in cannot be used as a precedent. Only the EEA really constitutes a model.

That argument, though, was lost long ago. I’ve long since stopped arguing for it and the further we get from it, the less desirable it is. It would have been an ideal landing ground for our departure but having gone for the hardest Brexit the Tories can get away with, and the damage done, we are looking at developing a British model over the next twenty years.

Essentially were we not a member of the single market, having evolved our trade inside it for the last three decades, we wouldn’t join it, but as an EU member it made sense the graduate our departure. Instead we have thrown caution and all good sense to the wind.

All these arguments though, were made without Covid in the mix. Now the picture looks very different. There was always a question of sustainability about driver accompanied loads and Covid certainly reveals the vulnerability of these supply chains. Brexit notwithstanding they’d have taken a while to recover. Since we’re taking the hit anyway we may as well get used to it and remodel our trade accordingly.

If, then, there is still an Eftarian case then the argument is more for a stand alone Efta membership, preferably as the relationship governance mechanism to cut the ECJ out of the mix as the relationship evolves toward more regulatory and technical cooperation. But again, that seems like remote possibility. The Tories are gearing us in all directions but Europe.

As to how we adapt, it may be that we make greater use of air freight which is certainly no bad thing as far as UK aviation is concerned and we certainly have no shortage of airfields. There is then the possibility of developing more specialised ports. Turbulent Times is highly sceptical of the economic benefits of free ports, although their regenerative potential should not be wholly discounted. That, though, is a double edged sword. It might revitalise port towns such as Middlesborough, but it would most likely displace that business from the rural regions. In that case, we are simply shifting the problems around.

In any case, the government needs to reacquaint itself with reality. Since we are leaving the single market and customs union, and largely abandoning any form of regulatory harmonisation, the utility of the haulage rights they’re asking for are wholly inconsistent. It smells like an attempt to placate the UK business lobby. Being that their collective comprehension is only marginally more advanced than the government’s it may have been enough to quell the disquiet.

If the government seriously thought the EU could entertain them on this then it’s further evidence that they have little clue what they’re doing or why. Anyone would think that some sort of plan was a good idea after all.