PM Boris Johnson yesterday signed the Trade & Co-operation (TCA). It will define the UK’s future relationship with the EU to replace Britain’s full membership which ended on 24 January 2020.
The TCA has more than 1,200 pages and was agreed just six days earlier on Christmas Eve. Britain’s Houses of Parliament approved it in a single day.
There was a predictable storm of conflicting views about its impact.
But the TCA is by definition not a No-Deal Brexit because there’s a deal.
It’s also not a Hard Brexit. Free trade in tangible goods between the UK and the EU will continue though the provisions for trade in goods do not apply to Northern Ireland. They will be governed by a protocol to the January 2020 Brexit withdrawal agreement.
From 1 January, the UK ceases to be a full participant in what is known as the Single Market, which involves free trade in all goods and services. But there will be limited mutual services market access, cooperation mechanisms in a range of policy areas, transitional provisions about EU access to UK fisheries and UK participation in some EU programmes.
So it’s a form of Soft Brexit, an objective of the UK government under Johnson’s predecessor former PM Teresa May.
What’s distinctive is that TCA establishes a Partnership Council made up of EU and UK representatives. That will administer the agreement, resolve disputes through negotiation and modify parts of the agreement if necessary.
So this is not just a soft Brexit. It’s a soft and flexible one.
Let’s call it Rubber Brexit.