HUGO YOUNG, an author, alighted on Hobbesian metaphors to describe Britain’s negotiations, in the early 1970s, to join the then European Economic Community. But if accession was “nasty”, “occasionally brutish” and “indisputably long”, leaving the club may prove harder still. Last week Theresa May, Britain’s prime minister, praised the European Union effusively even as she triggered the process to leave it, beginning two years of withdrawal negotiations. But Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, captured the mood better, predicting “difficult, complex and sometimes even confrontational” talks.
This week’s contretemps over Gibraltar was a depressing reminder that the strain of British jingoism unearthed by the vote to leave the EU last June remains alive. It will no doubt find fresh modes of expression as the Brexit talks unfold (see article). Expect other battles, too: the debate over Britain’s outstanding financial obligations to the EU seems almost guaranteed to end in tears....Continue reading
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