Hard-liners’ hell on the horizon

European Union President Donald Tusk’s comment that there should be a “special place in hell” for those who are willing to leave the EU without a deal produced  a predictable response from those hard-line Brixiteers in his firing line.

Hard-line, but thin-skinned.

After years of hurling every insult under the sun at Brussels, the delicate flowers in the European Research Group  (ERG) were having fits over getting just a little of it thrown back at them.

Even Prime Minister Theresa May called the comments “outrageous”, causing “widespread dismay” in the United Kingdom.

Bruised feelings and dismay aside, there are very real reasons behind Tusk’s exasperated outburst.

Much has been written about the damage a no-deal Brexit would deliver to the UK. Far less about the problems it will cause across the English Channel.

Having what had been the EU’s second largest economy suddenly cut off behind tariff walls will cause significant disruption throughout Europe. Exports by EU countries to the UK would be halved by one estimate, with German manufacturers hit the hardest.

Because May repeatedly said she was committed to an orderly withdrawal and because, after months of negotiations, a deal was worked out which she accepted as fair, the EU never really considered the possibility of a hard Brexit, and did very little work in anticipation of one.

The overwhelming defeat of the deal in the British Parliament came as a stunning blow to Brussels, where May’s continued dogged insistence that she will deliver Brexit by the March 29 deadline is seen as a willingness to embrace leaving without a deal in place if that is what it takes.

Bureaucrats are aghast at some of the ideas coming out of London to deal with a hard Brexit, such as International Trade Minister Liam Fox’s suggestion of cutting all UK tariffs to zero.

“The man is supposed to be a trade expert; can’t he see what that will do? Every country on earth will be rushing to dump their spare produce onto the UK; one easy way to destroy domestic industry and jobs. He’s crazy,” one fuming bureaucrat said.

There is a growing feeling among more moderate MPs that March 29 will have to be scrapped to give negotiators more time.

Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn has put forward proposals that would gain his party’s support, but they would almost certainly involve remaining in the EU’s Customs Union — something that is anathema to the ERG and many other Brexit-backing MPs.

A second referendum, with the choices of a negotiated deal, no deal or remaining in the EU, is the best way out of this increasingly desperate situation, but it would involve Parliament accepting what is already obvious — that it is hopelessly split and cannot produce an outcome.

It would also come up against May’s massive ego and the ERG, bent on charging over the abyss crying “God for Harry, England, and St George”.

Never has there been a greater need for some sane reflection — but among too many of the UK’s leaders sanity is in short supply.

Meanwhile, the hard-liners’ hell beckons.