The vassal state

This follows on from Peter Black's post of  13th July. The conditions in the UK after a "clean break" with the EU could be worse than feared. Mrs May's refusal under questioning from Sarah Wollaston MP yesterday to publish government research is worrying. At the liaison committee meeting yesterday (held conveniently while Boris Johnson was making his statement in the Commons chamber), the prime minister undertook to inform the general public of the implications of a hard Brexit only in the event of it occurring.

Progressive governments among the EU27 are being more helpful to their business community. According to BBC Business Live, several have set up web-sites giving advice about the implications of a relationship purely on WTO terms with the rest of Europe. The European Commission has encouraged others in the 27 to prepare, as a hard Brexit becomes more and more likely. The Netherlands has already started.

Cast adrift from the EU, the UK will clearly be forced into trade deals on inferior terms. From being part of a multi-national organisation whose direction we can take a part in shaping, we will be fought over by the biggest global economies - the US, China and possibly India - in which we have no say, rather as Tito's Yugoslavia survived by playing off the West against the Soviet Union.

There is a new factor in these days of globalisation, the power of multinational corporations. There was evidence of what we will be missing in yesterday's announcement of the EU's financial sanctions on Google for misusing the corporation's virtual monopoly power over smartphone users. One recalls previous decisions which have forced mobile telephony providers to abandon roaming charges, and Microsoft to give up some anti-competitive practices.

At present, it looks as if we would come under the sway of the United States. The obvious danger is to our food production and environmental standards, and a long-term threat to the NHS. However, the recent arguments over the Iran nuclear deal have pointed up another malign effect of weakening both ourselves and the EU, namely strengthening the US hold on the international financial settlements system. So far, the UK has sided with the EU27 in trying to maintain the agreement with Iran and resist the US bullying. It could be a different story if we are forced to choose America over our European neighbours, and Iran could be only a beginning.

I agree with Boris Johnson that the Chequers agreement is a shoddy compromise that will reduce the UK's status to a virtual dependency of the EU. Moreover, it is unworkable, as the official EU response will confirm, if rumours are true. However, the answer is not to swap one dependency for another, but to resume our place among the decision-makers of Europe.