A delicate balancing act
The on-going conflict in Ukraine has sent shockwaves through global energy markets, impacting everything from international relations to commodity prices.
The UK government late on Monday published its Brexit withdrawal Agreement Bill ahead of the Beginning of a key Commons debate.
The bill runs to 110 pages and is accompanied by 124 pages of explanatory notes.
The move is seen as the government’s attempt to fast-track the legislation through the House of Commons and ratify PM Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal in just three days, Xinhua news agency reported.
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Earlier on Monday, Jacob Rees-Mogg, leader of the House of Commons, told lawmakers that a debate on the bill would start on Tuesday, with ministers hoping to get it through all its House of Commons stages by Thursday.
The bill was published just hours after the speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, rejected a government’s bid for a meaningful vote on the London-Brussels Brexit agreement in the day.
The development comes after MPs in a historic Saturday session in the House of Commons voted 322 to 306 in favour of an amendment withholding the approval of Johnson’s deal until all the necessary legislation was completed.
Johnson’s Brexit deal ditches the backstop, the “insurance policy” designed to prevent a return to physical checks on the Irish border, the BBC reported. Instead, it will, in effect, draw a new customs border in the Irish Sea, because goods which could then travel onwards to Ireland will have to pay a duty tax.
The whole of the UK will leave the EU customs union, meaning it could strike trade deals with other countries in the future. The EU is now considering how to respond to the UK’s request for a delay but has said Saturday’s developments did not mean that the deal had been rejected. The UK is due to leave the EU at 11 pm on October 31.
Johnson is likely to go for an election within months regardless since he has no majority. If he passes a deal unamended, then the election could not be until next year otherwise, he could proceed to an election pretty quickly in order to try to get a mandate for leaving with the agreement he negotiated.
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