Kern wrote:
I skimmed the whole thing yesterday. It was pretty vacuous, full of weasly statements and empty clever-sounding words, the kind I would write during essay crises as an undergraduate when I would end up trying to fill up the word count rather than engage with the issue.
Few things that caught my eye:
Quote:
The sovereignty of Parliament is a fundamental principle of the UK constitution. Whilst Parliament has remained sovereign throughout our membership of the EU, it has not always felt like that.
This is an absolute howler. God forbid we should be doing all this for something more substantial than the "feeling" of sovereignty.
Quote:
We recognise that for the people of Northern Ireland and Ireland, the ability to move freely across the border is an essential part of daily life. When the UK leaves the EU we aim to have as seamless and frictionless a border as possible between Northern Ireland and Ireland, so that we can continue to see the trade and everyday movements we have seen up to now
Completely substance-free waffle on an issue that deserves much more commitment. Peace in Northern Ireland was one of the defining accomplishments of our government during our lifetimes.
Quote:
The EU budget
8.51 Once we have left the EU, decisions on how taxpayers’ money will be spent will be made in the UK. As we will no longer be members of the Single Market, we will not be required to make vast contributions to the EU budget. There may be European programmes in which we might want to participate. If so, it is reasonable that we should make an appropriate contribution. But this will be a decision for the UK as we negotiate the new arrangements.
That's the entire section. No mention at all of, say, the €60bn the EU is already demanding the UK pay, which, sure, we might negotiate our way out of. But we also might not. Which brings me on to:
Quote:
Risks register
::crickets::
Only joking. The word "risk" only appears in the document twice, in irrelevant contexts. There's nothing in here that specifically itemises potential future problems and then outlines measures to mitigate them. For fuck's sake, I'm a worker peon, and I do that amount of diligence for my annual planning to my boss. If you did that in a project approval document to your board of directors with tens of billions on the line, you'd be laughed out of the room on your way to clearing out your desk.