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The backstop extending to the UK was a UK requirement. And the backstop bonds the hands of a future parliament as much as any international agreement does. Tha

• makomk 7y ago
  The backstop extending to the UK was something Theresa May came up with as a compromise to reduce the problems with the Good Friday Agreement and hopefully make it more acceptable to the DUP than what the EU came up with originally. Which is why, as I said, we could've avoided it but only at the cost of making that other problem worse. It also ended Theresa May's career and lead to the most spectacular rejection of a key government bill by Parliament in its entire history. Also, most of the international agreements the UK has signed up to are unilaterally revokable - unlike the backstop - for pretty much that reason. There's a few exceptions, but the ones I've seen Brexit opponents cite are things like war crimes restrictions, not giving up control over most of out domestic laws. Americans should also bear in mind that the rule against parliaments binding their successors is the only protection against (say) a party voting to transfer law-making power to a body they think will be more pro-business than the opposition. There's no requirement for a supermajority or a referendum, as would be required to amend your country's constitution. (In fact we don't even have a codified constitution that can be amended!) Our joining the EU scraped through the House of Commons with a 50.7% majority basically on the whim of one party.
  • jashmatthews 7y ago
    Doesn’t the GFA itself have no exit clause?