‘No deal’ is the wrong way to frame crashing out – we need to talk about ‘arrangements’ instead

Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

I suggest that in the Brexit argument we stop referring to a “deal” and instead talk about “arrangements”? However the relationship between the UK and the EU ends, there will still have to be arrangements in place for things like cross-border trade and travel. Even when Berlin was divided by a solid wall, local administrators had to have arrangements for utilities and services that crossed between east and west.

If we leave the EU without any arrangements in place, ferries would not be able to leave Dover, flights to Europe could not take off, and the thousands of other connections – personal, governmental, academic, commercial, security, legal and financial – that have developed over nearly half a century would be severed. Clearly we cannot leave the EU without negotiated arrangements being in place, so changing threats of leaving with “no deal” to leaving with “no arrangements” shows what nonsense the idea is.

Richard Charnley
Ripon

Must more lives be lost before we recover our decency?

In what loathsome age are we living in that politicians boast about disobeying the law and call out lawyers, judges and academics for explaining it. The law is there for our protection. As a wise playwright (Robert Bolt) once said: “The law is a causeway upon which, so long as he keeps to it, a citizen may walk safely.” Undermining the rule of law ought not to be acceptable.

What is equally egregious is the hatred pervading politics today, bashing each other’s views, upbringing and education. An MP lost her life some three years ago – the vitriol spouted by both sides of benches in the Commons should have no place in modern Britain.

Our society is injured and polarised enough over the issue of Brexit. Must the hatred that entire generations fought against win? We cannot and should not live in fear and disdain. Must more lives be lost and people be hurt before we realise that we have lost our basic decency? The personal must be separated from the political.

Tammy G
Address supplied

Johnson’s conundrum

Even Jeremy Corbyn has now raised his head above the parapet and finally appeared on Radio 4’s Today programme, albeit on the coat-tails of the Supreme Court ruling. What is Boris Johnson waiting for? It would be interesting for him, as our prime minister, to explain, in the absence of a Brexit deal, how he intends to leave the EU on 31 October, as he has pledged to do so, without breaking the law. None of cabinet members have been able to answer this seemingly unanswerable question.

Christopher Learmont-Hughes
Caldy

No surrender

The prime minister calls the Benn Act a “surrender act”, claiming it leaves the UK at the mercy of the EU. Once again Mr Johnson is misrepresenting the position. Section 3(2) of the act acknowledges that the EU may decide on a shorter or longer extension. However before such an extension is agreed by the prime minister the House of Commons must agree to such an extension, as is laid out in Section 3(3). How can that be described as surrendering sovereignty?

Maurizio Moore
Brentwood

I wanted to leave sensibly – the ERG scuppered that

May I say how much I support the view expressed in Thursday’s letter from Jane Mogford. I too voted Remain, and though disappointed by the referendum result assumed we had to leave the EU. Another assumption I made was as the victory was narrow, the views of 16 million people would be taken into account and a close relationship with the EU would be maintained.

The 2016 vote was only the start of the story, the difficult and complicated bit was still to come.

I believe the reason we haven’t left yet is because the ERG and others, insist on a “clean break”, and there is no majority for this extreme version of leaving.

As I say, I am assuming we will leave, but I will oppose a no deal or clean break, unless there is a second referendum to see if that is actually the will of the people.

Derek Thornhill
Gloucester

Thoughts on the Supreme Court decision

Mary Dejevsky’s column sparked a memory of my first days as a civil servant, of a booklet called Judge Over Your Shoulder, alerting me to the situations when I, and all who work for the government, could have our decisions challenged under the judicial review process. Looking up the current version of this document I wanted to see what it had to say about challenging political decisions.

There on page 59 it stated (and forgive me for boring readers!): “political judgements should be left to the decision maker, who understands the policy and has the experience of its operation to inform his decision. In this kind of area, the court should defer to the decision maker, or recognise the demarcation of functions between the executive and the judiciary; the court should allow the decision maker a ‘margin of discretion’ or ‘discretionary area of judgement’.”

So if I, or even Gina Miller, were to challenge a prime minister’s decision to prorogue parliament, the court would be reluctant to interfere with the political decision, as indeed happened in the Court of Appeal. But if a group of parliamentary politicians were to challenge such a decision, the court would feel obliged to intervene because it becomes a question of politicians against politicians, as was the case in the Scottish Court of Session. In such circumstances the court was compelled to intervene, allowing the PM’s transparently tactical prorogation decision to be overturned.

When the two cases came together in the Supreme Court, it seems obvious to me that the court would similarly decide that the executive cannot prorogue parliament as it desires against the wishes of parliament without good reason, as the Scottish court judgement would inevitably weigh more than the English, since the former involved politicians on both sides. Hence the Supreme Court unanimously decided that Boris Johnson had lost his head in making such a rash decision, following a precedent set by the unfortunate King Charles I.

I’m certainly no lawyer but I draw three conclusions from this: that the judiciary are clearly important in supporting parliamentary sovereignty against an over-mighty executive; that Mary Dejevsky was probably never a civil servant; and, finally, that next time Gina Miller takes the government to court, she might consider working closely with current members of parliament like Joanna Cherry QC.

Sarah Wood
Address supplied