B-Day: Brussels says goodbye!

by Andreas Thomsen, Head of the RLS Brussels Office

Brexit is a watershed and warning sign, a historical break and alarm signal. It marks a turning point for the hitherto highly successful and steadily expanding project of the European Union. It is also the first time that a member state has left the Union. But when the United Kingdom leaves the EU on 31 January after 47 years of membership, the future relationship between the British government and the Union will still largely remain to be settled.

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Brexit day and the year ahead

by Stiofán Ó Nualláin & Seán Byers

The day marking the UK’s official departure from the EU is fast approaching, following December’s Brexit election which handed the Tories an 80-seat majority and with it the votes to comfortably pass Boris Johnson’s Withdrawal Bill. Johnson’s deal has yet to receive the assent of the House of Lords or the European Parliament. Although these decisions were considered a formality, the Lords has just defeated the government by voting for EU citizens to receive physical proof of their right to remain in the UK post-Brexit. Tory MPs are likely to be whipped to overturn the Lords vote in the next week, clearing the way for the UK to meet the new deadline of 31 January and for Johnson to claim that he has delivered on his simple election pledge to ‘Get Brexit done’.

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The 2019 General Election and Scotland

by David Green

Where now for the Left?

The 2019 UK general election result was a shock for the left. An 80-seat Conservative majority in the House of Commons — an unfamiliar sight after nearly ten years of coalition and minority rule — has already led to Boris Johnson moving quick to capitalise on his new mandate to ensure Brexit will go ahead. In Scotland, the left needs now to move beyond rhetorical opposition to the Tories and create a new vision of what kind of country Scotland should be.

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