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Originally Posted by Damien
It's pretty easy for us to have no deal, we just don't do anything. Although you still have the problem of Northern Ireland amongst others. Although It seems the government have been giving assurances to various companies which are presumably about the nature of the relationship with the EU post-Brexit.
It might be that the British Government has spent months working on the 'divorce bill' and assumed once that was agreed the Germans would tell Ireland to knock it off and move onto the next stage of talks over their objections. When that didn't happen they tried to fudge it and it fell down on the matter of the DUP.
The idea that German car manufacturers wouldn't tolerate the lack of a deal that was popular during the campaign seems to be the basis of the government's strategy. Now we have been taken aback by the lack of domestic pressure on EU governments to do a deal as well as the unified approach they've all taken to the talks has surprised us. Hence the bigger bill, hence the lack of an answer on Ireland.
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I can't remember the Leave campaign talking much about N. Ireland? I suppose it did not play well with the simplistic narrative they were selling. Mrs May does have an almost impossible conundrum to resolve: the anti-EU cabal in her cabinet and the DUP will stop any EU-tainted compromise whereas the NI people as a whole, who don't forget voted 56% to Remain, will be horrified what a hard border would lead to.
I cannot see how we would be surprised about the unified approach you refer to? The EU leadership must have, as a priority, the preservation of the long term future of the project even if it means a financial penalty. In the same way, although the Leave voters were duped about this, the UK will suffer a similar financial penalty due to Leaving.