I really don’t want to come across as too much of a pedant but I feel I haven’t quite made clear what I was trying to say. Brexit has happened. On January 31st 2020 the United Kingdom formally left the European Union. There is absolutely no doubt about that in the same way there is no doubt about the fact that Trump has been impeached even if many people will say he hasn’t because he hasn’t been removed from office. There might be an (infinitesimally small) chance that the UK just continues to prolong the transition period and de facto enjoys the benefits of EU membership but that is so unlikely it isn’t really worth thinking about. It would require a complete overthrow of the UK government in the next month and a half. I have long since reached the acceptance stage of grief over this.
But even in this scenario (which would basically require Al de Pfeffel and his entire odious menagerie to disappear in a puff of smoke tomorrow) the UK wouldn’t be able to stay in the EU because they have already left. They also wouldn’t be able to rejoin in anything under a few years to a decade. Unlike the UK, the EU has been working on getting ready for Brexit for a long time now. It has already changed in ways that make it impossible to simply slot the UK back in for at least the current parliament’s and commission’s terms.
You know all this of course, as I said I really don’t want this to come across as patronising, I just feel we have not been talking about the same thing. I was talking about the actual legal fact of Brexit having happened de jure while you have been expressing hope it can be neutralised de facto.
