What WTO Really Means

WTO General Roberto Azevedo 

I owe James Delingpole a favour for not understanding macroeconomics, duly for it has given me the chance to confirm what I always suspected about No Deal Brexit: that ‘Ol Blighty being a nation that 80% of its GDP is Service Sector orientated has everything to fear about leaving the EU on World Trade Organization (WTO) terms.

What article 50 does make clear is that the UK’s de facto position if a deal hasn’t been agreed thereafter 29/03/19 we’re consigned to World Trade Organization WTO terms.  The Supreme Court clarified this in their closing statement in the R Miller case asking for a ‘Meaningful Vote’ in parliament, Lord Carnwath announced; “the trigger does not change or affect laws such as rights, but is merely the start of an essentially political process of negotiating and decision-making.” In May’s article 50 letter to Donald Tusk (President of the European Council) the ‘default position’ is vague on a No Deal scenario too. Leaving the EU without an agreement means adopting WTO terms, albeit rapidly removes that position by stating ‘coping with change’ and ‘undisclosed outcomes’ – at no point was this a letter of the law. To engage in the judicial factors ‘No Deal’ isn’t automatically law, to proclaim it’s the case is deliberately misguiding the power and credentials of national sovereignty…. The UK could also remain in the EU.

What Delingpole fails to grasp is the ideology is merely a phantasmagorical vision that has no plan nor can stipulate macroeconomic formulas that include an imbalanced Service Sector. Politics or ideology isn’t what embodies us at all, we exist due to our family, good old fashioned household economics, to gift us all a secure mind-set. Brexit unravels all of that in one act of stupidity, to continue to re-enact this prose three years on, without any means of knowing the actual destination, not only is this inane the position is of a cult, a dangerous one that chooses everyone’s destiny and no democratic state has this right. Under the King Henry VIII Laws there’s civil rights that can hold a person or ruler responsible for economic ills. No Court in the Land can override such laws; if they do it’ll bring the UK constitution into disrepute. Herewith, bring it on, Delingpole, let’s see you run the gauntlet. Such an expensive condemnation comparatively makes Andrew Neil’s slow car crash interview a splash in the paddling pool with three rubber ducks.

Questionable anecdotal evidence from nothing in particular cannot possibly be used as a heightened appetite for a No Deal Brexit; to evaluate it as ‘growing’ is emblematic of the myopic language that claims to know what the electorate is thinking. Call it a fools’ paradise to clarify my perspective; the government’s impasse and EU’s contempt for British politics is a non-discriminatory reflection of UK’s Brexit proceedings. The fifth richest economy (80% Service Sector) is on the edge of entering fully into WTO Rules which is predominantly Goods Based. The impact and change to the UK’s GDP is impossible to imagine. Why I referred this concern to Roberto Azevedo the chieftain of WTO.

The response is unsavoury for the ilk of Delingpole and hard-line Brexiters to realise, why the ‘breitbart blog’ in simplistic terms identifies what the WTO core rules are, not what is in the UK’s interest.  Without being too unfair, Delingpole forgot about 82% of what 100% WTO means to a macroeconomic ‘imbalanced’ powerhouse. Roberto Azevedo backs up the theory that it’ll be suicidal to unhinge a national economy on WTO alone. An ex-EU State would be severely restricted via administrative burdens and tariffs. Inadvertently, endangering the UK’s market prowess, on values they cannot compete. Furthermore, the impact of trade friction on the Irish border (s) will make the UK non-compliant on future Trade Treaties globally. The so-called technologies to make it possible are not a panacea, hence; invalid - leaving an insurmountable gap in respectable Trade and Global Investment, for the UK and Ireland. A No Deal analogy also doesn’t protect the UK from being compliant with EU rules, meaning extra tariffs and administration costs.

Those who announce that the UK can trade with the EU post-Brexit via imitating the methods of trading with the US are daft. The Appellate Body is in the midst of reforms from the directives of the US administration and the WTO themselves; the Body ironically deals with national trade disputes, for the UK to add to the convoluted machinations will stagnate global trade agreements, why Secretary of State for International Trade, Liam Fox cannot pen a bona fide bilateral Trade Agreement and why Tory MEP Daniel Hannan’s US Treaty ‘the best ever’ has stalled. The WTO Body has already categorically stated the paralysis is ongoing imminently. Delingpole and Brexiters are not foreseeing the long-term scenarios that are defining UK’s global influence and future prosperity – worse still; they’re using ambiguous terms such as: ‘alternative arrangements!’ Codswallop and the mass media are not doing enough to pull the plug on these rhetorical soundbites at this late stage.

Roberto Azevedo notified governing bodies that the WTO is experiencing global free trade impasses, the worse kind for seventy years; this goes back to pre-digitization and the modern era. There’s no escaping this conundrum and we’ve no global trade stimulus due to having no WTO Council Representatives. Shockingly, The Capital (London) is 91% dependent on the Service Sector; the warning signs claim there’s no succinct pathway for the UK’s Service Sector to trade unscathed under WTO unilateral terms – which is what UK, will be if No Deal becomes a reality on 30/03/19. Notably, the competitive edge ceases of the onus WTO Service arrangements is strung out multilaterally. A very different mechanism to what London and Service orientated economies are accustomed to and there’s an economic nuance that the UK will resemble the Asian market hardships China had to endure for so long.

Economic paralysis is inevitable, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Our national constitutional laws protect citizens and livelihoods. This is the reason why ‘ol Blighty is so successful, the envy of humanity from afar. Brexiters and the myopic ilk of Delingpole who grandstand about their failures can get up and move on - a national status isn’t so magnanimous. Why suchlike need to be called out for what they are…. charlatans.  And better still; remove the platforms to which they blow-out their absurdism.