The Spectator Podcast: Theresa May's Brexit deal is hard to stomach
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The Spectator
4.4 • 785 Ratings
🗓️ 8 November 2018
⏱️ 40 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As Theresa May prepares to unveil her Brexit deal, we ask: just how bad is it, and what happened to ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’ (00:50)? In the American midterms, the Blue Wave didn’t happen, but Democrats did take control of the House of Representatives – what next for Trump’s presidency (17:15)? And last, as we approach Remembrance Sunday, who are the lives we are remembering, and is it time to move on (28:10)?
With James Forsyth, Charles Grant, Kate Andrews, Leslie Vinjamuri, Liz Hunt, and Glyn Prysor.
Presented by Lara Prendergast.
Produced by Cindy Yu and Alastair Thomas.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is Spectator Radio and you're listening to The Spectator podcast with Lara Prendergast. |
| 0:05.5 | This podcast is sponsored by Merrian Global Investors, bringing together the art and science of investing. |
| 0:16.8 | Hello and welcome back to The Spectator podcast. I'm Laura Prendergast. As Theresa May prepares to |
| 0:24.4 | unveil her Brexit deal, we ask, just how bad is it? And whatever happened to, no deal is better |
| 0:30.5 | than a bad deal. In the American midterms, the blue wave didn't happen, but Democrats did |
| 0:36.1 | take control of the House of Representatives. |
| 0:38.5 | So, what's next for Trump's presidency? |
| 0:41.3 | And last, as we approach Remembrance Sunday, we look at some of the lives we are remembering |
| 0:45.7 | and ask, is it now time to move on? First, Theresa May is serving up two fairly unpalatable |
| 0:52.3 | options when it comes to Brexit. It's her deal or no deal. |
| 0:56.3 | If we take her deal, Britain risks being tied to the EU forever through the customs union. |
| 1:01.3 | But if there's no deal, the country will face a period of instability and disruption that we're |
| 1:06.2 | simply not prepared for. James Forsyth argues in this week's magazine that she's serving up an impossible |
| 1:11.7 | choice. He joins me now, together with Charles Grant, director of the Centre for European |
| 1:16.5 | Reform. James, you start your piece by saying that Brexit has been served and it's her deal or |
| 1:22.1 | no deal. Can you explain to us what Theresa May's deal is? So you might think that her deal is all about the future, what the relationship with the UK and the EU is going to be like in 10 years time. |
| 1:34.1 | Really, though, at the moment, everything has boiled down to the backstop, because the nature of this is that there's going to be a withdrawal agreement between the UK and the EU and then a trade deal negotiated. |
| 1:45.6 | The B is stumbling block to getting a withdrawal agreement is this whole question of the Irish border. |
| 1:51.0 | And back in December last year, you know, the UK and the EU signed off on something called a joint report, |
| 1:57.2 | made various commitments on the Irish border. |
| 2:00.4 | The UK government view was, oh, don't worry about this. |
| 2:03.6 | This is a classic Brussels fudge. |
... |
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