Going it alone

The Brexit white paper includes the line: “Whilst Parliament has remained sovereign throughout our membership of the EU, it has not always felt like that.”

In other words Brexit won't give us sovereignty (we already have it), what it will give us is the feeling of sovereignty.

¿Que?

Clearly, in order to keep this feeling fresh we will need to exercise our sovereignty more robustly. We will have to refuse to pass laws that other nations ask for.

So if we have sovereignty already, why on earth are we passing these laws?

The laws we have adopted from the EU (the ones that will be dealt with by the Great Repeal Bill) are intended to harmonise laws over the whole EU. This is to make trade easier, to protect our rights, and to protect us (e.g. from criminals selling horsemeat as beef).

Leaving the EU means we can assert ourselves:

• Bring back pounds and ounces, feet and inches, grains and ells - though we couldn't sell things in Europe unless we made separate metric packaging, of course.
• Enact Mrs May's Snooper's Charter that the EU struck down due to privacy concerns - allowing the "general and indiscriminate retention of internet data". Take care where you surf!
• Invade Spain - currently rather difficult as Spain is in the EU too, but once we leave the gloves are off. Once Gibralter is sorted then Normandy should be next.

Obviously these are just some ideas that our leaders have had. There is scope for much more.

Of course the downside of going it alone is that if we don't fit in then no-one will play with us. If we want a trade deal with the US then we need to fit in with them and make laws allowing the sale of hormone-laced beef and chlorine-flavoured chicken. If we want to sell financial services to the EU then our banks will need to to fit in and obey EU regulations.

The only truly sovereign country in the world today is North Korea.