Stephen Collins: Phil Hogan could prove to be Britain’s post-Brexit saviour

Phil Hogan’s appointment to the powerful post of European trade commissioner has been widely portrayed as a reinforcement of the Irish position on Brexit and of course it is. The other side of the coin is that it could ultimately prove helpful to the British when they eventually get around to negotiating a trade deal.

Immediately after European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen announced his appointment, Hogan made the point that even if the UK exits the EU on October 31st without a deal the British government will have to come back to talk about future trade arrangements and the same conditions, including the backstop, will apply before they can start.

That penny has taken a long time to drop with the UK government and it is something of which the British public and media appear oblivious. With the publication of the Operation Yellowhammer no-deal planning documents in recent days, the scale of the disruption that will ensure if the worst happens is beginning to impinge more forcibly.

The disruption will not simply last through the early days of November but until the UK concludes some sort of trade deal with the EU. Hogan will be the key figure on the EU side in those talks and, in typically blunt fashion, he has spelled out what the British will have to do before they begin.

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Dublin and Brussels

His appointment to the crucial trade post is the latest evidence that when it comes to Brexit, Ireland’s interests trump British ones every time as far as our EU partners are concerned. In the months after the Brexit referendum in June 2016, the facile notion that the EU would throw Ireland under the bus when the crunch came was a persistent thread in the commentary not just in the United Kingdom but in this country as well.

Step by step since the negotiations began it has become apparent that the EU will not sacrifice the interests of a member state for those of a departing country, no matter how powerful that country is or what the damaging consequences of a bad-tempered divorce might be for both sides.

The British are coming to realise this reality very late in the day but whether or not it will prompt Boris Johnson to make a realistic attempt to do a deal with the EU or pursue his “die in the ditch” policy is anybody’s guess.

Hogan, who has established himself as an influential figure in Brussels during his five-year stint as agriculture commissioner has made no secret of his disdain for the foolishness and incompetence of the Brexiteers. Just a few weeks ago, he launched a scathing attack on Johnson’s approach. Referring to the prime minister’s Churchillian pretensions he turned the famous phrase of the great leader on its head saying that in the event of a no-deal Brexit “never will have so few done so much damage to so many”.

Consummate politician

For all that, Hogan’s pivotal role in the trade negotiations could well turn out to be a positive development all round once the British side sorts out the internal politics at Westminster and gets down to real negotiations. The bottom line is that Ireland has a far greater interest than any other EU country in the emergence of a deal that allows trade between the UK and the EU keep moving as freely as possible.

Hogan, who has proved himself a consummate politician at European level, is well aware of that, despite his impatience at the antics of Johnson and his allies. His basic approach to politics is that a deal can always be done no matter how unpromising the circumstances appear.

One EU official summed up the position neatly. “From a British point of view, Hogan is a far better guy to be dealing with than a Frenchman who would probably be quite happy to see the UK sink beneath the waves or somebody from the other side of Europe who wouldn’t be affected one way or another by what happens.”

The meeting between Johnson and Taoiseach Leo Varadkar last Monday provided some limited grounds for hope that the prime minister really does want a deal. If so, some version of the Northern Ireland-only backstop looks like the only feasible solution but that will require concessions all round involving flexibility and creativity not simply from the Democratic Unionist Party and hardline Tories but from the Government as well.

The full scale of the disruption that will result from a no-deal Brexit is beginning to make itself felt in Ireland as well as the UK and that may concentrate minds in the coming weeks. Already the Dáil Opposition has started the process of blaming the Government’s allegedly poor planning for all of the problems that will inevitably follow from a no-deal.

The Government has compounded its problems by failing until very recently to spell out to the public that Border checks of some kind will be necessary to protect the EU single market in the event of a no-deal. While there were obviously tactical negotiating reasons for the reticence, Varadkar and his Ministers might rue not being more open about the inevitable consequences at an earlier stage.