Europe awoke stunned on Friday 24 June 2016 to learn that a majority of UK citizens had made the sovereign choice to leave the European Union and take back “control” of their destiny.
Until Friday 29 March 2017, Brexit was no more than a distant possibility. The process is now underway, with its agenda and indicative timetable – and could result in a new reality to which we all, Europeans, will have to get used, maybe as early as March 2019.
No one can say as yet where the negotiations will take us, these first negotiations that will lead to a member state leaving the European Union and, consequently, casting a shadow of doubt over the assumption that the European project was irreversible. A marathon of this sort, gruelling for bodies tired of lurching from one crisis to another, is likely to bring surprises and knock-backs.
In view of this situation, unprecedented in more than 60 years of European construction, Agence Europe will publish a newsletter every Friday throughout the negotiations devoted to Brexit, just as we did during the accession talks with the countries of Central and Eastern Europe.
This column, by Sarah Collins, an Irish journalist long established in Brussels, will complement our daily coverage of the events that will mark the various steps in the divorce between the United Kingdom and the EU. The weekly feature will report on the key issues and look to what lies ahead.
The new column will be called “The B-word”. This expression oft-heard in the corridors of the European Parliament, elides a word that is already so present that it no longer has to be uttered for its significance to be understood. The choice of title is also a nod in the direction of British humour, where a single letter is sufficient to alert the informed reader.
Mathieu Bion