This week’s Political WorldView podcast walks the Brexit path as the UK Government puts its withdrawal deal with the European Union before Parliament.

Host Adam Quinn considers the possibilities and consequences — from an amicable deal and transition to “No Deal” to “No Brexit” — with University of Birmingham experts on UK and European politics: David Bailey, Charlotte Galpin, Mark Goodwin, George Kyris, and Sotirios Zartaloudis.

A Message to Brexit Britain — Germany Still Loves You

The Immediate Future

4:43 — Goodwin: “Everyone’s miserable” but deal might pass
10:20 — Galpin: Deal’s fate may rest on opposition Labour Party
12:23 — Zartaloudis: “There’s always a Plan B” but what is it?
15:13 — Goodwin: To pass deal, frame it as restrictions on freedom of movement?
17:23 — Kyris: Look beyond withdrawal to a “softer Brexit”
20:49 — Bailey: “Whatever happens, it will be ultra-soft Brexit”

Brexit and the People

24:24 — Galpin: The crisis for the unwritten UK Constitution
26:48 — Kyris: “Hard Brexit does not respect the referendum”
30:31 — Zartaloudis: Chaos when populism faces reality of power
32:41 — Galpin: Leave’s strange coalition of promises cannot be fulfilled…
33:46 — Goodwin: …but that fuels resentment

The Austerity Argument

36:42 — Bailey: The “elite stitch-up” of capitalist democracy
38:23 — Galpin: “Drivers of austerity are in the UK, not the EU”
39:38 — Goodwin: Austerity only indirectly affected outcome at most
41:17 — Zartaloudis: “The UK system has cultivated scepticism. These aren’t working class warriors”

Has EU Dictated UK’s Future?

44:25 — Bailey v Quinn: European Union set up for capitalist “retrenchment”?
46:34 — Zartaloudis: “Within the EU are some of the most generous, egalitarian states in the world”
48:10 — Galpin: Member states have role in direction of EU
51:39 — Bailey: “Too late to undo EU neo-liberalism”
54:33 — Galpin: Brexit will not solve wider issues around the referendum

A 2nd Referendum?

58:53 — Goodwin: Technically difficult and a bad idea
1:03:10 — Galpin: “A really risky move” but strange for Government to rule it out
1:06:50 — Kyris: “Who is sovereign, people or Parliament?”
1:11:32 — Bailey: People had deeply-embedded hostility to EU
1:12:17 — Zartaloudis: “Big cleavage in British identity”
1:15:02 — Galpin: “Don’t we have responsibility to people who are going to suffer from Brexit?”
1:15:54 — Zartaloudis: “We live in a populist moment” that will portray this question as “betrayal”