[JumpCrisscross]

Practically speaking, if the United Kingdom on January 1st, 2019 declares its previous Article 50 declaration was unlawfully issued, I have a hard time seeing the EU gathering the stomach to essentially enforce sanctions against the United Kingdom. This could all end up being a weird "did you know Britain isn't technically in the EU?" factoid in a hundred years.

[Nursie]

>> Practically speaking, if the United Kingdom on January 1st, 2019 declares its previous Article 50 declaration was unlawfully issued

I'm not quite sure how that would work, given article 50 was issued after an act of parliament.

[blibble]

the Act in question:

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2017/9/pdfs/ukpga_201700...

very simple and unambiguous

saying that, the UK parliament can declare things to be unlawful retroactively, so it's possible

just at "bernie can still win" levels of possibility

[JumpCrisscross]

> article 50 was issued after an act of parliament

I think everyone believes the Article 50 declaration was properly done. But proper isn't politics. Parliament can say whatever it wants. If on March 30th, 2019 Britain says it's in the EU, a disagreeing EU member would need to begin enforcing customs, tariffs, et cetera. If nobody, or nobody who matters, does that the rule goes unenforced.

It reminds me of an oversight in the North Dakota Constitution, which did not contain a clause required for accession [1]. (It was later added.) Laws are just codified conventions; the EU has an enforcement problem in that it cannot enforce, only its member states can.

[1] http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/07/14/because-of-constitution-...

[fleitz]

Exactly, the EU and UK are soveriegns, they'll do whatever they want, lots of countries ratified EU treaties after their populations voted against it. The same can happen in reverse.

The EU wants to heavily penalize the UK to prevent others from leaving.

Similar, to how in Vancouver the federal gov't says pot is illegal, but no one will ever bust you for it.