LONDON, March 29 (Xinhua) -- The year since Britain formally announced it would leave the European Union (EU) has seen one of political uncertainty, but despite political turmoil, the country remains on course to leave the 28-nation bloc at the end of March next year, a leading British expert has said.
Britain voted in a referendum in June 2016 to leave the EU, and British Prime Minister Theresa May formally started the engine at the end of March last year by activating the Article 50 process, the mechanism to leave.
The past year has seen a general election, in which May gambled for more power and lost. She kept her role as prime minister and her party, the Conservatives, stayed in power but she is in a personally weak position and her party relies on the support of a much smaller party to remain in power.
"The most likely outcome is that Britain leaves in March 2019," Professor Anand Menon of King's College London (KCL) told Xinhua in an exclusive interview.
"And the most likely outcome is that there is a pretty poor trade deal," said Menon, who is professor of European Politics at KCL.
BREXIT TWISTS AND TURNS
The EU and Britain are currently negotiating at an advanced stage around the exit process. And the negotiations are taking place against the clock, with the end of March being the point where Britain is actually out of the bloc.
Menon believes both sides will go for a transition period, when Britain is out of the bloc but still obeying the rules while not having a say in drawing them up.
"There will be a transition period, it will not be long enough," said Menon.
While a transition period would stop the threat of a cliff-edge Brexit taking place, where Britain follows EU rules and benefits from open borders until it leaves and then faces drastic changes immediately afterwards, Menon believes the transition period will likely not be long enough for the complexity of the task ahead of both parties.
"The real feature of the worst outcome is that we face a crash-out in December 2020 after a transition that isn't long enough and one which Britain has no legal means of extending," said Menon.
This is not a certainty, nor even a probability, especially in a political environment in Britain where uncertainty has been a daily feature since the Brexit referendum in June 2016.
"Even predicting what will happen tomorrow is difficult," said Menon.
Menon is a close observer of the Brexit twists and turns, and heads an academic think-tank UK in a Changing Europe, of which he is the director, which has produced many papers on Brexit issues.
Menon sees Brexit as undefined, and meaning many things to different people. Its lack of definition is a strength, but also an obstacle later on.
"Brexit means different things to different people; people for whom it means slashing immigration, people for whom Brexit is a liberal enterprise in taking back control but taking back control of immigration; there are people for whom Brexit means slashing the state, and those for whom it means more money for the NHS," said Menon.
"You cannot reconcile all those conflicting views, so some are going to be upset. The paradox of Brexit is that there is probably no sustainable majority for any conceivable outcome.
"There is not a majority in favor of remain; we just don't know how a second referendum would go -- to what extent would people think 'this is unfair we have already done this'."
"To what extend would leave voters -- many of whom stopped voting or had never voted before -- would say this is rigged we are not voting again.
"There is a campaign to stop Brexit. I don't think it is likely but it is conceivable."
ODDS ON AN EXIT
Brexit is still the most likely outcome. Much useful discussion on complex and technical issues has already taken place and many hurdles which seemed daunting have been cleared.
There is no reason to think that Brexit will be halted for technical issues, said Menon. Nor for political ones, because there is no party which opposes Brexit.
And despite a year of uncertainty, a lot of progress has been made on a path towards exit, even though the terms of that exit remain unknown.
"We are loads closer to Brexit. The fact is that much of the technicalities of exit have been negotiated, it doesn't make the headlines. Pension rights, health insurance, all those technical things. Two teams from the EU and the UK have negotiated and done it really well," said Menon.
"There is a lot of technical stuff but the big thing for Britain -- which is sorting out our future trading relationship, which we haven't even started to talk about that yet."
Yet the situation now seems touched with nonsense; the British parliament will be asked sometime this year or early next year to vote on a Brexit for which it does not know the full details. There is likely to be not enough time to discuss the knotty problems that a trade agreement will through up.
Menon said: "It's an issue because parliament is going to be asked to vote on an outcome they haven't seen. Parliament will not be having a meaningful vote on a trade deal because there will not be a trade deal by the time parliament votes.
"We will have left before we have negotiated. So that is where the whole thing does not make any sense."
But despite the uncertainty Menon believes that May will remain as prime minister and will deliver a Brexit. What happens after that is clouded in obscurity.
"If I had to bet, I would bet May would be in place until Britain leaves the EU. Whether May is there when Britain reaches the end of transition, I don't know," he said.
And between now and the final time for a decision to be changed there will be an opportunity for, as William Shakespeare put it in Macbeth -- "sound and fury". But will it signify anything?
"What you will see between now and the end of January is a ratcheting up of the noise in a desperate attempt by those who don't want to leave in a bid to prevent it," said Menon.
