A must read if you’re not sure of your “Article 50s” from your “Trade Deals”
Are you left feeling confused by the constant debates?
Would you know how to explain Brexit in your own words?
Let’s break things down for you in this easy to read and simple guide to Brexit so you can feel freshly informed and up to date with the biggest new story this year.
For starters, where did the word Brexit come from. It’s a mix of two words, “Britain” and “Exit”, pretty clever, huh?
So, that means Britain is exiting, or leaving something. But the word merger doesn’t tell us what.
What is the EU?
The European Union – often known as the EU – is a partnership of 28 European countries, such as England, France, Germany, Greece ect.
It was formed after World War Two to improve co-operation, with the idea that countries which trade together were more likely to avoid going to war with each other.
It is now a “single market” which means that goods and people are able to move around, basically as if it was all one big country.
The EU has its own currency, the euro, which 19 countries use. We, however, chose to keep our own pounds and pennies.
It also has its own parliament and sets rules in a wide range of areas – including, the environment, transport, consumer rights and even things like mobile phone charges. We are part of the EU at the moment so we abide by its rules and standards.
David Cameron was in power when talks of a referendum began. It was a vote from parliament and the people in the UK on whether they wanted to leave the EU or not. The country was very divided and it was almost an even split but the Brexiteers just clipped it with 51.9% of votes.
This then meant that a “Brexit Deal” needed to be negotiated to agree the terms of this ‘breakup’.
Teresa May triggered article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty on the 29th March 2017, which is essentially a law put in place that the UK will leave the EU within 2 years. The UK will leave the EU whether or not they can agree on a deal or not, but at the moment all the recent news is really focussing on is how those negotiations are going. As you can imagine, it’s a long and complicated process.
Recently there have been talks about how the UK could cancel Brexit, and remain in the EU, but no one really knows if this will happen as at the moment, there isn’t much agreement on what is the best deal for the UK.
Teresa May has been under a lot of scrutiny to get a good exit deal for months, and the UK and the EU have finally agreed a Brexit deal. There are two steps to it.
One is a withdrawal agreement, which is similar to a divorce papers, breaking down the relationship between the EU and the UK, it covers things like how much money the UK owes the EU.
The next is a statement on future relations which is a document discussing what the long-term relationship will be like.
The next step is for the UK MPS to vote on the deals proposed to see if Brexit will all go ahead as planned.
And that pretty much sums it all up, simply.
Make sure to keep up to date with all the latest Brexit news without the nonsense, here on the Doughnut.
