The risks to Britain of its vote to leave the EU were laid bare on Monday when Scotland's nationalist government announced a new independence vote, pre-empting this week's expected start of the Brexit process. Prime Minister Theresa May could announce as early as Tuesday that she is triggering the Article 50 process of withdrawing from the European Union, putting Britain on course to leave by March 2019 after four decades of membership.
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has long warned that largely pro-European Scotland would not accept a damaging break with the EU - and on Monday she made good on her threat. "I will now take the steps necessary to make sure that Scotland will have a choice at the end of this process," she said at a hastily convened press conference in Edinburgh.
This would be "a choice of whether to follow the UK to a hard Brexit or to become an independent country, able to secure a real partnership of equals with the rest of the UK and our own relationship with Europe", she said. The Scottish National Party (SNP) leader said she would next week begin seeking authority for a vote between autumn 2018 and early 2019 - before Britain leaves the EU.
May's government has repeatedly made clear it does not believe there should be another vote after a first Scottish referendum in 2014 in which a majority voted against independence, and she has the power to block Sturgeon's request. "Another referendum would be divisive and cause huge economic uncertainty at the worst possible time," a Downing Street spokesman said.
However, rejecting Sturgeon's request would likely only energise the Scottish nationalists' cause - and is a major headache for May as she enters Brexit negotiations with the other 27 EU member states. Sturgeon's announcement came just hours before legislation empowering May to trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty returns to parliament for its final stages. After heated debate and a delay in the upper House of Lords, the bill could win final approval by both houses by Monday evening. It could be signed into law by the head of state Queen Elizabeth II as early as Tuesday, leaving May's path clear to begin Brexit whenever she wants.
May has promised to trigger Article 50 by the end of March, a timetable her spokesman said on Monday the government was "firmly on track to achieve". At a summit in Brussels last week, the prime minister said: "Our European partners have made clear to me that they want to get on with the negotiations, and so do I." Once May has notified the EU of her decision by letter, the other 27 EU leaders will take just 48 hours to issue their first draft proposal for the negotiations.
But talks are not expected to begin for months as both sides finalise strategies for two years of mammoth negotiations. EU leaders have planned a follow-up meeting on April 6, "provided that the prime minister moves Article 50, I think by March 15th", Irish premier Enda Kenny said. Article 50 provides only two years for Britain to unravel four decades of membership and forged new trade ties when it leaves the single European market.
EU leaders are determined that Brexit will not undermine the unity of the bloc, and that the final terms do not encourage other member states to follow Britain and jump ship.
May was forced to introduce the two-clause bill empowering her to trigger Article 50 after the Supreme Court ruled she must seek parliament's approval to start Brexit.
The bill was held up earlier this month by amendments passed in the unelected House of Lords, demanding guarantees for EU nationals' rights and a parliamentary vote on the final withdrawal deal. MPs in the elected lower House of Commons, where May has a majority, overwhelmingly supported the bill last month, and ministers hope they will overturn the Lords amendments in a vote on Monday. "The British people have voted to leave and what we can't do is have anything which would tie the prime minister's hands as she goes into these negotiations," May's spokesman said.
Some europhile Conservative MPs may rebel but the bill is likely to return unamended to the Lords on Monday for final approval, where further opposition is unlikely.Britain's opposition Labour party is braced for May to trigger Article 50 on Wednesday or Thursday, but Sturgeon said she had no idea when it would happen - proof, she said, that Scotland was being sidelined. A BMG survey for Scottish broadsheet The Herald found that 56 percent opposed to a new independence referendum before Brexit, and 52 percent said they were against Scotland seceding from the UK.
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