UKIP Scotland Leader Donald MacKay gave his views on whether the powers that are in Brussels will be able to find a workable solution and plug the financial gaps left by the departing Brits.
Sputnik: How will the EU plug the gaps in its budget after Brexit?
Donald MacKay: I think the chickens are coming home to roost. The reason why the EU don’t want Britain to leave, or don’t want Britain to leave, and are going to make it as difficult as possible, is because there is a financial deficit which they are going to have to try and make up.
If they don’t; and I suspect they won’t, then actually you have the danger of other countries wanting to leave the EU, so this is a kind of crisis situation, so how will they make it up? The usual suspects France and Germany will have to put their hands in their pockets, and that will cause a degree of tensions between them.
All of that was really predictable, because the EU has become a monster of a political institution, instead of it just being a free trading arrangement; it’s now a political unit in itself and I think the British exit is very bad news from the EU’s point of view.
Sputnik: Could the EU reform itself in order to deter other member states from wanting to leave?
Donald MacKay: It could reform itself, but it’s had many opportunities to do so. The problem is that when you give people power, salaries and perks; they do not wish to give up that power, so the reality is that to reform themselves, they would have to throw themselves on their sword, and they are not going to do that.
What you really want is a trading arrangement, a common market, whereby countries trade with one another freely, with minimal restrictions, but there’s no political background, so you remain an independent sovereign state.
The EU are not interested in that, and never have been, even going back to its very origins in the 1950s they were never interested in that, they want to create as they have done, a separate political unit which thankfully the UK is now free from.
Sputnik: Is a no-deal Brexit now inevitable?
Donald MacKay: I still think the UK will end up leaving the EU under WTO rules. I know there are various options, at least in theory, but the idea that the EU will give Britain a favourable trade deal, to basically trade with other economic blocs in the world, and also the EU on favourable terms, is a fantasy.
If they were to do that; then surely France, Germany, Spain, Italy and other countries would want to do the same thing, so they have to make it difficult, and therefore I think the end result will be WTO rules, and I look forward to it.
