A Bleak Week ahead

It is looking increasingly likely that this week could be the week in which the Government triggers article 50. We all knew it would happen at some point and indeed some will be overjoyed, but for how long?


The fact that it was increasingly inevitable shouldn't let you give up though, it isn't that we are leaving the EU that is the main fighting point here, I am far from happy that we are leaving, but we need to now concentrate on how we leave and how as a country we treat people.


It is fairly obvious that we are going to be poorer as a result and anyone who doesn't think so is clearly very blinkered indeed, how much poorer is to be seen.


So we have started the week with Nicola Sturgeon announcing a likely date for a second Scottish independence referendum and although I was opposed strongly to the first one, I really don't blame her for announcing it this time as there is a very strong mandate for one, and I suspect that they will vote to leave the UK and stay in Europe, that puts us in a very bad place and Scotland in quite a strong one.


Also this week sees the debate on the changes to the Brexit bill and its not looking good. Both the House of Commons and House of Lords will debate and vote on the bill starting today. MPs will go first, and if they reverse the Lords changes it will be passed back to peers to decide whether they want to go against the government's plans again.

The bill travels back and forth between the two chambers until both sides agree - Parliament could sit through the night to try to reach an agreement, and time has also been set aside on Tuesday and Wednesday. Once it is agreed, the bill will go for Royal Assent, after which Mrs May can formally tell the rest of the EU that she is ready to start negotiating.


It is likely that MPs would overturn the Lords' amendments to the bill, and it is not looking likely that peers will try to block the bill any further. This could mean it was all done and dusted by midnight on Monday.. Labour has urged the prime minister to consider keeping the "really important" Lords amendments, saying that EU citizens in the UK had been "left in limbo", waiting to hear if they would have the right to stay.


Its a sorry state of affairs and if you want to get foreign currency, I would buy it now before article 50 is triggered.


Jon Davis