Another Boris U-turn – running roughshod across trust ++ legal fracas

Breaking a promise made less than a year ago, Boris has chucked a hand grenade into the Brexit impasse saying he will tear up the Northern Ireland section of the Withdrawal Agreement to avoid returning to a hard border. Commentators say that cases of democratic governments seeking to unilaterally overwrite ratified international agreements are rare; and such action will undermine any future moral authority for the UK to criticise, for example, China via vis its actions in Hong Kong – or indeed to be believed about anything in future agreements. Boris further says the talks will finish one way or another by mid-October. By breaking the Withdrawal Agreement he may find the EU – bored, irritated and overloaded with Covid and economic matters – brings the guillotine down sooner.  

  Whether he’s playing a reckless game of hardball or chicken, reckoning the EU will cave in, it’s very high stakes. Where things go badly south for the Boris Government is when Neptune moves to 18 degrees on October 2^nd staying there till late January 2021. See previous posts below.

  There was a suggestion that the Barnier/Frost negotiating team would be sidelined allowing the political leaders to step in to negotiate directly though whether that will happen is still in doubt.  Boris’s relationship with Ursula van der Leyen is hostile at the best of times with a composite Mars square Pluto. Their connection is nerve-stretched and high-tension late this month and through October and seriously jolted mid November to mid December.

  Boris’s relationship with the EU is similarly toxic with a power-struggling, implacable-dislike composite Mars opposition Pluto; and a chilly Venus square Saturn. Tr Pluto is in an intensely emotional square to the composite Venus now till late November; paralysed and riddled with confusion in late September and October; and knocked sideways late December to early February 2021 as tr Uranus is trine the composite Pluto – though that could indicate a release from bondage – on both sides.

  The new addition to the UK team and Dominic Cummings’ centralised ‘mission control centre’ is Simon Case, Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service, 27 December 1978. He is a Sun Mars in Capricorn trine Saturn in Virgo with his Mars square Pluto and his Saturn square Mercury Neptune – still Mutable but more practical than most of the Boris acolytes. Although he starts this week with Neptune opposing the Virgo Sun which isn’t too hopeful a sign for what lies ahead.  His relationship with Cummings is jangled and bad-tempered through this month and on a disappointed and confused slide from early October into 2021; with a discouraging few weeks late November to late December.  His relationship with Boris is faring no better with loss-making transits October through January and worse from March 2021 on till late 2022 – if either of them survive politically speaking.

  Case himself has one gung-ho upbeat moment late December to late January but is otherwise unnerved moving ahead with a minefield to cross in 2021.

  It is truly difficult,, even from the most detached viewpoint to see good coming out of this, since most of the true-believer Brexiteer proponents appear to be in a state of nervous collapse and certainly not jubilant.  

Excerpt from previous August 3 post: Brexit – grinding towards a deadlock.

The Boris government chart, 13 December 2019 11 am London, looks devastated, turned into an emotional blancmange by several rolling crises from early this October to late January 2021 – which is the crucial period for pushing the EU up against the deadline in the hope they’ll bend.  This September on the run-up is agitated and coming down to earth with a bump. There’s muddle, lies and scandal from late January 2021 for a few weeks with the real downward slide picking up from late March 2021 running on and off till early 2022 with tr Neptune square the Government Sagittarius Sun – and indeed at the same time is square the catastrophe-attracting Mars/Pluto midpoint on Cummings’ chart. He’s also having an exceptionally stressed September (next month).

   Boris’s personal chart is being rattled by an emotionally upsetting Solar Arc Uranus conjunct his Moon, exact in six months’ time which will be activated over the New Year. Plus the December Solar Eclipse opposing his Mercury, Sun, Venus which usually indicates a crisis or several in the months following. Plus Solar Arc Midheaven conjunct his Uranus, exact now if his birth time of 2pm is exact to the minute, indicating a sharp change of career and life’s direction.  His Solar Return relocated to London also has Uranus in the 10^th for a career twist, either voluntary or forced.

His relationship chart with the UK is sagging further from late August till March 2021; and more dips to follow after that.

Excerpt from August 23 2020 post: Brexit – how much fudge is coming?

Uk negotiator David Frost’s relationship with Gove is extremely fraught as well with a frustrated, trapped, impatient tr Pluto square the composite Mars from now till late November; and downbeat across the New Year. None of which sounds like a resounding joint success whichever they were aiming.

Gove’s personal chart is similarly afflicted with tr Pluto square his Mars/Uranus and Uranus/Neptune midpoints now to late November this year, suggesting acute stress, losses and catastrophes; and his troubles won’t lift in 2021 with a nasty sinking feeling from tr Neptune square his Sun/Saturn and Mercury/Saturn midpoints picking up in April and running on and off till late 2022. As he no doubt surveys the proof of the pudding with the Brexit consequences becoming clear.

ADD ON: The SNP has made it clear that reneging on obligations under the Brexit withdrawal agreement and leaving without a deal, causing “lasting damage to Scottish jobs and the economy in the middle of a pandemic” would make the case for breaking up the UK stronger.

 Boris’s relationship with Nicola Sturgeon, never warm at the best of times, is on a discouraging slide from now right through till next spring with tr Neptune opposition Pluto and square Moon and then opposition Uranus. There’ll be major outbursts between them late this month and through October and maximum pressure being exerted into late January next year. No rapprochement there either. The scorched earth policy rolls on.

ADD ON: 8 September 2020: Jonathan Jones, head of the UK government’s legal department, described as “a man of enormous integrity”, has quit over the proposal to renege on parts of the Brexit deal relating to Northern Ireland. He is the sixth senior Whitehall official to resign this year and it evidently followed months of tension over the Brexit negotiations and legal disagreements with Suella Braverman, the attorney-general. She was appointed last February after the previous attorney-general, Geoffrey Cox, was sacked by Boris Johnson for making what one insider described as “uncomfortable noises” about the importance of abiding by international law. 

 So bad faith has been implicit from the get go. What a way to run a country.

 Suella Braverman, 3 April 1980, is a controlling and controlled Aries Sun opposition Pluto with a stubborn and flashy Mars in Leo square Uranus opposition Venus in Taurus. She’s looking no happier than any of Boris’s other cronies in the months up to the New Year and apart from one upbeat few weeks is generally standing on a very long banana skin of hopes dashed through 2021.