Nobody knows what will happen if the UK leaves the EU, with or without an agreement. Rather than add to the speculation it seems more useful for us to review the main issues and conclusions covered by this blog since the Referendum was announced three and a half years ago.
This post summarises most of our reservations about the Union, with links to further detail.
Background The “Monnet Plan”, outlined after the Versailles Treaty following the first World War, was to create, quietly and without triggering disturbing opposition, a ‘United States of Europe’. Jean Monnet believed that the nations of Europe had to be persuaded to give up their national sovereignty to a federal power that could maintain peace and bring prosperity.
History shows that a strategy based on such foundations won’t work for long without the clear consent of the people. Forced or artificial unions generally fail, so can a strategy like this work for long without the clear consent of the people?
Unity and Unification The declared purpose of the European Union is to unify the continent economically, socially and politically. There is a presumption that if everyone behaves in the same way under the same rules there can be no basis for disputes and therefore conflict will be avoided by unification. 
If ‘unity’ is good, ‘uniformity’ is not, the latter does not serve the former and is likely to inspire rebellion in hard times. Hard times are here now in some EU countries. If EU laws and regulations had any purpose beyond promoting central governance then it would surely be to support economic growth and social development. There is no evidence that this has happened and it is obvious that the opposite has been true for several members at least since the start of the millennium: some EU countries are suffering more than America did in the 1930s.
‘Europeans’, as the EU perversely calls its citizens, are not consulted on further unification; they are not invited to express their desires, because few want more union—it’s safer not to ask their opinion. The core ideology of ever closer union at any price is simply not achievable because national priorities must take precedence if democratic governments are to get re-elected.
Risks & Crises The founders thought that resolving crises would advance the Project, despite any public reluctance. However, ambition has often outrun achievement, the clearest example being monetary union.
Only an ideology needs to make its progress irreversible: expanding EU powers may not be reversed, by treaty. The EU’s response to populism and separatism is to call for unity (by which they mean uniformity). They talk over the heads of objectors because wise rulers don’t need to listen to common folk, although their failure to listen is at the heart of the risks they are taking, politically and economically. 
Economics & EMU-Euro Economics is a bit like driving a car at night without lights, peering at the road ahead, hoping that nothing unexpected emerges from a side road, all the time checking the mirrors to see whether anything behind looks familiar. There’s plenty of room too for back-seat drivers asking if we’re nearly there yet.
The five EU presidents, in their 2015 report, proposed four strands to completing economic and monetary union (EMU): they declared that the EU must have economic, financial, fiscal and political union. These four unions remain key objectives for the EU (it’s worth reading the original report to find out what they mean). 
A single currency was seen from the very beginning as a key signifier of a single nation—it would help mould us into a common mindset, to identify as ‘Europeans’; it would promote convergence towards a single economy, bringing equality and prosperity to all its constituent communities. None of this has happened in practice.
The EU faces economic risks that threaten its future. The eurozone isn’t ready to handle the crises it faces; only by deploying Germany’s surpluses could it be rescued but no German government would survive that.
The practicality of EMU and the economic security of citi