The document discusses the history of Brexit, beginning with the etymology of the term and the UK's initial attempts to join the European Union in the 1960s. It then covers important political events between the 1970-1990 period, including UK uncertainty over EU membership and Margaret Thatcher's resignation. Referendums in 1974 and 2016 are discussed, with the latter resulting in a vote to withdraw the UK from the EU. The negotiations and withdrawal process as governed by Article 50 are outlined.

3. Brexit
 The word Brexit is a portmanteau of the exit of Great
Britain from European Union. The first two letter ‘Br’
are short abbreviate for British and the last four letters
‘exit’ mean the withdrawal.
 British became the first country to leave the EU after
being a part of it for almost 47 years.

4. Etymology
Six European countries signed treaty of Paris and formed an
organization known as European Coal and Steel Organization.
It became successful and later peace treaty of Rome was signed in
1957 and other organization were established EEC and Euroatom.
 Later EEC was renamed as European Union(EU).
UK first attempt to join EU came in 1963 and 1967 both of which were
vetoed by the then French President Charles de Gaulle.
 Later Gaulle resigned in 1969. UK successfully became a member of
EU alongside Denmark and Ireland on 1 January 1973.

5. Important Political Event between years of 1970 and 1990
During the years of 1970 and 1980, UK remained in constant confusion
whether to remain in EU or not.
The two leading political parties were the Conservative and Labour party.
The former was Eurosceptic and the latter was more Europhile. The
manifesto of Labour party even included withdrawal of UK.
Labour won the 1974 general election without majority and again
contested the 1974 general election. They committed to renegotiate the
UK’s term. The labour party being Euroseptic didn’t wanted to give power
in favour of EU. They thought that UK’s term in EU were unfavourable.

6. Cont’d
 First ever UK referendum was held in 1974. The results
of referendum came on June, 5 1975 in which 67.2 %
population supported to leave EU.
 In elections of 1983, Labour party suffered a heavy
defeat and Margaret Thatcher became the PM and
again in 1985 and the Treaty of Rome was signed.
 In 1990, UK joined a EU organization named as ERM.
The PM Thatcher was more of Eurosceptic views,
therefore she resigned.

7. Opinion Polls
.
Two thirds of British Politics were against the rule to vest power in the
hands of EU.
Professor John Curtice of Strathclyde University performed a statistical
analysis and reported that Eurosceptic views grew in British people after
resignation of Margaret Thatcher.
According to Stats, 38% people were of Eurosceptic and it increased to
65 % in 2015.
 Finally, UK decided to take a big final step and the famous referendum
of 2016 was held to finally decide whether UK will remain in EU or not.

8. Referendum of 2016
In 2012, David Cameron acknowledged the need of a referendum but
advised people to be patient.
Cameron said in his famous Bloomberg speech that referendum will be
held before 2017 if his party was able to win the general election of 2015.
The conservative won the election with a heavy majority. Thus soon after
the victory of the conservative party.
The European Union Referendum Act 2015 was introduced in Parliament.
PM David Cameron addressed the parliament and announced 23 June
2016 as the date of referendum.

9. Results of Referendum
People of UK had become fed up of the banter being played between EU
and UK’s politicians. So they voted in favour of withdrawal of UK from EU.
The result of referendum showed that more than 17 million people
supported in withdrawal and more than 16 million wanted UK to stay in
EU. The then PM David Cameron resigned on 13 July 2016. Theresa May
became the new PM of UK.

12. Withdrawal Process Rules of European Union
Withdrawal from the European Union is governed by Article 50 of
the Treaty on European Union.
It was originally drafted by Lord Kerr of Kinlochard and introduced by
the Treaty of Lisbon at the insistence of the United Kingdom.
On the EU side, the agreement needs to be ratified by qualified majority
in European council , and by the European Parliament

13. Article 50
 The article states that any member state can withdraw
"in accordance with its own constitutional requirements"
by notifying the European council of its intention to do
so.
 The notification triggers a two-year negotiation period,
in which the EU must "negotiate and conclude an
agreement with the leaving State, setting out the
arrangements for its withdrawal, taking account of the
framework for its future relationship with the European
Union".
 If no agreement is reached within the two years, the
membership ends without an agreement, unless an
extension is unanimously agreed among all EU states,
including the withdrawing state.

14. UK-EU negotiations in 2017-2018
UK govt. had the stance that the jurisdiction of ECJ and free movement
people of Irish should be stopped.
The EU appointed Michael Barnier as the chief negotiator and Theresa
May was to lead the UK govt. The negotiations were to be completed in
two phases and EU said that the negotiations must be completed before
October 2018.
The negotiations commenced on 19 June 2017. The topics for the
negotiations included the rights of EU citizens living in UK, on the issue
of border between UK and Ireland and UK will have to do a financial
settlement by paying 35-39 billion Euro.

15. Cont’d
 The first phase was completed in December 2017. The second phase
started in March 2018 and lasted for over 21 months.
During the second phase, certain economic policies didn’t went well with
the cabinet of PM Theresa May which led to resignations of many cabinet
members
The most famous resignation was of Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson who
succeeded Theresa May as PM of UK
Theresa May also tried to pass the agreement through the UK parliament
in which she failed. Thus she resigned and Boris Johnson became the PM of
UK on 24 July 2019.

16. Snap Election of UK in December 2019
By the end of October 2019, he tried to pass the revised version of
withdrawal agreement from the Parliament and he failed.
He constantly called a snap election which was held on 12 December 2019.
The snap election proved to be a nightmare for the labour party as they
suffered their worst defeat since 1935.

17. This election won Boris Johnson’s party 365 seats in the kingdom and
they gain a clear majority in Parliament with 80 seats.
The Labour party lost 60 seats in the parliament and could manage to
win only 203 seats. The most humiliating fact for Labour party was that
they could only secure a single seat in Scotland.
Jo Swinson lost her own seat.
Boris Johnson became the PM of UK for second time and this time
with clear majority.
Johnson’s govt. introduced the withdrawal agreement in the
parliament which was passed with margins of 258-234.
Thus it became a law on 23 January 2020 and finally on 31 January
2020, the long 47 year run of UK as member of EU and agony of British
people came to an end.