Whether or not a post-Brexit EU-UK trade deal is ratified by Dec. 31, Britain faces major changes in the new year. However, one big constant in the relationship will be the monumental time and effort that UK governments will continue to need to devote to the European bloc. This is one of the great ironies of the UK’s vote to leave the EU. Despite the 2016 referendum, which saw about 52 percent of voters opting to cut ties with Brussels, London has since had to devote huge amounts of attention to Europe, perhaps more so than almost all previous post-war administrations. While Dec. 31 is a key milestone in the process of leaving the EU, the development of a new relationship with Brussels and the 27 member states will continue well into the 2020s, and potentially even beyond. For, even if an EU-UK trade deal is ratified in the coming days, it will only be a “thin” agreement when compared to the much more comprehensive deal that many had hoped for. It is, therefore, likely that future years will see — in a similar scenario to Switzerland — a series of UK-EU bilateral deals to ladder up the institutional relationship. The Swiss example is interesting in its parallels with the UK, given that, in 1992, Switzerland voted by 50.3 percent to 49.7 percent against joining the European Economic Area. In the three decades since that referendum, Bern has negotiated a series of bilateral deals with the EU, including allowing the free movement of people, which was backed by a vote in 2000. Moreover, 2005 saw a Swiss vote to join Europe’s Schengen open borders treaty, followed by a 2014 plebiscite to allow quotas on EU workers. In the decade ahead at least, the UK may well also follow a path of incremental changes, although it will be by no means identical to that of Switzerland. Far from “Getting Brexit Done,” as Prime Minister Boris Johnson frequently asserts, this points to negotiations and internal political wrangling continuing for many years, in a manner that former UK Minister of State for Europe Denis MacShane has dubbed “Brexiternity.” It is likely that future years will see a series of UK-EU bilateral deals to ladder up the institutional relationship Andrew Hammond Part of the reason why this is likely is that, as analysis from LSE IDEAS at the London School of Economics highlights, the 2016 Brexit vote triggered not one but more than a dozen overlapping negotiations. Collectively, these comprise discussions centered on the UK itself, between the UK and the EU, within the EU, and also internationally, which are all far from resolved. This highlights that, more than four years after the Brexit referendum, the country’s future relationship with the EU is far from being decisively defined. Moreover, views on the relationship “model” the nation wishes to have with the bloc could well change significantly over time — in a more or less integrationist direction — as political and public opinion evolves. In practice, there is a wide range of different models that could be followed in the future, with one caveat: The one option that will probably not be open to the UK is returning as a full EU member with the uniquely favorable position it previously held, with all the benefits of the single market while not being part of the euro zone, and having a big budgetary rebate. Should London ever seek to return to the fold, those terms would be unlikely to ever be offered by Brussels. Beyond this, the stark reality is that the nature of existing agreements with the EU varies widely, from Norway to Switzerland and Canada to Turkey. All have a mix of advantages and disadvantages, including the fact that none of them provide full access to services, which accounts for about 80 percent of the UK economy, while those that have access to (let alone membership of) the single market without EU membership pay a significant price. Take the example of the Norwegian model, which was proposed by some as one that the UK could adopt. Oslo has considerable access to the single market, except in areas like agriculture and fisheries. In exchange, Norway is required to adhere to EU rules without having a vote on them; accept the free movement of people; make contributions to EU programs and budgets; and carry out customs checks on goods crossing into the bloc. While there is significant uncertainty regarding how the UK’s relationship with the EU will evolve going forward, one possibility is that the British government will need to continue to devote more of its attention to the bloc in the coming years than it did pre-2016. This irony is compounded by the fact that, despite years of talks, the relationship the UK ultimately lands on may not be better for the British national interest than the one offered in 2016 — continued membership of a potentially reformed EU. *Andrew Hammond is an Associate at LSE IDEAS at the London School of Economics. Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News" point-of-view