I see that my colleague on Federal International Relations Committee is somewhere rather warmer than I am. Unfortunately, his passionate opposition to Brexit has led him into dangerous waters.
An explanation is in order.
One of the jewels in the crown of our system of checks and balances is the concept of a neutral Civil Service. Its role is to deliver the business of government, enforcing the law of the land in as accurate a manner as is possible, drawing up plans for the introduction of Government legislation, advising ministers in terms of the potential consequences of a particular course of action. What it does not do is obstruct the Government of the day in its chosen path, unless that path is known to be illegal, or impossible due to other regulatory barriers.
So, the idea that the mandarins might cause Brexit to be halted is not only absurd but positively dangerous. Yes, it might deliver something you want, but what if the position was reversed, and the Civil Service was preventing the delivery of something you wanted to happen?
As a democrat, one should be horrified by the prospect of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats subverting our legitimately elected Government. Democracy itself relies on the people holding their tribunes to account in free and fair elections, and if bureaucrats were to believe that they were somehow above that, where would we be?
I am a civil servant, I serve the Government of the day, and thus the public. If I don’t like that idea, the door is that way. In return, politicians should not seek to interfere in individual decisions unless required to do so by legislation. They set the legal framework, we deliver upon it, the judiciary rule where the law requires interpretation or where arguments need to be determined. It’s a fairly simple division of responsibilities and one that has worked pretty well thus far.
Mess with it at your peril...
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