Matters looking rather ropey in the Brexit negotiations. There’s apparently now nothing substantive planned until Biarritz G7 meeting at end of month. You’d expect the sort of briefings emerging from Brussels tonight, and a pinch of salt required etc BUT...
... sending the message that they have interpreted the new negotiator Frost’s meetings as consistent only with leaving with No Deal and calling a GE.. “they can’t climb down from this”...
They recognise that the UK Government is now trying to isolate and put personal pressure on Irish leader Leo Varadkar. So they purposely sent a message of full support for the Irish at the EU Council debrief... and for the backstop etc.
Understand some key officials rearranged their holidays in anticipation of some sort of proper talks in August - but nothing substantive happening till G7 at least. That’s pretty much 5/14 weeks before Brexit deadline under Johnson administration gone.
No 10 say: “PM wants to meet EU leaders & negotiate a new deal – one that abolishes the anti-democratic backstop. We will throw ourselves into negotiations with the greatest energy & spirit of friendship and we hope EU will rethink its current refusal to make any changes to WA”..
No 10 continued... “The fact is the Withdrawal Agreement has rejected by Parliament three times and will not pass in its current form so – if the EU wants a deal – it needs to change its stance. Until then, we will continue to prepare to leave the EU on 31 October”...
There’s more to say here - but it’s late and I’ll blog about it for tomorrow on the website - so watch this space.
Here is the blog reflecting what I’ve heard on Brexit stand-off...
more than the backstop - diminishing chance of UK level playing field guarantees - social, regulatory, environmental, also undercutting path to a tariff free UK-EU trade deal, they say.
bbc.co.uk/news/business-…
EU side saying that the much-cherished offer of a tariff free, quota free UK-EU trade deal in March 2018 was always conditional on “sufficient guarantees for a level playing field”. That is now in real doubt, after initial conversations with new administration here
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