I will not break ranks with Barnier, Macron tells May
EMMANUEL Macron last night warned Theresa May that he stood firmly with EU negotiators as he refused to break ranks over Brexit.
The British prime minister cut short her holiday to set out her Chequers plan to the French president at his Riviera retreat yesterday. She warned him that Brussels faces a choice of a ‘Chequers deal or no deal’ as they held talks at Fort Brégançon.
But the Elysée Palace refused to give a public account of the meeting as they sought to demonstrate that negotiations can only take place in Brussels.
A source signalled the French president was closely aligned with the European Commission’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier, adding: ‘There is absolutely no intention to speak in place of Monsieur Barnier.’
Mrs May visited Mr Macron at Fort Brégançon, the Mediterranean island fortress that serves as the French president’s summer retreat. She was accompanied by officials including her Europe adviser Olly Robbins.
A source in Mr Macron’s office yesterday said Mr Barnier has maintained that any Brexit deal ‘must conform with the economic interests of the 27 remaining EU members, and the president has always supported this as well.’
Meanwhile, Bank of England governor Mark Carney sent sterling plunging yesterday with a grim warning about a no-deal Brexit.
Sterling fell to an almost 11month low as he said the ‘highly undesirable’ scenario was now an ‘uncomfortably high’ possibility.
He said UK banks had been ‘put through the wringer’ to ensure they could cope with a worst case scenario where house prices plunge, interest rates soar, unemployment doubles and the UK goes into recession.
Mr Carney told the BBC: ‘The possibility of a no-deal is uncomfortably high at this point. It is highly undesirable.
‘Parties should do all things to avoid it.’
Asked what no deal would mean, he replied: ‘Disruption to trade… a disruption to the level of economic activity, higher prices.’
He said the worst-case scenario, which included the UK economy shrinking by 4%, was not a prediction but an exercise to assess what the UK system could cope with.
‘We have been planning for very difficult circumstances and the banks are ready,’ he said.
Mr Carney said the Bank of England’s job was to make sure the financial system kept working, adding that no deal was ‘a relatively unlikely possibility but it is a possibility’.
He said: ‘What we don’t want to have is people worrying about their money in the bank.’