Merkel: Getting Brexit deal isn’t a priority for me

ANGELA Merkel has warned that Britain will have to ‘live with the consequences’ of Boris Johnson’s plan to ditch close economic ties with the EU.

The German Chancellor said Brexit was not a priority for her – suggesting she is hardening against the idea of any compromise on the European side to help reach a trade deal with the UK.

Mrs Merkel has previously suggested she was open to a deal that would maintain the UK’s current flows of trade with the bloc.

‘We need to let go of the idea that it is for us to define what Britain should want,’ Mrs Merkel told a group of European newspapers, including the Guardian. ‘That is for Britain to define – and we, the EU27, will respond appropriately.’

The comments could dash hopes in London that Mrs Merkel could be influential in persuading the EU to ditch its rigid negotiating position in pursuance of a trade deal.

The Chancellor made clear that her priority was instead to push through a coronavirus rescue plan to stop Europe’s economy sliding into the worst slump it has experienced since the 1930s.

She said: ‘With Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the British government wants to define for itself what relationship it will have with us after the country leaves.

‘it will then have to live with the consequences, of course, that is to say with a less closely interconnected economy.

‘if Britain does not want to have rules on the environment and the labour market or social standards that compare with those of the EU, our relations will be less close. That will mean it does not want standards to go on developing along parallel lines.’

Negotiations between the UK and EU are in deadlock over whether Britain needs to tie itself to the bloc’s state aid rules and common environmental, social and labour standards in return for a zero-tariff trade deal.