Trade deal is possible this week

BRITAIN and the EU could reach a trade deal this week – if Brussels can demonstrate ‘pragmatism and good faith’, Dominic Raab said yesterday.

The Foreign Secretary said the UK was in the ‘last leg of negotiations’ with the EU over a post-Brexit deal and talks now depended on resolving a ‘fairly narrow’ set of issues, such as fishing rights.

Face-to-face discussions between Britain’s chief negotiator Lord Frost and the EU’s Michel Barnier (right) resumed over the weekend. Yesterday Mr Raab told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show: ‘We’re down to really two basic issues. But I think in particular the issue around fisheries, and we need the EU to accept the point of principle that as we come through the transition period it’s a fact of leaving the EU that we take back sovereignty and control of our own waters and our own fisheries.’ He added: ‘If the EU understand that point of principle and we have some pragmatism, we can get there. The Government received a boost last night when Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said his party would probably support any trade deal. He told a conference: ‘We need a deal... I don’t think there’s a much of a case for voting against it’, as this would be effectively voting for no deal.