Cut EU posturing and let negotiators work

The UK has broken three basic rules, but it is not too late for Britain’s team to learn from its mistakes

Brexit negotiations resume today, and yet more than one year on from the referendum, we are no closer to knowing what the UK’S final relationship with the European Union will look like. Partly this is because, so far, the UK has negotiated poorly. However, with a change in approach, a settlement that is to everyone’s advantage is still achievable.

One of the main problems that has led to a lack of progress is that three of the most basic rules of international negotiation have already been broken.

First, do not to make threats unless you are willing to carry them out. Public announcements of red lines rarely make sense unless there is total willingness to walk out or punish one’s counterpart. The UK’S failure to follow through on threats such as “no deal is better than a bad deal” results in loss of credibility and weakens the ability to negotiate.

Second, achieve unity among your own constituencies, before you start negotiating. Twelve months ago, with a new prime minister in place, promising strong leadership, and a new ministerial team to negotiate Brexit, it looked as if unity might be achieved. But from ministers to backbench MPS and peers, the example that Westminster has set for the country has been one of disarray. What is Brussels meant to make of a situation where even the cabinet can’t agree on the UK’S negotiating priorities?

A third rule is to create a harmonious atmosphere and build trust between both parties in advance of a negotiation. The hostile rhetoric – mainly from London but also from Brussels – over the past year has damaged this commonsense prerequisite for constructive talks.

So, after breaking the rules so far, what must UK negotiators do to obtain the best possible outcome? The challenge is simple: to make Britain better off outside the European Union than it would have been by remaining a member. To do this, the UK needs less political posturing, and must let the negotiators do the negotiating.

The British side needs to put itself in the shoes not only of its counterparts in Brussels, but also think itself into the mindsets of governments from Stockholm to Sofia, not to mention Berlin and Paris, and try to capitalise on the differences between them. The unity displayed among 27 EU member states could unravel as talks progress. The UK must be ready to empathise with or take advantage of these differences by acquiring superlative knowledge of everything that matters to all its negotiating counterparts.

They must analyse the relative value that everyone at the negotiating table attaches to each of the thousands of issues to be settled. Good results are based on recognising the different relative values each side attaches to the same issue. Concessions and gains can then be packaged for mutual benefit.

If this is to work effectively, it means taking some of the heat out of the intense media interest in the discussions. In the Brexit talks, the public’s need to know needs to be weighed against the need for negotiators to test proposals privately and make concessions without media castigation for showing weakness. Politicians on both sides of the Channel need to curb their rhetoric and leave the negotiations to the negotiators. Officials negotiating at the coalface must have the authority to exchange gains and concessions across the artificial boundaries separating single market issues and those of security, human rights, consumer protection, justice, and many more areas.

They need to keep issues in play rather than, for instance, getting all the agriculture and fisheries issues settled before moving on to migration issues. That is how package deals are brokered.

This week, if it’s not too late, the UK should be much tougher in opposing the Commission’s insistence that the divorce terms needed to be settled before negotiating the future relationship. These issues should all be in the same mix as the negotiations about the future.

Whatever the outcome, it will be full of compromises and many constituencies will be dissatisfied. That is when the expert negotiators can hand over to political leaders, whose skills will be tested in selling the deal to Britain – and to 27 other countries.

Tim Cullen is director of the Oxford programme on negotiation at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford