Merkel victory won’t help Brexit, claims rival
FDP candidate warns that talks will not accelerate after election – and that a special deal is ‘unrealistic’
THE British government should not expect Angela Merkel to break the deadlock in the Brexit talks if she joins forces with the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP) after this weekend’s election, a leading figure in the party has told The Daily Telegraph.
The warning came after David Davis, the Brexit Secretary, predicted that the talks would “accelerate” after the German election, with UK ministers privately hoping that a German coalition government with the FDP could lead to a more flexible approach from Berlin.
But Michael Theurer, a senior FDP candidate who has argued publicly for a more pragmatic approach to Brexit and is a strong candidate to become economy minister in such an FDP coalition government, cautioned against raised British expectations.
“It was my initiative to call for a Brexit cabinet… because Brexit was being under-estimated at the ministerial level in Berlin – but I don’t believe, actually, that the room to manoeuvre will be so big,” he said, while campaigning in Blumberg in the southern German state of Baden-württemberg.
Mr Theurer, who is set to win a seat in the Bundestag, reported that small and medium-sized German companies were expressing fears about Brexit, but warned those fears were unlikely to translate into effective political pressure on Mrs Merkel, who resisted pressure from the business sector before imposing sanctions on Russia.
“Our machinery and tool industry was badly affected by sanctions. Businesses complained, but they were told by the government that for security reasons it was necessary to accept [them],” he said. “So German companies are used to accepting political deci- sions. They will just find new markets.”
His comments will come as a blow to UK ministers who have been promising that a newly elected Mrs Merkel could break the current Brexit deadlock. “The FDP are likely to be in the coalition, and they will not allow Mrs Merkel to ignore German industry,” one senior government minister said.
Mr Theurer’s comments on the limited “room to manoeuvre” echo the German government’s private line to ministers, and the warnings of senior figures in Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrat (CDU) party.
A senior aide to Mrs Merkel said that German Brexit policy would be the “same old soup” after the election, while a senior CDU politician, who asked to remain nameless, was equally vehement.
“I am seriously worried that London is getting this wrong,” he warned. “As much as Brexit plays a role in the UK, Merkel never talks about Brexit. The future of the EU is just so much more important to her.”
Mr Theurer added that Germany felt somewhat sore about Brexit, since it left Germany “overloaded in organising everything in continental Europe” and sucked up large amounts of political energy at a time when Germany was focused on re-energising the EU.
“There is so much work to do to stabilise the euro, get back on a growth path, to integrate refugees, stabilise eastern Europe, there are so many questions – we are busy, but now instead of developing a better-functioning Europe, we are now dealing with Brexit.”
Mr Theurer said the UK government should accept the binary choice being presented by Brussels – to stay close in a Norway-style arrangement, or be treated like any other non-eu country, adding there will be no “special deal” to accommodate Britain.
“Why is it so difficult for the UK to understand that the EU has agreements with Switzerland and Norway, and they can be the blueprint. It should be clear that a deal would be on Swiss/ Norway terms,” he said. “Expecting anything else is unrealistic.”