Brussels aims for more concessions over fishing

EU-27 adds environment, social standards, security, tax and foreign policy to its customs union wish list

Brussels Correspondent

THE European Union will try to railroad the UK into a permanent customs union and extract more concessions in fishing, heaping yet more pressure on an embattled Theresa May.

The EU-27 is looking to hardwire British commitments on fishing, tax, the environment, social standards, security, transport and foreign policy into the negotiating boundaries of a future UK-EU trade agreement, keeping the UK shackled to its red tape, preventing it from becoming more competitive than the bloc.

“Now the UK has got its hands on the lid of the cherry jar, who else do we make sure we don’t wake up one day and realise the jar is half empty?,” asked one diplomat after a meeting at which Michel Barnier, the EU’S chief negotiator, had addressed ambassadors.

Britain made promises to secure the Irish backstop agreement, a bare bones customs union that will be triggered to prevent a hard Irish border if trade talks fail but the EU-27 wants to extend that to all “level playing field provisions”.

Both UK and EU sides have accepted that the withdrawal agreement, the 585-page divorce treaty published on Wednesday after months of deadlocked talks, will not be renegotiated.

That has cost the EU-27 governments significant leverage over Britain. Now they are focusing on strengthening the terms of the draft political declaration, a slim seven-page document setting out

‘We will want EU guidelines on fish in the political declaration. We will want to fish as we did before’

the parameters of a future UK-EU trade relationship.

EU-27 ambassadors meet again tomorrow and Europe ministers on Monday before the finalised declaration, which must be agreed by Britain, is published on Tuesday. On Thursday, leaders’ top officials meet before an emergency Brexit summit is held the following Sunday to sign off the deal. Mrs May is expected to attend, regardless of developments in Britain.

Both the Withdrawal Agreement and the political declaration were negotiated by Britain and the European Commission, the EU’S civil service, which acted on behalf of the EU-27. Countries such as France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and Denmark wanted stronger, more explicit guarantees that the trade deal was conditional on their continued access to British waters. The current draft is not detailed enough to satisfy them. One European diplomat said: “The EU-27 will want to ensure reflection of EU guidelines on fish in the political declaration. We will want to fish as we did before Brexit.”

Another senior EU official added: “We will need a future fisheries agreement to deal with access to waters and quota shares. This is one of the very contested areas of the future relationship.”

The official said that there was a July 2020 deadline to complete the final fisheries agreement with Britain.

After the ambassadors’ meeting, EU diplomats said there was an agreement not to “rock the boat” and jeopardise the whole Brexit deal, given the delicate political situation in London. “The deal will not be brought down by fish. I am convinced that reason will prevail,” one diplomat said.

“The feeling in the room was ‘let’s be cautious’ – but we want to get this ball over the line,” a third diplomat added.

Mr Barnier is understood to have told the ambassadors that Britain still did not fully understand the consequences of Brexit, in particular when it came to being denied full access to the Galileo satellite after leaving the EU.