Brexit talks can’t be treated as a game

ANYONE interested in the future prosperity of Wales cannot fail to be concerned by the continuing impasse affecting negotiations between the UK Government and the EU over the terms of Brexit.

There is a gulf between the two sides that will remain unbridgeable if one or the other does not give way.

There is no reason at all to suppose that the EU will blink first. Why should it?

The other 27 member states are united in their commitment to the core principles of the Single Market, membership of which has served the UK well for many years and exclusion from which would be likely to prove economically disastrous.

Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator, says he is not angry, but he is clearly frustrated by the UK delegation’s failure to take seriously the need to reach agreement on the so-called divorce bill, the status of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens in the EU, and the future of the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic.

Until significant progress has been made in these areas, there will be no discussion about the UK’s future trading relationship. Although Mr Barnier has made this clear from the outset, the UK Government has continued to pander to the hard Brexiteers in the Conservative Party for whom the future prosperity of their country is an irrelevancy at worst, and of secondary importance at best.

Two contrasting statements made by Michel Barnier and David Davis yesterday encapsulate the extent of the problem.

Mr Barnier said the UK “wants to take back control, it wants to adopt its own standards and regulations, but it also wants to have these standards recognised automatically in the EU – that is what UK papers ask for. This is simply impossible. You cannot be outside the Single Market and shape its legal order ... The Single Market, the EU capacity to regulate, to supervise, to enforce our laws, must not and will not be undermined by Brexit.”

Mr Davis, however, said: “I think we have succeeded in building mutual understanding, but it is also clear that there are still significant differences to be bridged.”

The Tory Cabinet Minister continues to give the impression that a bit more negotiating could lead to an agreement, while Mr Barnier is emphatic that the UK Government is barking entirely up the wrong tree.

If the UK fails to budge, there is no doubt that we shall face a cliffedge hard Brexit with no transitional deal to soften the blow. This is an appalling prospect which all sensible politicians must oppose.

After protecting the state’s physical security, the most important duty of any government is to safeguard economic security.

The Brexit negotiations are not a game or an intellectual jousting match. Their outcome will determine the future prosperity of the UK and, from our point of view, of Wales.

As Mr Barnier has said on a number of occasions, and repeated yesterday, the clock is ticking.