May gets little help from EU leaders
British Prime Minister Theresa May (center) talks with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte (left) and Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel in Brussels on Thursday at a summit of European Union leaders. The EU largely rebuffed May’s pleas to help her sell her Brexit deal to the UK Parliament.
BRUSSELS — European Union leaders have rebuffed a plea by British Prime Minister Theresa May to help her sell her Brexit deal to the UK parliament, warning that she must set out exactly what she wants — and announcing they would step up contingency plans in case the deal collapses.
The United Kingdom’s leader came to a Brussels summit on Thursday, a day after seeing off a challenge to her leadership by her own Conservative MPs, but still facing huge opposition to the departure deal with the EU.
She told the other 27 leaders that the agreement could still pass the House of Commons next month if they helped her reassure lawmakers over a controversial “backstop” clause on Ireland, a British official said.
But European sources said the atmosphere in the room was tense, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders repeatedly interrupting May to ask exactly what she wanted.
May floated the idea of setting a target date to agree a free trade deal with the EU if one had not been agreed by the end of a post-Brexit transition period, to avoid London falling into the backstop.
Many of her MPs fear the arrangement for Britain to enter a temporary customs union with the EU to avoid border checks with Ireland could become permanent.
But European leaders have said they will not accept a time limit, and after May left agreed a statement that the Brexit deal “is not open for renegotiation”.
With May having promised to have something to offer MPs before they finally vote on the Brexit deal by Jan 21, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said she would have to come up with proposals in the next few weeks if she wanted Europe’s support.
However, he said he would publish further plans on Wednesday to protect European businesses and citizens in case the deal fails, and the UK exits on March 29 with no new arrangements in place.
Deal ‘a trap’
May told EU leaders they must help her “change the perception that the backstop could be a trap from which the UK cannot escape”, adding: “Until we do, the deal — our deal — is at risk.
But while an early draft of the summit conclusions had said the EU “stands ready to examine whether any further assurances can be provided” on the backstop, this was removed from the final published version.
Juncker did offer one concession, promising that talks on the future trading relationship — a deal on which would undermine the need for the backstop — would start as soon as MPs and the European Parliament approved the Brexit deal.
The summit statement also confirmed the backstop would only “apply temporarily” and that EU members would work to “conclude expeditiously” the new trade deal.
But this is not the legally binding promise sought by Brexiteers and the Northern Irish party that props up May’s government — without which they have warned they will not support the deal.