UK negotiator hints Brexit delay possible

LONDON : British lawmakers will face a stark choice between Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit deal or a long extension to the March 29 deadline for leaving the bloc, the UK’s chief Brexit negotiator was overheard saying in a Brussels bar.

Unless May can get a Brexit deal approved by Parliament, she will have to decide whether to delay Brexit or thrust the world’s fifth largest economy into chaos by leaving without a deal. May has repeatedly said the UK will leave on schedule, with or without a deal, as she tries to get the EU to reopen the divorce agreement she reached in November.

But her chief Brexit negotiator, Olly Robbins, was overheard by an ITV correspondent saying MPs would have to choose whether to accept a reworked Brexit deal or a potentially significant delay. “Got to make them believe that the week beginning end of March... Extension is possible but if they don’t vote for the deal then the extension is a long one,” ITV quoted Robbins as saying on Monday during a private conversation. Robbins said he felt the fear of a long extension to Article 50 - the process of leaving the EU - might focus lawmakers’ minds, ITV said. The spectacle of one of May’s most senior officials undermining her negotiating position in a hotel bar in Brussels indicates the scale of the UK’s Brexit crisis that has shocked both investors and allies.

It’s unclear why Robbins would make such comments in a hotel bar.