Barnier says UK future at stake in Brexit vote

BRUSSELS: The British parliament’s vote on Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit deal will determine the future of the country, the chief EU Brexit negotiator said on Thursday, insisting that the deal was the only route to secure an orderly withdrawal from the EU.

“If there is no withdrawal treaty, there is no transition, no basis of confidence that we need with the British regarding the future relationship,” Michel Barnier told representatives from cities and regions in the European leave Britain forced to accept EU regulations indefinitely, or Northern Ireland treated differently from the rest of Britain.

In legal advice the government was forced to publish on Wednesday, the government’s top lawyer warned there was a risk Britain could get stuck in “protracted and repeating rounds of negotiations” to reach a deal to supersede the backstop.

May’s critics, including both supporters and opponents of Brexit, say that means Britain could be subject Union.

Barnier told the gathering of the European Committee of the Regions that it was key now that the withdrawal treaty agreed between Brussels and London be ratified.

“Now is the moment for everyone to bear their responsibilities. You know the British parliament will give its verdict on this text and on the future relationship in the coming days. It is a vote in which the future of their country is at stake.”

— Reuters to EU laws long after it has given up any influence over determining them.

May hinted she might give parliament a greater role in deciding whether to start the backstop or extend a transition period under which more EU membership terms would apply.

“There are questions about how decisions are taken as to whether we go into the backstop, because that isn’t an automatic,” May said. “The question is: do we go into the backstop? Do we extend... the implementation period?”