Leo McKinstry

almost any price. Even on Saturday your Government accepted the Spanish demand that no part of any future trading relationship can apply to Gibraltar without the agreement of Madrid.

That has been the pattern. Concession after concession has been made to Brussels, notably over the “divorce bill” of £39billion and the everextending length of the transition period when the UK will have to abide by EU rules without any say in them.

Above all, your negotiators allowed the EU to turn the minor issue of the Irish border into a colossal obstacle as a means of trapping us indefinitely in a customs union. There is a danger that far from embracing freedom next March we could be trapped in Brexit limbo for years.

So, given all the problems, what is the way forward for your deal? One step I would avoid is an overdose of scare stories. It is fine to point to the nightmare of a Corbyn Government that could result from Parliamentary chaos but be cautious about predictions of an apocalypse in the event of no deal. Wild talk can smack of panic-stricken defeatism as if we are too weak a nation to stand on our own feet.

Moreover, after the failure of the original Project Fear it lacks credibility. After all, you yourself have frequently said, “No deal is better than a bad deal.”

Nor should you cede any further ground to the EU in an attempt to buy Remainer votes. Remainers are irreconcilables who prefer the worship of Brussels power to British democracy, as shown by their clamour for a second referendum. Yesterday Tony Blair, the high priest of globalism, wrote his own open letter to the Brussels officials in which he urged them to “offer a way out” so that a decision on Brexit will “go back to the British people”.

But a second referendum would just be a recipe for more delay, division and destruction of faith in our political system. The real solution is to improve your agreement by winning more concessions from Brussels. That might seem unlikely given that EU President Jean Claude Juncker told you yesterday that “this is the only deal possible” but Brussels has always been more flexible than it likes to pretend.

AT PRESENT the EU is gripped by a crisis of legitimacy over sluggish growth, rampant populism and immigration. That gives you room for manoeuvre.

There are two measures that might win over Brexiteers. One is the insertion of a “sunset clause” into the withdrawal agreement, which would compel the EU to expedite trade talks. The other is to remove the Irish backstop, the insurance policy to prevent a hard border by maintaining EU customs rules within the UK. But as the EU admitted in the last week, a frictionless border could also be achieved by technology and trader programmes.

So an amended version of your deal might get through Parliament, especially if about 40 Labour MPs back it and pragmatism prevails on the Tory benches. And you will also have an ally in much of the public. The majority who voted for Brexit want it finally to be delivered.

‘We could be trapped in limbo for years’