BREXIT TALKS ‘AT END OF THE ROAD’
EXCLUSIVE Britain stands firm as desperate EU chief begs leaders to avoid no-deal
A NO-deal Brexit moved a step closer last night as the EU made desperate attempts to force Britain into a compromise.
Top Eurocrat Michel Barnier is begging EU leaders to help pressure Boris Johnson into a Brexit settlement.
It comes amid growing fears that trade deal talks are on the brink of collapse.
And one EU insider said of Mr Barnier, left: “He thinks we’re coming to the end of the road.” EU sources told the Daily Express
the bloc’s chief negotiator has been ringing round European figures, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron to plead for their support as the wrangle reaches the crunch point.
The Brussels diplomat wants the European premiers to persuade the Prime Minister to compromise on key sticking points in the deadlocked negotiations.
These include fishing rights and regulatory alignment.
Tory MPs claim his plea for help is a sign EU chiefs are “desperate” to avoid a no-deal Brexit and are urging Mr Johnson and his chief negotiator David Frost to stand firm.
Andrew Bridgen, a Brexitbacking Tory backbencher, said: “This is the sign that we are reaching the compression point in the negotiations. It is clear that David
Frost is standing his ground and
Boris will back him.
“Barnier and his EU negotiators look increasingly desperate. They clearly want a deal.”
Mr Barnier embarked on his round of calls to European leaders after the latest round of negotiations with Mr Frost, the head of the Prime Minister’s Task Force Europe, failed to break the deadlock in the quest for a trade deal.
EU officials are said to be “despondent” about the prospects of agreeing a deal that will come into force at the end of the year, when the UK’s Brexit transition out of the EU single market and customs union ends.
Mr Barnier told EU leaders that he has failed to convince Mr Frost to budge on the bloc’s demands for a regulatory “level playing field” and unchanged access to Britain’s fishing waters for EU vessels.
He is also understood to have told European diplomats the EU may have to reevaluate his hardline negotiating guidelines if both sides cannot overcome their differences in the coming weeks.
One EU official told the Daily Express: “Barnier is ringing capitals to update us on the lack of progress.
“When leaders will be involved depends on how things develop across the next few weeks, but it’s difficult to be optimistic at the moment.”
Mr Barnier is said to believe that only a political push from EU leaders can inject life into the stalled talks ahead of the next round of face-to-face discussions in London from September 7.
An EU source said: “He thinks we’re coming to the end of the road and have gone as far as we can without serious political decisions made at the top level.”
Another EU official added: “Pretty soon, either some political things have to happen or we are simply heading towards no deal – by accident or political will.”
EU officials admit the chances of a no-deal Brexit have dramatically increased because of the ongoing stalemate.
Leaders of the member states, led by President Macron, have previously rejected attempts by Mr Barnier to water down his demands for existing Brussels rules on fishing.
After last week’s seventh round of negotiations broke up, Mr Barnier accused British negotiators of “wasting valuable time”. He had been banking on the PM’s lead negotiator to offer a series of concessions on fishing and state subsidies to move the talks forward.
But Mr Frost blamed the deadlock on his counterpart’s refusal to begin drafting a joint legal text for the future relationship.
EU officials are bemoaning a “completely wasted summer”, claiming the Prime Minister’s attempts to outflank the bloc’s negotiators have failed.
One Brussels insider said: “We have had a whole summer completely wasted, a cabinet that doesn’t understand how
negotiations work, a Prime Minister who, I think, doesn’t understand how the negotiations work.
“He is under the wrong impression that he can pull off negotiating at the 11th hour.”
Opinion among some EU leaders against the UK is said to be hardening, with President Macron in particular unwilling to offer compromises to try to get a Brexit deal over the line.
European Council President Charles Michel has shelved plans for the bloc’s leaders to discuss the future relationship pact at a summit in Brussels next month.
And it emerged yesterday that Chancellor Merkel has scrapped plans for a discussion of the trade talks at a meeting of EU ambassadors next week.
A diplomatic source said the issue had been scrubbed from the agenda because of the lack of “tangible progress” in the trade talks.
UK officials have warned an agreement must be reached by the end of September at the latest to allow for Brussels’ complex bureaucracy to ratify the treaty. Brexit trade talks have so far proven unsuccessful, sparking more questions around whether the UK will have to extend the transition period.
This could result in outrage at Mr Johnson from Brexiteers in the Tory Party and across the country.
A UK Government spokesman said: “Although there is still a lot of work to do, it remains our goal to reach an agreement and we’ll continue to work hard to do so.
“We have tabled a consolidated text to try and inject momentum into the talks, and we want to quickly move into text-based discussions as time is short, and there remains a lot of detail to work through.”
Sandro Gozi, an Italian MEP, said: “I doubt even Merkel or Macron would be able to transform a stalemate into a positive outcome.
“I have always thought – that is my personal position – that no-deal was a real option, especially on London’s side.
“Every day that passes without concrete progress is a day closer to no-deal Brexit.”
IT’S all getting a little desperate now with Michel Barnier and the Brussels machine. The idea of the EU’s chief negotiator desperately calling his friends in Paris, Berlin and other European capitals to persuade Britain to kowtow to the bloc’s demands is nothing short of pathetic.
We are almost inclined to feel sorry for Mr Barnier and the rest of the EU had they not tried to humiliate Britain for the best part of four years, actively undermine our democracy and generally try to make us look foolish for leaving the prison bloc.
But they obviously are struggling to understand that now Britain has made the decision and actually left the EU we do not want to be run by Brussels or obey its rules and we certainly do not want foreign fleets pillaging our supplies of fish. Hint to Mr Barnier, that’s why we voted to leave so there is no point pushing these obsessions unless you want no deal.
No wonder the UK’s chief negotiator David Frost has given a 34-day deadline to get all this wrapped up. There is only so much of this nonsense to which Britain should be subjected.
In the end it is worth noting that there are other equally lucrative and much more hassle-free trade deals to do around the world not least with the US, Australia, Japan and others.
It is the EU that will lose out if it wants a tariff war with Britain. It exports seven times as much to us as we do to Europe.
And, of course, the biggest losers will be Ireland who were used by Brussels to try to make life as difficult as possible for Britain to leave.
What should be clear though is that if the EU continues to break the terms of the Withdrawal Agreement and political declaration by pursuing demands for a trade deal which do not respect Britain’s sovereignty then they should also forfeit the £39billion divorce bill we are due to pay them.