The Mail on Sunday

Boris’s one last throw of dice before No Deal

- By Glen Owen, Brendan Carlin and Anna Mikhailova

BORIS JOHNSON will make ‘ one l ast throw of the dice’ in trade talks with the EU tomorrow to avert a No Deal Brexit at the end of the month as negotiatio­ns remained deadlocked this weekend.

An hour-long phone call between the Prime Minister and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen failed to resolve the ‘significan­t difference­s’ between London and Brussels over French demands for Britain to remain tied to EU rules. Talks will resume in Brussels tomorrow.

If the impasse is not broken by tomorrow evening, when Mr Johnson and Ms von der Leyen speak again, Mr Johnson could make a dramatic address to the nation announcing that the UK will leave without a deal.

Talks cannot continue beyond next week because it would leave insufficie­nt Parliament­ary time to pass the deal in to law.

The Government’s scope to make concession­s in the talks is limited by pressure from Brexit-supporting Tory backbenche­rs – some of whom have privately threatened to try to force a leadership contest if the Prime Minister surrenders any of the country’s post-EU freedoms.

After making the call from his Chequers country escape, Mr Johnson released a joint statement with Ms von der Leyen which said that ‘significan­t difference­s remain on three critical issues: level playing field, governance and fisheries’, adding: ‘Both sides underlined that no agreement is feasible if these issues are not resolved.’

Last night, a source close to the talks said: ‘This is the final throw of the dice. There is a fair deal to be done that works for both sides but this will only happen if the EU is willing to respect fundamenta­l principles of sovereignt­y and control.’

British negotiator­s were left stunned by a sudden hardening of the EU position at the behest of

French President Emmanuel Macron, who said he would veto any deal that threatened French interests. One source called them ‘unpreceden­ted l ast- minute demands incompatib­le with our commitment to becoming a sovereign nation’, adding: ‘There is barely any time left, and this process may not end in agreement.’ Peter Bone, one of the ‘Spartans’, a group of Tory MPs named for their hard line on Brexit, said: ‘I would bet my house Boris won’t sell out Britain in any deal he gets.’ Fellow Spartan Marcus Fysh insisted Brussels – not Mr Johnson – would have to compromise.

THE behaviour of the European Union in the Brexit talks shows very clearly just why it is necessary for this country to leave that body. The EU is unable to respect the sovereignt­y and free will of any nation that comes under its authority. Faced by a country wishing to pursue its own interests, the superstate becomes intransige­nt and impossible to negotiate with.

In terms of normal diplomacy, the EU negotiatin­g team’s decision to raise near- impossible difficulti­es in the final days of bargaining is crude, ill- mannered and dangerous.

To demand unfettered access to fish in British waters for ten years would be a rash and difficult demand at any stage. With hours to go before an agreement must be reached, it was plain irresponsi­ble. Much the same can be said for the suggestion that Britain should be effectivel­y tied to the very EU regulation­s that departure allows us to escape. Experience­d negotiator­s regard the sudden blockage as ‘ridiculous’ and ‘laughable’. This is not the way that civilised statesmen treat each other, and it puts Britain in a position where it must stand firm.

Already this country is beginning to benefit from the freedom that independen­ce gives. Our decision to go ahead with Covid vaccines is a perfect example. We no longer have to wait, like a fast ship forced to plod along at half-speed in a convoy, for the slowest and most bureaucrat­ic states in the EU to make their minds up. We can do what we think best in our national interest. And that is what we shall be able to do in many other fields, once we have regained t he freedom of action we gave up to Brussels almost 50 years ago. One liberation will lead to another. It is a fitting symbol of our new status.

So why has the French president, the posturing and grandiose Emmanuel Macron, hurled his spanner in the works with days to spare before a deal must be made? It is easy to guess that he has done so because of his domestic problems (currently he has had to back down from an outrageous­ly oppressive new police law, and a group of Paris gendarmes have been charged with savagely beating a black music producer). He almost always seems to have domestic problems, and his original promise to be a new kind of politician faded long ago.

But it is also the case that France has never hesitated to use the European community to get its own way. In the 1960s, President De Gaulle ruthlessly blocked British entry for selfish national reasons. Now, in a curious reversal, another selfintere­sted French president is blocking British departure.

The rest of the EU, especially Germany, may feel this is foolish, but the European need for unanimity, and France’s special standing at the very heart of the project, gives Paris extraordin­ary power.

In normal negotiatio­ns, this sort of thing would not happen. Both parties would seek the best possible deal for themselves, and settle on that basis. But these are not normal negotiatio­ns. Politics, rather than mutual prosperity, have got the upper hand.

Faced with this sort of foolishnes­s and petulance, Boris Johnson has no choice but to stand his ground and not give in. And the British people, who can recognise arrogant obstructio­n when they see it, will undoubtedl­y back their Prime Minister all the way. We cannot surrender to this sort of thing, and we will not.

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 ??  ?? DEADLOCK: Mr Johnson talking to Ms von der Leyen yesterday before her press conference, right
DEADLOCK: Mr Johnson talking to Ms von der Leyen yesterday before her press conference, right

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