Theresa May's Commons statement on Brexit - Summary and analysis
Here are the main points from Theresa May’s Commons statement.
- Theresa May repeatedly told MPs that she does not intended to water down workers’ rights after Brexit, but failed to satisfy opposition MPs that the working time directive is safe. Their questions were triggered by reports in the Sunday Times and the Sun on Sunday saying some Tories want to tear up the working time directive after Brexit. May responded to the many questions with similar answers, just stressing her commitment to workers’ rights in general terms. For example, when Labour’s Chuka Umunna asked her to “guarantee that post Brexit none of the working time regulations, importantly the 48-hour working week, will be done away with by her government”, she replied:
Under the EU withdrawal bill we are bringing these rights into UK law. I have said that we will maintain workers’ rights, and indeed enhance workers’ rights.
Later Umunna and other MPs said they were not satisfied by the assurances they had had. (See 4.46pm.) Their doubts are heightened by the claim in the Sun on Sunday that getting rid of EU rules on maximum working hours would enhance rights, not undermine them.
- Some Tory Brexiters expressed doubts about May’s negotiation. The strongest criticism came from Jacob Rees-Mogg and Peter Bone. Rees-Mogg attacked the EU’s new negotiating guidelines, saying paragraph 4, saying the UK would continue to bound by EU law during the transition, “would make the United Kingdom in the transition phase no more than a vassal state, a colony, a serf of the European Union”. Rees-Mogg urged May to copy Margaret Thatcher and “show mettle and steel in rejecting these rather hostile negotiating terms from the European Union”. Bone said the UK should refuse to pay the £39bn offered to the EU. The government has agreed to pay the £39bn, and does accept that it will be bound by EU law during the transition, but May managed to gloss over these points in her replies, and it did not feel as if Rees-Mogg and Bone were escalating hostilities. Other Tory MPs demanded assurances that Brexit would actually happen on 29 March 2019 and that the EU payments would be conditional on a final deal being negotiated. (They will be, but the relevant final deal will be the withdrawal deal - not the trade deal, which will come later.) For all the reservations, generally May’s MPs were supportive.
- May condemned the abuse of MPs for their stance on Brexit - but refused repeated invitations to criticise the Daily Mail in particular for its coverage of the Tory rebels who voted against the government on Wednesday. In her opening statement May said:
We are dealing with questions of great significance to our country’s future, so it is natural that there are many strongly held views on all sides of this Chamber.
And it is right and proper that we should debate them - and do so with all the passion and conviction that makes our democracy what it is.
But there can never be a place for the threats of violence and intimidation against some members that we have seen in recent days.
Jeremy Corbyn accused the Mail of “whipping up hatred” against the rebel Tory MPs. He and other Labour MPs challenged May to condemn the Mail, but she dodged these questions.
- May claimed the UK would be outside the common agricultural policy and the common fisheries policy after Brexit. Asked about these programmes, she said:
We will be leaving the European Union on March 29 2019, we will therefore be leaving the common fisheries policy and the common agricultural policy at that date.
The relationship we have on both those issues continuing through the implementation period with the European Union will be part of the negotiation of that period which will start very soon.
But, given that May also says the UK will be leaving the single market and the customs union during the transition despite the fact that for all practical purposes it will be staying in both, May’s comment is probably more of a linguistic tic than a statement of policy.
That’s all from me for today.
Thanks for the comments.
Updated
Theresa May has now finished her statement. I will post a summary soon.
Frances O’Grady, the TUC general secretary, has written an article for the Guardian about Brexit and workers’ rights. She says that, if the UK goes for a Canada-style, rights would be at risk.
Here is the article.
And here is an extract.
During the referendum campaign, Vote Leave promised Britain’s workers that their rights from the EU would be safe after Brexit. In the year and a half since, the prime minister has repeatedly stressed her desire to “protect and extend” workers’ rights – including in the Conservative manifesto.
So Theresa May’s promise is now being put to the test. Will she keep her word? Or is she a hostage to the hard Brexiteers in her cabinet?
That’s why I’m so concerned by the prospect of a Brexit deal modelled on the Ceta deal between the EU and Canada. David Davis has called Ceta “the perfect starting point” for trade talks. But Ceta puts the rights of corporations and foreign investors ahead of those of working people.
Worse still, nowhere does Ceta contain any workplace protections to stop countries engaging in a race to the bottom. If we do a Ceta-style deal, we’ll constantly be fighting a rearguard action to protect our rights at work.
For an alternative view, it is worth looking at how the Sun on Sunday reported the claim that ministers want to tear up the working time directive after Brexit. It’s a classic of its kind. The Sun ran the story under a headline saying: SHACKLES COME OFF - British workers set for post-Brexit overtime boom as ministers plot to scrap EU limits.
And here is how the story started.
British workers are set for an overtime bonanza after Brexit, it was revealed last night.
Ministers want to scrap EU laws which limit the working week to 48 hours — costing the average family £1,200 in lost pay.
The move would also be a boost to industry which loses billions of pounds bringing in agency staff to plug the gap.
Updated
Labour’s Stephen Timms asks if the reference to “full alignment” in the deal would apply just to Northern Ireland, or to the UK as a whole.
May says the “full alignment” provisions will only come in if other mechanisms to avoid a hard border don’t work. And she says the relevant clause makes it clear that this could be Northern Ireland only, if the Northern Ireland executive agrees, or it could be UK wide.
Here is Labour’s Chuka Umunna on what May has been saying about workers’ rights after Brexit.
The PM has failed twice to guarantee that worker’s rights set out in the European Working Time regulations such as the 48 hour working week would not be scrapped after Brexit. Not good enough. pic.twitter.com/MeWW3JILOq
— Chuka Umunna (@ChukaUmunna) December 18, 2017
The Times’s sketchwriter Patrick Kidd is not impressed by the session so far.
I've been watching this Theresa May statement on EU council for over an hour and don't feel one iota more enlightened or inspired. Never has so much been said by so many to mean so little.
— Patrick Kidd (@patrick_kidd) December 18, 2017
Labour’s Paula Sheriff asks May to accept that MPs from all sides of the Commons have been victims of abuse. It is not just Tory MPs who are victims, as May implied earlier.
May says no MP should have to put up with intimidation.
Labour’s Wes Streeting asks May to give an assurance that there will be no attempt to water down the working time directive rights, including maximum working hours, after Brexit.
May says those rights will be incorporated into UK law.
Labour’s Rachael Maskell asks, again, if there will be no watering down of these rights, and the ECJ judgments affecting them.
May says those rights are being brought into UK law. This government is committed to protecting and enhancing workers’ rights, she says.
Philip Hollobone, a Tory Brexiter, asks if the reciprocal rights for Britons living in EU countries will only apply to the countries where they live now, or whether they will apply if they want to move across the whole of the EU.
May says there will be further discussions on this in phase two.
Martin Vickers, a Conservative, asks if the UK will be able to control migration numbers during the transition.
May says EU citizens will be able to come to the UK during this period. But there will be registration measures in place, ahead of the UK taking full control after the transition period.
Here is HuffPost’s Ned Simons on what May is saying about workers’ rights.
The problem with Theresa May just saying she will 'not only maintain but enhance workers rights' is that those pushing to scrap the working time directive claim doing so gives workers more rights.
— Ned Simons (@nedsimons) December 18, 2017
Labour’s Pat McFadden says service industries are the “dog that hasn’t barked” in this story. Does May accept that services will have to have the same access to the single market after Brexit?
May says she wants an agreement that is right for goods and services.
Labour’s Stephen Kinnock asks May to confirm that the jurisdiction of the European court of justice will continue to apply during the transition.
May says it will at the start. But if it is possible to bring in a new dispute resolution period halfway through, the government will do that.
Here is the start of the Press Association story about May’s statement.
Jeremy Corbyn has urged Theresa May to “face down” cabinet ministers who want to scrap EU regulations which limit the working week.
The Labour leader asked the prime minister to “categorically” offer assurances over her intent to maintain the standards of the Working Time Directive during any transition period and beyond.
May, replying after updating MPs about the latest European Council summit, reiterated the government intends to “enhance” workers’ rights.
Reports emerged over the weekend which suggested Brexit-backing ministers could demand an end to the regulations which limit the working week to 48 hours.
Corbyn described the reports as “worrying”, adding: “These demands were reported to include that Britain should leave the working time directive.”
Labour MPs could be heard shouting “Shame”, with Mr Corbyn adding: “Can the prime minister state now, categorically, that she will face down this push with some in her cabinet and that Britain will maintain the standards of the working time directive both during a transition period and beyond?
“Will she also guarantee this government will not seek to use Brexit to water down any other working or social rights in this country?”
May, in her reply, said she had confirmed on several occasions the UK government’s intention to “not only maintain but also enhance workers’ rights”.
She said: “If he is so worried about workers’ rights, why did the Labour party vote against the very bill that brings workers’ rights from the EU into UK law?”
Work and Pensions Secretary David Gauke earlier also said the government was committed to protecting employment rights.
He was challenged at work and pensions questions in the Commons by SNP MP Neil Gray, the party’s social justice spokesman, who asked Gauke “what representations he has made at cabinet to ensure his Brexiteer colleagues are not successful in ripping up our workers’ rights”.
Gauke replied: “I think it’s the case that [environment secretary Michael Gove] said, don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers.
“This government is committed to protecting employment rights.”
Labour’s Mike Gapes asks May to confirm that the transition phase for Gibraltar will be the same as for the rest of the UK.
May says Gibraltar will be included in what is negotiated.
Labour’s Ann Clwyd asks why May has refused an invitation to address the European parliament.
May says she is discussing with the parliament the “interaction” she will have with it.
Labour’s Angela Smith asks if the working time directive will be brought into UK law.
May says EU workers’ rights will be transposed into UK law.
Sir Desmond Swayne, a Tory Brexiter, asks how likely it is that May would asks the EU27 to extend the Brexit deadline.
May says people are working to the March 2019 deadline.
We will be leaving on 29 March 2019.
Bob Neill, the Conservative, asks if Gibraltar will be included in these arrangements.
May says Gibraltar will be part of the agreement.
Labour’s Stephen Doughty asks May if she has seen the FT analysis that leaving the EU has cost the UK £350m per week.
This is from the FT’s Chris Giles.
Before the UK leaves the EU...
— Chris Giles (@ChrisGiles_) December 18, 2017
After 15 months of data...
Brexit has cost Britain roughly...
£350m a weekhttps://t.co/bQE1pz5imw via @FT
May says when the UK leaves the EU it will save money.
Peter Bone, the Tory Brexiter, asks May to ensure Britain leaves the EU on 29 March 2019. The UK should spend the £39bn here instead, he says, perhaps cutting taxes.
May says having a transition deal is practical.
Nigel Dodds, the DUP leader at Westminster, asks May to confirm that offering a second referendum would encourage the EU to offer the worst deal.
May agrees. She says that would also be betraying the British people.
Richard Drax, a Conservative, asks for an assurance that the UK will have left the EU after 29 March 2019. May confirms that is the case.
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Tory Brexiter, asks May to reject the EU negotiating guidelines. Paragraph undermines the principle that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. And paragraph four would turn the UK into a “vassal state”. He says May should copy Margaret Thatcher and reject these “hostile” guidelines.
May says it takes two sides to negotiate. She says the transition arrangements are there to provide certainty to business.
Labour’s Chuka Umunna asks for a commitment that after Brexit none of the EU working regulations will be abandoned.
May says after Brexit she will maintain and enhance workers’ rights.
The Tory Brexiter Owen Paterson asks for an assurance that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.
May says it will all be wrapped up in the withdrawal agreement.
Labour’s Yvette Cooper asks if MPs will get a meaningful vote on the withdrawal agreement. And she asks if May if she thinks it was wrong of the Daily Mail to accuse those who voted against the government on the EU withdrawal bill last week of treachery.
May says the government was always clear there would be a meaningful vote on the withdrawal agreement. She ignores the question about the Mail.
The Tory MP John Redwood asks for a commitment that there will be no binding offer on money until there is a deal parliament accepts.
May says the financial offer will be part of the overall withdrawal agreement.
Here is Allie Renison, head of Europe and trade policy at the Institute of Directors, on what May said about the UK leaving the CAP and the CFP.
I think I get what PM means but this is wordplay at its finest. On Brexit day we are leaving X, Y and Z but the actual substance of the policies/relationships remains effectively the same for the implementation period? https://t.co/Gh66tv2v07
— Allie Renison (@AllieRenison) December 18, 2017
Labour’s Hilary Benn, the chair of the Brexit committee, asks May to confirm that all teh commitments made in the UK-EU deal agreed this month will be written into UK law.
May says they will be put into the withdrawal agreement. MPs will get a vote on that, and there will be withdrawal agreement and implementation bill legislating for it, she says.
Anna Soubry, the Conservative pro-European, asks when May will be able to announce the transition period has been agreed.
May says negotiations will start soon. She hopes they will conclude within the first quarter of 2018.
The Tory Iain Duncan Smith backs May in condemning the abuse of MPs.
Ian Blackford, the SNP’s leader at Westminster, asks for a long-term commitment to Erasmus. Many Scots have benefitted, he says.
May says Erasmus is exactly the kind of issue that will come up in phase two.
May implying govt will try to leave Common Fisheries Police and Common Agricultural Policy during transition - won't be easy... EU view is transition is absolutely sticking to status quo, UK view is sticking more or less to status quo - first big fight of next year
— Laura Kuenssberg (@bbclaurak) December 18, 2017
May is responding to Corbyn.
She starts by welcoming the fact that Corbyn condemned intimidation against MPs. But that will seem “a bit rich” to Tories who suffered intimidation from the Labour party at the election, she says.
She rejects the claim the transition period was a Labour idea. She backed a transition in the Lancaster House speech, she says.
She says Corbyn called for article 50 to be triggered after the referendum. That would have given the government no time to prepare, she says.
As for the CAP and the CFP, she says the UK will be leaving those on that date. But the relationship the UK has with them remains to be negotiated, she says.
(Since May says the UK is leaving the single market and the customs union after March 2019, when many observers think in practice the UK will remain members, she seems to be making a semantic point here - not making a substantive point about whether or not the CAP and the CFP will continue apply during the transition.)
Updated
Jeremy Corbyn is responding to May.
He says the agreement came two months late. And there are still questions unresolved.
He accuses the Daily Mail of whipping up hatred against Tory MPs who voted against the government over Brexit.
He says the government is now backing Labour’s calls for a transition period. The UK must stay in the customs union and the single market for a limited period, he says.
He asks May to clarify if the UK will remain subject to the single market and customs union rules. Will it stay part of the CAP and the common fisheries policy? And will the UK be able to sign trade deals during this period?
He asks about Tory calls for the UK to leave the working time directive. (See 12.01pm.) Will May commit to keeping this after Brexit and beyond?
Will the UK continue to contribute to Erasmus, the EU student exchange programme, beyond the current budget period?
He says many Tories want to use Brexit as a chance to turn the UK into a tax haven for the very rich.
May condemns threats issued against MPs over their stance on Brexit
Theresa May starts with the non-Brexit issues discussed at the summit: Russia, Jerusalem, immigration and education.
The UK made substantial contributions on all four topics, she says.
On Brexit, she says she has now achieve a reciprocal agreement on citizens’ rights - her first priority.
On the financial settlement, she says she set out the principles in her statement to the Commons last week. The UK’s contribution will be between £35bn and £39bn. That is equivalent to around four year’s EU membership, she says. She says she managed to bring the figure down.
She says the guidelines published on Friday (see 3.30pm) show a shared desire to make progress on an implementation period.
She says the UK will not be in the single market or the customs union at this point, as it will have left.
She says the UK will now work with EU partnership with ambition and creativity to get a deal in both sides interests.
She says she has done what many people said could not be done. She will not be derailed from delivering on what the public wanted.
She says it is good news for those who voted leave, who were worried the process might be derailed. And it is good news for those how voted remain, who were worried about the UK leaving without a deal.
She says there are strong views on both sides. But she says “there can never be a place for the threats of violence and intimidation” seen against MPs in recent days.
- May condemns threats issued against MPs over their stance on Brexit. Her comment seemed to be aimed particularly at those who have made online threats against the Tory rebels who voted against the government on the EU withdrawal bill on Wednesday.
Theresa May's Commons statement on Brexit and the EU summit
Theresa May is about to make a statement on Brexit and the EU summit last week.
Here are the new Brexit negotiating guidelines (pdf) the EU27 agreed at the meeting.
And here is an extract from the statement May is about to give released overnight.
In a speech today David Lidington, the justice secretary, called for online retailers to stop selling mini mobile phones, which can easily be smuggled into jails, the BBC reports. The full text of the speech is here.
Stefaan De Rynck's speech and Q&A at Chatham House - Summary
Stefaan De Rynck, senior adviser to Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, was speaking at Chatham House earlier. Thankfully this was a Chatham House event that wasn’t on Chatham House terms - ie, it was all on the record - and De Rynck provided quite a lot of insight into EU thinking on the Brexit process.
Here are the main points.
- De Rynck said businesses would only get absolute “certainty” about the Brexit transition when the withdrawal agreement is finalised, probably in October 2018. Asked when business would get certainty, he replied:
On businesses and when the certainty comes, it only comes indeed when the transition, which is part of the article 50 deal, will be ratified. I know it is very uncomfortable - stakeholders say we have contingency planning, what do we do, it’s a cost. It’s up to business to see. We are, in the commission at least, continuing with no deal planning.
When it was put to him that a transition deal might be agreed in principle by the end of March or the beginning of April, but that it could not be finalised until the withdrawal agreement was settled, he replied: “Exactly”. He also said the transition deal was “not a given” yet. (See 12.40pm.)
- He said the UK would have to accept any new EU rules coming into force during the transition. (See 12.22pm.)
- He said the EU would not give the UK access to the single market for just some sectors of the economy. He said:
To come back to the mathematics of pluses and minuses, what you cannot do is square an FTA [free trade agreement] circle into a single market. And that is one of the key issues that people have to live with and clarify quickly. There can be no sector-by-sector participation in the single market. And trying to square the FTA in a way that would lead to sector-based participation in the single market would for the EU be the beginning of the end of the correct functioning of the integrity of the single market. And that’s therefore something the EU will want to avoid.
He also said the UK would get a bespoke trade deal, in the sense that all free trade agreements are different. This appears to contradict what Michel Barnier said in his Prospect interview. (See 9.16am.) But the point Barnier was making was that the UK will not be able to get some of the advantages of single market membership without any of the obligations. De Rynck was also saying this (see above). When he spoke about the UK getting a bespoke trade deal, he was just making the point that it would not be literally the same as Canada’s.
- He said the EU would never see Brexit as a success.
For us, I don’t think we will ever label Brexit a success. I think it’s a mutual weakening of two parties. Last Friday or Thursday the sanctions against Russia were extended by the European council at 28. Post Brexit, that will be 27 plus one. It can work, but it won’t be as easy as it happens today [under a] common framework.
Economically for us Brexit is a lose, lose situation. So our negotiation here is not, like we had with Japan, how we create value together. It’s how do you minimise loses economically on both sides. Because no matter how you turn [he may have meant ‘spin’] Brexit and what it means, it means there will be barriers that don’t exist today in terms of the UK-EU relationship, no matter how ambitious the free trade agreement could be.
Global standards could be more important than EU standards, Brexit 'war cabinet' told
I’m hearing that the prime minister made the argument at her Brexit “inner cabinet” (see 9.50am) that the UK should aim high in EU negotiations and should be thinking less about conforming to European standards and more to international standards. The idea of global regulations becoming more important than EU wide ones is an argument I’ve recently heard from at least one critical cabinet minister when it comes to talks.
I hear that there was a split in the cabinet, to some extent, with Amber Rudd - the home secretary who was a leading remain advocate - arguing that she was worried about jobs and believing that remaining close to the EU would be better economically for the UK.
One person with knowledge of the meeting said the group splits into “divergers” and “aligners” along a spectrum, with Rudd, Philip Hammond, Damian Green, Greg Clark and David Davis and one side, and Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, Liam Fox and Gavin Williamson on the other.
“But no one is quite sure which way the prime minister leans,” said a source.
Turning back to the cabinet sub committee meeting on Brexit this morning, this from Rupert Harrison, George Osborne’s former chief of staff, probably contains some element of truth.
Q: how can you tell that most of the big Brexit decisions about the future relationship have already been made?
— Rupert Harrison (@rbrharrison) December 18, 2017
A: because the Brexit Cabinet sub-committee is finally discussing them#howgovernmentworks #jokingbutonlyabit
Here is the Express’s Nick Gutteridge on what Stefaan De Rynck, Michel Barnier’s senior adviser, had to say at Chatham House.
13/ To add my own tuppence - EU is far more scared of rapid UK deregulation a la Rees-Mogg than many give voice to. It would seriously threaten the Single Market, so the EU will work hard to try and tie Britain into its regulatory sphere.
— Nick Gutteridge (@nick_gutteridge) December 18, 2017
Q: Could the UK be part of the European Economic Area (EEA) in a minus way after Brexit?
De Rynck says the EU assumes the UK is leaving the customs union and the single market.
But the EU does want to hear more from the UK as to what it wants, he says.
And that’s it. The session is over.
I will post a summary soon.
Q: We hear the cabinet is thinking of a plan of gradual divergence. (See 10.28am.) Can you see the EU agreeing to that?
De Rynck says this is a matter of stating the obvious. After Brexit, the UK will diverge where it wants to.
Q: The UK says it will not be in the single market and customs union during the transition. But the EU says it will be in both. Is this just a linguistic difference, or something more serious?
De Rynck says what is important is that the rules remain clear.
Q: Can you say more about that the political agreement on trade expected in the autumn will look like?
He says it is too early to start speculating about how many pages it will run to.
UK will not get 'certainty' on transition period until autumn 2018, says top EU official
Q: Have the negotiations amounted to rational decision making?
De Rynck says the EU has approached this in a calm and businesslike way.
Q: At what point will business have certainty about a transition period?
He says it will only come when the withdrawal agreement gets ratified. He knows that is “uncomfortable” for business.
.@StefaanDeRynck on #Brexit
— Peter Foster (@pmdfoster) December 18, 2017
to @ChathamHouse
Transition hardline - no early harvest (as HMT hopes):
"The certainty [on transition] only comes at the end of the article 50 deals, when it is ratified. I know this is very uncomfortable."
Q: So the transition deal can only be agreed in principle by March?
That’s right, says De Rynck.
- The Brexit transition deal will not be finalised until the autumn, De Rynck says,
Q: Will the UK notice any difference during the transition, apart from not having a seat at the EU table?
De Rynck says the UK will continue to have rights and responsibilities during the transition.
Updated
Q: Is it true that, if the UK leaves the customs union, there is no way of avoiding a hard border in Ireland?
De Rynck says paragraph 49 of the joint report was crucial. It said the UK would try to solve the Ireland border issue in the context of the future relationship. If that does not work, the UK commits to find a specific solution. And if that does not work, full alignment will be the solution.
This will be a distinct issue in the next phase of the talks, he says.
Q: Is there any reason why the UK could not get a free trade deal including financial services?
De Rynck says there is a financial services sector in the Canada free trade agreement. But it is more modest than single market membership would offer, he says.
16/ He says there is a little known services provision in CETA allowing Canadian companies to operate within the EU on level terms with European ones. But cautions: 'It's Much more modest than the Single Market. In terms of market access it’s very limited.'
— Nick Gutteridge (@nick_gutteridge) December 18, 2017
.@StefaanDeRynck says Canada deal has some financial services, based on EU making a “unilateral equivalence decision” - and these "only exist for a subset" [swaps/clearing] of the current EU-UK financial services engagement #Brexit
— Peter Foster (@pmdfoster) December 18, 2017
Updated
Q: Listening to you, I thought I was listening to the surrender terms imposed on the UK by a victorious leviathan. At what point do EU member states get a say?
De Rynck says the 27 member states are involved every day in the work of the Brexit negotiating team.
Q: There is a growing consensus that the transition will last about two years. Many people think that will not be enough. What will happen at the end of two years if you have not agreed on the final result?
De Rynck says it is too early to say would would happen.
.@StefaanDeRynck says transition is 2 years, but doesn't rule of transition extension on sectors where things are 'pressed'... "but it’s way too early to think about how that work"
— Peter Foster (@pmdfoster) December 18, 2017
Q: When will you know whether Brexit is a success?
De Rynck says he does not think the EU will ever label Brexit a success.
It is a mutual weakening of two parties, he says.
Economically for us, Brexit is a lose, lose situation.
Stefaan De Rynck says he cannot ever see Brexit as a success: "It’s a mutual weakening of the two parties."
— Peter Walker (@peterwalker99) December 18, 2017
Economically, it's not about making things better, but "how do we minimise losses economically on both sides", he says.
.@StefaanDeRynck on foreign policy:
— Peter Foster (@pmdfoster) December 18, 2017
Russian sanctions were renewed at 28 last week, after #Brexit it will be 27+1. “It can work but it won’t be as easy as it is today.”
Updated
Q: Will the political agreement on trade be part of the withdrawal agreement?
De Rynck says it would have to be referred to in the treaty, if it is not an actual integral part of it.
Future framework will be a political declaration, but referred to in the Withdrawal Agreement treaty, says De Rynck
— Matthew Holehouse (@mattholehouse) December 18, 2017
Q: "And therefore legally binding"
A: "Yes"
Updated
Brexit transition 'is not a given' yet, says senior EU official
Q: The EU is talking about translating this months’s deal into EU terms. But how do you square that with the principle that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed?
De Rynck says the EU wants to start drafting a withdrawal treaty now.
He says a transition period “is not a given today”.
In that withdrawal treaty there could be a transitional arrangement, transition period, implementation period, which the prime minister refers to. That is not a given today, let’s be very clear about that.
- Brexit transition “is not a given” yet, says senior EU official.
Updated
De Rynck is now taking questions.
Q: Is it possible that the EU was offering more to the US than it will offer to the UK?
De Rynck says there was public opposition to TTIP, the EU-US free trade deal. People were worried that it would threaten the EU’s ability to set standards, he says.
At some point there was talk of mutual recognition of standards in that deal. But that language was dropped, he says.
Q: To what extent is there capacity for the EU to be open to what Theresa May spoke about in her Florence speech? She said some UK regulatory matters were not applicable to EU trade. She said in some areas the UK should do its own thing, in some areas it would have the same regulatory aims as the EU but different methods, and in some areas it would be happy to adopt EU regulations.
De Rynck reports the point about how “there cannot be sector-based participation in the single market”.
Does the UK want to cut air quality standards, he asks. Does it want to lower regulatory standards?
He says what worries people on the EU side is that the UK will leave the single market, and the EU will be asked to trust them about not lowering standards. That does not provide enough “glue” to hold it together, he says.
The single market is a dynamic system of rule making, he says. He says if the UK does not want to abide by the rules, people will want to know what it does want to do.
Why is there a lack of trust on EU side, about UK #Brexit intentions?@StefaanDeRynck : “If you [the UK] don’t want to abide by the rules, then the natural question is ‘what do you want to do?”@ChathamHouse
— Peter Foster (@pmdfoster) December 18, 2017
Updated
De Rynck says there has been a lot of talk “about Canada and its pluses”.
He says he does not see such talk as helpful.
What you cannot do is square an FTA [free trade agreement] circle into a single market.
He says there cannot be sector by sector participation in the single market.
Updated
De Rynck is now talking about the proposed trade deal.
There are tensions between what the EU wants and what the UK wants, he says.
He says the UK cannot simply reinstate common recognition of standards outside the single market.
He says even in the single market mutual recognition of standards is sometimes not enough to make the single market work. That has been shown in financial services, he says.
UK will have to accept new EU rules during Brexit transition, says top EU official
De Rynck is now talking about the transition.
He says the UK will have to accept new EU rules that come into force during this period.
- UK will have to accept new EU rules during Brexit transition, says top EU official.
He says there can be “no cherry picking, or what one could call a buffet-style transition”.
And he says it would make sense for the transition to end at the end of 2020.
He says the EU understands that businesses want certainty about the transition soon.
But the transition deal will have to be part of the withdrawal agreement, he says.
Stefaan De Rynck, Michel Barnier’s senior adviser, is speaking at Chatham House now.
He says drafting a withdrawal treaty will be the first task for the new year. That will involve putting the UK-EU agreement reached this month into the form of a legal treaty.
On citizens’ rights, he says the deal will not give the UK any discretion to diverge from what has been agreed.
On the financial settlement, he says there is now a “watertight methodology” for deciding what the UK will pay.
Stefaan De Rynck, senior adviser to Michel Barnier, is speaking now at a Chatham House event. There is a live stream here.
I will be monitoring what he says closely.
No 10 rejects Barnier's claim that bespoke Brexit trade deal impossible
I’m just back from the Number 10 lobby briefing. It was short and relatively perfunctory. Here are the main points, as far as they went.
- Downing Street dismissed Michel Barnier’s claim that a bespoke trade deal with the EU would not be available to the UK. (See 9.16am.) Asked about Barnier’s comments in the Prospect interview, the prime minister’s spokesman implied that what he was saying might just be an opening negotiating gambit. The spokesman said:
We believe that we can secure an ambitious deal with the EU that works for the UK and for the European Union and that we come at this from a unique perspective, in that we already have a strong relationship with the European Union from which to build upon...
We are at the beginning of the second phase of the negotiation. That’s a fact. We continue to believe that we can get the ambitious future relationship the prime minister has spoken about in Florence and elsewhere.
- The spokesman played down claims the government could abandon the working time directive after Brexit. A story in the Sunday Times yesterday (paywall) said that at today’s Brexit cabinet sub committee meeting Michel Gove, the environment secretary, “and other ministers will ... call for Britain to abandon the EU working time directive, which restricts the working week to 48 hours.” Asked about this, the spokesman said the government was using the EU withdrawal bill to writing existing EU law into UK law. He went on:
Going forward, I’ve got nothing to add beyond the prime minister’s stated words that she’s committed to maintaining and, where possible, enhancing workers’ rights.
But the spokesman would not discuss whether the government saw keeping the working time directive as essential for maintaining workers’ rights.
- Theresa May spoke to the new Austrian chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, by phone this morning congratulating him on forming a government. She said she looked forward to working with him, particularly when Austria holds the EU presidency in the second half of next year. It was a short conversation, the prime minister’s spokesman said, and she did not say anything about Kurz being in coalition with the far-right Freedom party.
- The spokesman would not say when the Cabinet Office investigation into Damian Green would conclude. He could not even commit to the outcome being announced before Christmas, but he played down suggestions the outcome will be announced today.
Theresa May is not the only person suggesting that the UK may be able to agree a bespoke trade deal with the EU giving it many of the benefits of membership. The left-leaning IPPR thinktank has published interesting proposals for a “shared market” arrangement that would achieve much of what May wants.
The Press Association has got more details,
The creation of a “shared market” between the UK and remaining European Union states could resolve the problems surrounding a post-Brexit trade deal, David Davis will be told by a think tank.
The left-of-centre Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) suggests that agreement on regulatory alignment between the UK and the bloc would secure the benefits of the single market, with a comprehensive customs deal to replace the existing union.
The proposal would allow for the UK to diverge from EU rules - a key demand of Brexit backers - with “proportionate” consequences to the trading relationship.
But in a move unlikely to win approval from Brexiteers, the plan would involve making a continued financial contribution to the Brussels budget.
The thinktank will put its report to Brexit Secretary Mr Davis at a meeting on Tuesday.
Tom Kibasi, director of the IPPR and an author of the report, said: “The shared market is a practical proposal that honours the referendum result while securing our economic interests.
“It is neither remaining in the EU nor crashing out in a hard Brexit.
“This isn’t a proposal for the 15% of extremists on either side: it is a proposal for the 70% of people who want a sensible deal, built on precedents, that would work for the whole country.”
The plan draws on elements of relationships the EU already has with “third countries” outside the bloc.
Ukraine’s agreement allows for increased single market access as its regulations align with the EU’s - the proposed UK deal would reverse that, with a loss of market access as regulations diverge.
A new UK surveillance authority and court of justice - with judges from both Britain and the EU - would have jurisdiction, in a similar way to the European Free Trade Association’s arrangements.
There would be compromises on the freedom of movement, echoing the EU’s deals with Switzerland and Liechtenstein, the think tank argued.
Under the terms of the proposed deal, as the EU and UK updated their regulations, they would need to ensure continuing alignment.
If divergence were to occur, a “declaration of incompatibility” would be issued giving the UK and EU six months to agree a plan to bring their regulations back into alignment before losing a proportionate level of the preferential trading relationship.
I’m off to the Number 10 briefing now. I will post again after 11.30am.
System for fire safety in tower blocks 'not fit for purpose', says report
The current system for ensuring fire safety in tower blocks is “not fit for purpose”, a government review has concluded. That is one of the findings of the interim report from the independent review of building regulations and fire safety established after the Grenfell Tower fire.
Here is the communities department’s news release summarising the report. And here is the 121-page report in full (pdf).
The news release says:
The interim report finds that:
a culture change is required - with industry taking greater responsibility for what is built - this change needs to start now
the current system for ensuring fire safety in high-rise buildings is not fit for purpose
a clear, quick and effective route for residents to raise concerns and be listened to, must be created
And this is what Dame Judith Hackitt, chair of the review, told the Today programme about her conclusions. She said the current regulations were “probably” too complicated in their current form.
I think it’s also the case that when regulations are complex, rather than that complication giving people everything they need to know, it makes it quite difficult to penetrate that complexity and truly understand what they are required to do.
She said that although regulations themselves were relatively simple, they were accompanied by vast guidance documents detailing different areas that were hard to dip into individually.
Clearly, there is an opportunity to make this much simpler and to guide people to the right answer rather than presenting them with all that information.
It will vary enormously, depending on the building, depending on the team that are working on the process - but yes, for sure, there are issues of competence to be addressed as part of this.
Here are two takes on what the cabinet is likely to decide about the Brexit end state.
The Times understands that cabinet figures including Philip Hammond, Boris Johnson and Michael Gove are set to agree that Britain must be allowed to draw up its own rules on areas such as technology, robotics, artificial intelligence and data sharing rather than be subject to EU rules made after 2021.
Ignoring EU rules drawn up after that date will form the centrepiece of a “gradual” process of divergence away from the EU and this seems a more likely direction of travel than plans for a “big bang” change in 2021 once the transition has concluded.
However, the EU is thought to be highly sceptical about any approach that allows for gradual divergence ...
Asked if there was more likely to be big change straight after the transition or divergence over time, one cabinet member said: “The reality is it will be a matter of time. The important thing is to show that change can happen, but wholesale regulatory change will need even more legislation.” Bigger changes will only be possible after the next election, by which time the Tories hope they will have a majority government.
The two big meetings on Brexit have long been billed as Cabinet showdowns, pitting those like Philip Hammond who want to stay as close to Europe as possible against those like Boris Johnson who are demanding a clean break from Brussels’ rules and regs. But a well-placed Cabinet source tells Playbook it will be far more nuanced than that. “Everyone already knows each others’ views — and frankly no one is talking about continuing to follow the EU rules anyway,” the source said. “So it’s really about a trade-off, and how optimistic you are about the benefits of divergence. As in, ‘if you diverge 30 percent, the cost to EU trade will be £x billion and the benefit will be £x billion.’ In the end that is the discussion — and actually the PM is pretty optimistic.”
The Brexit minister Steve Baker has been tweeting from the Commons tea room.
Amiable breakfast chat with Dominic Grieve in the tearoom this morning. Rumours of his ostracism are unfounded!
— Steve Baker MP (@SteveBakerHW) December 18, 2017
Just 42 pages of EU (Withdrawal) Bill amendments to review today pic.twitter.com/CaoERCfgli
— Steve Baker MP (@SteveBakerHW) December 18, 2017
On the Today programme this morning Iain Duncan Smith, the Conservative former work and pensions secretary and prominent Brexiter, said he did not accept the argument that a Brexit trade deal allowing the UK to diverge from the EU would be bad for trade. He said:
l don’t buy this idea of a fixed position in the world. It’s not a case of less trade, it’s a case of a different type of trade, and British business will have to learn, as they do, to get by in a different world.
And to bear in mind, we are looking to make trade arrangements which will make life easier for us with other markets. So, you have to look at these things no longer in a case of just the European Union.
May to tell MPs UK will negotiate and sign trade deals during transition
The prime minister always gives a statement to the Commons after EU summits. Often in the past these used to be quite turgid affairs, but now they have become Brexit updates and major Westminster events.
Number 10 released some words overnight from the statement Theresa May will give. Here are the quotes. She will say:
[European Council guidelines point to a] shared desire of the EU and the UK to make rapid progress on an implementation period.
This will help give certainty to employers and families that we are going to deliver a smooth Brexit.
As I proposed in Florence, during this strictly time-limited implementation period which we will now begin to negotiate, we would not be in the single market or the customs union, as we will have left the European Union.
But we would propose that our access to one another’s markets would continue as now, while we prepare and implement the new processes and new systems that will underpin our future partnership.
During this period we intend to register new arrivals from the EU as preparation for our future immigration system.
And we will prepare for our future independent trade policy by negotiating - and where possible signing - trade deals with third countries, which could come into force after the conclusion of the implementation period.
Who sits on the Brexit 'war cabinet'?
Here are details of membership of cabinet committees (pdf). And here are the 10 members of the so-called “Brexit war cabinet”, the EU exit and trade (strategy and negotiations) sub committee.
Four of them voted leave and were prominent Brexit campaigners: Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, Liam Fox and David Davis. Johnson, Gove and Fox are all pushing for a hardish Brexit, with maximum opportunities for regulatory divergence, and Davis is broadly in that camp, although he is probably more pragmatic than the others.
And four of the sub committee members are firmly at the soft Brexit end of the spectrum, likely to want to minimise regulatory divergence. They are Damian Green, Philip Hammond, Amber Rudd and Greg Clark.
The two “floating voters”, less easy to pigeonhole into either camp, are Theresa May and Gavin Williamson.
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'No way' - Barnier says UK will not be allowed bespoke Brexit trade deal
Among the most waspish and patronising, but not untrue, things said about the government’s Brexit strategy recently was this comment from the Irish prime minister Leo Varadkar. Speaking last month at an EU meeting in Sweden, he said:
It’s 18 months since the referendum, it’s 10 years since people who wanted a referendum started agitating for one. Sometimes it doesn’t seem like they thought all this through.
This week ministers certainly will be engaging in that thinking process. The so-called Brexit war cabinet (aka the EU exit and trade [strategy and negotiations] sub committee) is meeting today to discuss specifically what’s known in the jargon as the Brexit end state (what the UK wants its relationship with the EU to be after withdrawal) and the full cabinet will discuss the issue tomorrow. Downing Street, of course, firmly rejects the idea that ministers don’t know where they are heading, and Theresa May’s Lancaster House and Florence speeches both contained lengthy but generalised passages about the sort of outcome she wants. But Number 10 is not disputing that until now key end state decisions have not been addressed.
Just to remind May and her colleagues how difficult this will be, Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, has given an interview to Prospect magazine re-iterating some of the EU’s key demands. In her Lancaster House and her Florence speeches May explicitly rejected the idea that the UK had to choose between soft and hard Brexit, between Norway and Canada, stressing that she wanted something different, a bespoke deal appropriate for the UK. But Barnier has quashed the idea aggressively: “No way,” he said.
Here are the main points from his interview.
- Barnier said the UK would not be able to get a bespoke trade deal with the EU after Brexit. He said:
[The British] have to realise there won’t be any cherry picking. We won’t mix up the various scenarios to create a specific one and accommodate their wishes, mixing, for instance, the advantages of the Norwegian model, member of the single market, with the simple requirements of the Canadian one. No way. They have to face the consequences of their own decision.
- He said full discussions on a future trade deal would only start after Brexit. The UK accepts that it will only be able to sign a UK-EU trade deal after it becomes a “third country” after Brexit. But ministers have repeatedly said they want the substance of the deal to be concluded alongside the withdrawal agreement, which is meant to be ready by October next year. (David Davis, the Brexit secretary, said as much only last Thursday.) But the EU says that by October all the UK will get will be a political agreement covering the framework of a future trade deal. Barnier told Prospect:
The British had the idea they could mingle everything: the price for past commitments, the financial issue and the future. We said: first we settle the past, like in any separation, then we start talking about the future. So parallel talks will start probably next March. The actual negotiations on the future relationship will only begin once the UK leaves the EU.
- He said the transition period could not last longer than two years.
There is no mandate to discuss the transition period yet, but it will be short and duly framed. Prime Minister May has stated it should take two years—it cannot last longer for legal reasons. But what matters is the time actually needed to negotiate our future relations.
This will disappoint those who want it to be longer. The Irish government has said the transition period should last up to five years and there has even been a claim that Davis envisages it lasting that amount of time.
May is giving a statement to MPs later, so we will get her own response to these comments then.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Theresa May chairs a meeting of the cabinet’s EU exit and trade (strategy and negotiations) sub committee.
11am: Downing Street lobby briefing.
3.30pm: Theresa May gives a statement to MPs about Brexit and last week’s EU summit.
As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I plan to post a summary at lunchtime, and another after May’s statement.
You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here.
Here is the Politico Europe round-up of this morning’s political news from Jack Blanchard’s Playbook. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’ top 10 must reads.
If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
I try to monitor the comments BTL but normally I find it impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer direct questions, although sometimes I miss them or don’t have time.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.
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