It was meant to be “the row of the summer”, but now looks like the British government’s first big climbdown on Brexit. Speaking at the end of the first day of talks, the Brexit secretary, David Davis, confirmed that the UK now accepts the EU’s negotiating timetable.
The EU had long insisted that trade talks could not begin until there was an outline of the order of divorce: the Brexit bill, EU citizens’ rights and the Irish border. Before the Tories’ election debacle, the Brexit secretary threatened to play hardball with Brussels, vowing to resist the EU’s timetable of deferring trade talks until after progress was made on the divorce.
But speaking after six hours of talks with the EU’s chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, Davis confirmed the UK now accepted the European approach. “It is not when it starts, it is how it finishes,” he said.
Turning to a well-worn phrase favoured by EU negotiators, he said: “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. The position we have agreed today is completely consistent with our long-standing position we have set out on article 50.”
When Theresa May sent the EU Britain’s formal notice to quit the EU in March, she wrote: “We therefore believe it is necessary to agree the terms of our future partnership alongside those of our withdrawal from the European Union.”
At Monday’s press conference Davis said trade would be discussed alongside the divorce issues, citing the EU’s own withdrawal clause. Article 50 stipulates the divorce deal should take account of the departing state’s “future relationship with the union”.
But Barnier made clear the trade talks would not begin until there was “sufficient progress on the divorce”, describing the sequence as “clearly defined and logical”.
Davis’s words were a stark contrast to his fighting talk on 15 May. “It’s wholly illogical and we happen to think the wrong interpretation of the treaty,” Davis said on ITV’s “Peston on Sunday.” Britain, he insisted would avoid EU’s attempts at time pressure “at every turn”.
Barnier, who stressed the EU was not seeking to punish Britain, said the time sequence was logical. “The United Kingdom will no longer enjoy the same rights and advantages as EU member states … I am convinced that this new partnership will contribute to stability on our continent.”
He will present a report card to EU leaders in the autumn on whether the UK has made “sufficient progress” on the divorce. The EU is looking for detailed guarantees on the status of EU citizens in the UK and is prioritising the delicate problem of the Irish border. But the Brexit bill may be fudged, with a final figure not emerging until 2018, to help the government sell it as part of a new trade deal.
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