Tag: delay

What now for Labour? Two key problems threaten the prospect of success: the prime minister’s almost non-existent authority, and whether it is ultimately ever going to be in Labour’s interests to do a deal with the Tories. This is also believed to have been a factor in the 31 October extension date offered by the EU. That was the calculation May made when she cancelled the first Brexit vote before the Christmas recess, but MPs returned still determined to vote her deal down. What now for the second referendum campaign? Once the question is agreed the Electoral Commission would then designate lead campaigners for both sides, adding more time to the process, before a 10-week campaign period. The People’s Vote campaigners have said that the EU would be minded to extend article 50 further if a referendum was already in play and more time was needed. The Brexit delay prolongs the sense of limbo for EU citizens in the UK and British nationals in the rest of Europe. The government wants the remaining 3.4 million to apply by the end of December 2020 if there is a no-deal Brexit, or by June 2021 if there is a deal. But the EU leaders hope that the threat of European elections on 23 May might push some Brexiters to finally back the withdrawal agreement.

But she at least knew she could avoid mass resignations from her cabinet. She could be confident enough about the consequences at home of tabling such a request again. UK risks losing European commissioner role over Brexit delay Read more But with the EU now appearing likely to reject her plea and deliver an extension of up to a year, ending either on 31 December or at the end of March 2020, the consequences are far from obvious this time – both domestically, given the potential shock in her party, and with regard to the EU-UK relationship and future trade negotiations. Article 126 of the withdrawal agreement lays out a clear end date for the transition, a period of time in which the UK effectively remains a member of the EU but without representation in any of the bloc’s decision-making institutions. Brexit secretary confirms plan to let MPs thrash out deal in Commons Read more The 21-month duration of the transition period was not a UK government choice. It was decided on by the commission to tally with the end of the EU’s seven-year multi-annual financial framework (MFF). It made for a neat fit. A Brexit delay until the end of March would leave the UK with a transition period of only nine months – hardly enough to negotiate much if the last two-and-a-bit years of onerous talks is anything to go by. If the UK wanted to extend the transition “by up to one or two years” as foreseen in the withdrawal agreement, a decision would need to be taken in July 2020 – four months into the transition period – by the joint committee overseeing the implementation and application of the withdrawal agreement. From 1 January 2021, the EU and the UK would share a single customs territory, and Northern Ireland would stay in much of the EU’s single market acquis.

Theresa May has signalled that she would accept the EU’s likely offer of a lengthy Brexit delay at a summit of leaders as the UK would still be able to leave when the withdrawal agreement is approved. May is expected to have her request for a limited extension to 30 June rejected by the EU27 in favour of a longer potential delay to Brexit of up to a year. But May told reporters in Brussels that the UK would still be able to leave the bloc under the EU’s likely offer – once parliament had approved the 585-page withdrawal agreement and 26-page political declaration on the future. “What matters, I think, is I have asked for an extension to June 30 but what is important is that any extension enables us to leave at the point at which we ratify a withdrawal agreement. “I am willing to offer it personally, but the big question is if there is any added value to a long extension. Speaking in the Bundestag in Berlin, Merkel said the outcome of the special summit “may well be a longer extension than the one the British prime minister asked for”. “But we will shape this extension in such a way that whenever Britain has approved the withdrawal agreement, Britain can then complete its orderly withdrawal very shortly after,” she said. We know that such talks across parliamentary groups require compromise and time, so I and the government are of the opinion that we should offer both parties a reasonable amount of time, because an orderly exit is only possible in cooperation with the UK.” “We understand from the British prime minister’s letter that the UK is willing to prepare for participating in the European election,” she said. “There is a doubt about whether the UK is going to participate in the European elections or not,” the diplomat said, adding that any failure to elect MEPs would mean an exit date in June. The European elections are a European vote, where the elections in the UK concern us all.”

Aa Aa More time, please? UK Prime Minister Theresa May visited heads of state in Germany and France on Tuesday, seeking support for another Brexit delay ahead of Wednesday’s EU summit. The United Kingdom is currently scheduled to exit the EU on April 12 but Mrs May is pushing for an extension to June 30. Trade threat The US is threatening to impose tariffs on $11 billion worth of goods from the European Union in response to European aircraft subsidies. Products targeted in a list released by the US Trade Representative on Monday are largely traditional European products — including cheese, seafood and wine. The US claims that by providing "launch aid" to Airbus, the EU is causing American rival Boeing to lose global market share. Moscow welcome Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated on Monday that he will go ahead with the controversial purchase of Russia’s S-400 missile system. During Erdogan’s third visit to Russia this year, the Turkish leader vowed to strengthen military cooperation between the two countries despite warnings from US Vice President Mike Pence last week. Pence urged Turkey to back out of the deal, arguing that their NATO membership would be at risk if the transaction is completed.

Theresa May is facing intense cabinet pressure to avoid the prospect of a long Brexit delay, amid increasing expectations that last ditch cross-party talks on a compromise departure plan will not produce anything concrete. Before a crucial EU summit later this week, the prime minister is facing a fast-diminishing range of options that could split the Conservative party and prompt a mass cabinet walkout, or could result in the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal on Friday. Under the terms of the previous brief extension agreed with the EU, if Brussels does not agree another delay, a no-deal Brexit will happen on Friday. Alexandre Holroyd, an MP from Macron’s En Marche party whose brief covers Brexit, told the BBC that this should come with conditions, for example, the UK should have no say on the next EU budget. They said: “A long, non-flexible extension would come with EU elections as well, which is another red line for lots of the Conservative party. The shadow business secretary, Rebecca Long-Bailey, who was among the Labour delegation, said on Sunday that while the mood of the talks had been positive, there was as yet no sign on where May might budge, particularly Labour’s key demand for a post-Brexit customs union with the EU. Adding to the sense of drift, Leadsom indicated that it was up to Labour to accept the customs arrangement already in May’s rejected deal, and that she and other Brexiter members of May’s ministerial team could not accept a full customs union. “There are various different types of arrangements, and those discussions are still ongoing,” Leadsom said, calling May’s existing customs plan “an excellent proposal”. “My expectation – and I’m not party to the discussions – is that the prime minister will only seek to agree those things that still constitute Brexit.” What does seem clear is that May’s options are closing in, with her deal conceded as lost, and a backbench bill led by the Labour MP Yvette Cooper mandating the PM to avoid a no-deal departure is expected to become law late on Monday, after finishing its progress through the Lords. Another source said the plot for the Brussels summit seemed clear: “I expect she’ll have a pretty bruising time and then walk away with a long extension.”

A key ally of the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has called for EU leaders to reject Theresa May’s appeal for a further short delay to Brexit, in a sign of the dangers of the prime minister’s strategy. Theresa May calls for talks with Jeremy Corbyn in attempt to save Brexit Read more The EU’s heads of state and government had agreed at their last summit that the UK could stay in the bloc until 22 May but only on the basis that the withdrawal agreement was ratified by 29 March. An unconditional extension to that date was firmly rejected during the leaders’ discussions in Brussels due to the danger that it risked a full-blown crisis before the elections, offering up ammunition for Eurosceptic parties. EU should insist on long extension with participation in EU elections.” The EU could not impose a long extension on the British government as any decision would need to be endorsed by all 28 member states. It could, however, present a long extension on a take-it-or-leave-it basis, leaving the British government with the option of leaving on 12 April without a deal – or signing up to a delay to Brexit of at least nine months and, more likely, a year or longer. Denmark’s prime minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, tweeted: “Since we could agree to postpone Brexit to right before EP [European parliament] election given the approval of May’s agreement, we should also be patient if there suddenly is a cross-party way forward in UK. There is a risk by being ambiguous you create a crisis on the UK side.” EU diplomats were quick to point to the legal text in last month’s decision on extension agreed by May and the 27 leaders. It states that the UK would be “under obligation” to hold elections if still a member state on 23 May. One EU diplomat said the prime minister had created “a darkest hour moment” that could help her agree the withdrawal agreement and a revised political declaration by 22 May. But it could also end in no deal, the diplomat said.

George Osborne has said that MPs are being asked “to deliver something impossible” in leaving the EU without damaging Britain, calling for a long delay in the Brexit process. Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme before the People’s Vote demonstration, where hundreds of thousands of people will march through central London on Saturday, the former chancellor said: “If you ask politicians to deliver something impossible don’t be surprised if they cannot. “As it happens, if I was a hard Brexiteer … I’d just get out and rip the plaster off and endure the pain, but it’s a lot of pain and a big shock. The best outcome now would be a long delay, and it’s not the worst thing in the world to ask people to vote for some MEPs, and certainly better than stockpiling medicine and turning Kent into a car park. More than 4 million sign Brexit petition to revoke article 50 Read more “So I think the best outcome is a long delay where we rethink how we deliver on the referendum result and we try and find a majority for a compromise Brexit agreement and possibly have a second referendum.” Osborne was asked about calling Theresa May a “dead woman walking”, to which he said: “After that election she called [in 2017] … I never thought she could recover authority and I said it at the moment.” The education minister, Nadhim Zahawi, said: “If parliament decides to vote down the prime minister’s withdrawal agreement, then I think it would be political meltdown and parliament would have failed.” Zahawi also said he was not prepared to tell his constituents that the UK would take part in the EU elections. “Each and every one of us will have to ask ourselves the question: ‘Am I prepared to go back to my constituents and say we’re not leaving the EU, we’re going to go for a much longer extension, and we’re going to take part in the European elections?’ I’m not prepared to do that. I don’t think the prime minister is prepared to do that.” The comments came as hundreds of thousands of people head to London on Saturday to march on parliament calling for the public to be given a final say on Brexit. Protesters will travel from all over the UK and further afield for the People’s Vote campaign’s Put it to the People march, after a similar rally in October drew crowds of 700,000. The march will move from Park Lane to Parliament Square from midday, followed by a rally in front of parliament. Labour’s deputy leader, Tom Watson, is expected to tell crowds that he believes the only way to resolve the current impasse is “for people themselves to sign it off”.

Any delay to the UK leaving the EU could cost the government tens of millions in extra payments to keep its no-deal ferry contracts in place. Conservatives tell MEPs to consider election bid if Brexit deal fails Read more It seems unlikely the contracts will now be realised after MPs voted to instruct Theresa May to seek an extension to article 50, which would delay Brexit beyond 29 March. According to the Financial Times, the cost of the delay could reach £28m. Brittany Ferries, which has contracts worth £46.6m under the deal, said the terms “included fair and proportionate compensation in a deal scenario, taking account of the significant preparatory work and concomitant costs incurred”. It said the firm had already “incurred a series of direct costs and resource commitments”, including hiring new staff and changing more than 20,000 bookings, and “the new schedule cannot now be changed, even as an extension to article 50 seems likely”. 'I feel frustrated': the Brexit view from Edinburgh and Hastings Read more The contracts are intended to ensure imports of medicines and other vital supplies to the UK continue in the event of a no-deal Brexit causing chaos on the short Dover-Calais and Channel tunnel routes. A National Audit Office memorandum in February noted the potential problems caused by a delay to the article 50 process. “If the date of the UK’s exit from the EU changes, and there is still the possibility of a no-deal EU exit, the department will need to decide how it wishes to proceed with the contracts,” the NAO said in February. “There is no provision for the start date to be delayed, but the department may seek to negotiate this with the operators.” A Department for Transport spokesman said: “As the prime minister has made clear, the legal default in UK and EU law remains that the UK will leave the EU without a deal unless something else is agreed. “Leaving with a deal is still our priority, but as a responsible government it is only right that we push on with contingency measures, that will ensure critical goods such as medicines can continue to enter the UK.”

After the chaos, contradictions and incompetence in the UK’s handling of Brexit, European media have spotted a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. On past form, of course, it will soon be extinguished, but the endgame seems – at least for now – to be approaching. “At long last, MPs now have to decide where they stand,” said Die Zeit in Germany after the Commons voted in favour of a short extension to article 50 on Thursday evening, having earlier in the week rejected both Theresa May’s Brexit deal and no deal. “Empty promises to voters and pithy speeches in parliament will no longer cut it. The drama currently being played out in Westminster represents, at long last, the painful intrusion of reality into Britain’s Brexit debate.” Party discipline had gone, arguments were mutating and majorities were switching, the paper said. It is loud and it is painful, but it is bringing much-needed clarity.” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reckoned the UK’s “battered prime minister may perhaps have slightly more reason for hope than before. However, Le Monde warned that the “apparent bright spot” masked “a weakening of May’s authority that is alarming not just for her political survival but for the democratic functioning of the country”. In Dublin, the Irish Times said that after the “chaos and humiliation of a double defeat in the House of Commons on Wednesday, Theresa May had a relatively good day” on Thursday. Neither May’s Conservative government nor parliament had “a clear picture of where Brexit might end up”, it said. “Brexit Day was supposed to be in two weeks.

She implied on Sky yesterday she was close to calling for a second independence referendum, because she has a mandate to stage one since the SNP won the most seats in the 2016 Holyrood and 2017 UK elections, and did so on a promise of holding a fresh independence vote if there was a material change in circumstances (in other words, Brexit). She can only exercise that existing mandate before May 2021 – the date of the next Holyrood elections. Yet on Thursday she said she actually wanted to see article 50 extended and then a second EU referendum, telling first minister’s questions: “Let’s get no deal properly off the table; let’s seek a lengthy extension to allow this issue to go back to the people.” That appeals to a large number of independence-sceptic moderate and centre-left Scottish voters: many more back EU membership than independence. Because then that “material change” in Scotland’s circumstances, her mandate, disappears. Best for Britain, the anti-Brexit campaign that favours a second referendum, has put out a statement saying that it does not want MPs to vote for that today. The debate today must focus on the pressing need for an extension to article 50 to confirm parliament’s rejection of a no deal cliff-edge on 29 March and protect the country from a damaging disorderly exit. So if the treaty provides for these, Art 62 does not apply. That means the whole treaty, not just the backstop. Labour’s Wes Streeting says there is “a considerable degree of discomfort” among Labour MPs who support a second referendum about the position of some on the Labour frontbench. He asks if the party will give wholehearted support to the Kyle/Wilson plan for a confirmatory second referendum (ie, backing a Brexit deal, subject to it being put to a public vote) if it comes to a vote.