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Dominic Raab attempts to break Brexit deadlock in Brussels talks Brexit: Raab and Barnier claim progress but no Irish breakthrough
(about 5 hours later)
Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab is meeting the EU's chief negotiator in an attempt to break the deadlock in talks. Both sides in Brexit talks say progress is being made but without any breakthrough on the crucial issue of the Irish border.
He and Michel Barnier are set for six hours of talks in Brussels ahead of the crucial EU summit on 17 October. Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab said he was "stubbornly optimistic" about getting a deal after talks in Brussels.
Both sides are hoping to agree a divorce deal and a statement on future trading relations before the summit. Unresolved issues include intellectual property, data protection and the role of the European Court of Justice.
But ex-Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said Theresa May's plan to follow EU rules on trade in goods, unpopular with many Tory MPs, must be "chucked". EU negotiator Michel Barnier said he needed detail from the UK on its plan to avoid a hard border in Ireland.
Mr Johnson, who quit the cabinet in July in protest over the PM's proposals, hammered out at her country residence Chequers, said he agreed with Mrs May's former aide Nick Timothy, who urged her to ditch the plan. He told journalists that remaining "bones of contention" between the two sides were being steadily eliminated with particular progress on issues of security, judicial and defence co-operation after "long" talks on Friday.
The UK is due to leave the EU on 29 March 2019.
Both sides are hoping to agree a divorce deal and a statement on future trading relations at a summit of EU leaders on 17 October, although Mr Raab said that deadline could be missed slightly.
He told reporters: "We're committed to resolving the deal by (the October council) and ultimately on my side I am stubbornly optimistic that a deal is within our reach."
Mr Barnier said there was a "measure of flexibility" and if the process slipped by a "few days or weeks" it would still be possible for the UK to leave the EU with a deal, if approved by the UK and EU Parliaments, on schedule.
The EU negotiator said the "building blocks" of an agreement were falling into place.
He repeated his offer of an "unprecedented" future partnership with the UK but insisted this depended on an "orderly" withdrawal and settling key outstanding issues.
He said the question of the Irish border had come down to "minutiae" and he needed to see the detail of how the UK proposed to manage cross-border trade between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in the event of there being no other solution - the so-called backstop - would work in practice.
"This backstop is critical," he said. "It is essential to concluding the negotiations. Without a backstop, there will be no agreement."
Mr Raab said he had used Friday's talks to explain in more detail the UK's proposal for its future relationship with the EU, the so-called Chequers plan agreed by Theresa May at her country residence in July.
The PM's blueprint, which would see the UK follow EU rules on trade in goods, is unpopular with many Tory MPs, with leading Brexiteers like Jacob Rees-Mogg and Boris Johnson calling for it to be ditched.
Mr Johnson, who quit the cabinet in July in protest over the PM's proposals, said he agreed with Mrs May's former aide Nick Timothy, who urged her to ditch the plan.
Mr Timothy wrote on Thursday that she would have to make further concessions to get EU backing for it and this would be unacceptable.Mr Timothy wrote on Thursday that she would have to make further concessions to get EU backing for it and this would be unacceptable.
And Stuart Jackson, the former Tory MP who until recently was an aide to Dominic Raab's predecessor David Davis, said the Chequers plan "has not really got any friends" on either side.And Stuart Jackson, the former Tory MP who until recently was an aide to Dominic Raab's predecessor David Davis, said the Chequers plan "has not really got any friends" on either side.
"For the EU, it's outside their core principles and undermines the integrity of the single market," he told BBC Radio 4's Today. "In the UK, people believe it is Brexit in name only.""For the EU, it's outside their core principles and undermines the integrity of the single market," he told BBC Radio 4's Today. "In the UK, people believe it is Brexit in name only."
The UK is due to leave the EU on 29 March 2019. The two sides say they have agreed 80% of the withdrawal agreement. The remaining 20% includes:
Mr Raab vowed to increase the frequency of talks with Mr Barnier when he took over the job in July, following the resignation of David Davis. Mr Raab vowed to increase the frequency of talks with Mr Barnier when he took over the job.
The meeting comes after the most senior member of Theresa May's cabinet, David Lidington, called for the EU to back the prime minister's Brexit plan or risk a no deal scenario. But Labour MP Ben Bradshaw, a supporter of the People's Vote campaign for a referendum on the outcome of the negotiations, said "nothing had changed" since then.
On Thursday evening, Mr Raab met with the European Parliament's Brexit representative, Guy Verhofstadt. "Dominic Raab may say he is more confident about reaching agreement but he can offer nothing concrete," he said.
The former Belgian prime minister called the meeting "productive", tweeting that he wanted a "close future association" with the UK after Brexit that "respects the EU's core principles". "He knows the EU27 are not buying the Chequers car crash - a proposal designed around the need to hold a fractured government together and not on the economic interest and well-being of either the UK or the EU."
Mr Raab told a Lords Committee earlier this week that he had a "good professional and personal rapport" with Mr Barnier, adding that he was "confident that a deal is within our sights".
But he suggested that the October deadline could slip, saying there was a "possibility that it may creep beyond" that date.
Speaking in Berlin on Wednesday, Mr Barnier said the EU was "prepared to offer Britain a partnership such as there never has been with any other third country".
But, he added, it would not permit anything that weakened the single market.
"We respect Britain's red lines scrupulously. In return, they must respect what we are. Single market means single market... There is no single market a la carte," he told reporters.
France's European minister told the BBC the consequences of the UK leaving without a deal would be "tough" for both sides but neither did the EU want a "bad deal" just for the sake of it.
Nathalie Loiseau said the UK could not expect a deal which gave it both the economic "benefits" of a Norway-style association agreement with the EU but the lesser "obligations" of a Canada-style free trade deal.
"There is something in-between but there has to be a balance between the rights and obligations in relations with the EU," she told BBC Radio 4's Today.