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Brexit: EU must show flexibility, says Raab before Johnson-Juncker meeting - live news
Brexit: Boris Johnson skips press conference amid noisy protests - live news
(about 5 hours later)
In an interview with the Today programme Jo Swinson, the Lib Dem leader, defended her party’s decision to go into the next election promising to revoke Brexit without a referendum if it won a majority. She said:
Bettel says one party decided to organise the referendum.
I absolutely am determined that we keep our place in the EU. And I have not given up. I still believe we can stop Brexit.
He says there was no clear information campaign in the UK, explaining what Brexit would mean.
But Swinson would not be drawn on whether the Lib Dems would campaign to rejoin the EU if Brexit happened.
He says Brexit was not the EU’s decision.
The Belgian foreign minister, Didier Reynders, has said Boris Johnson needs to put forward concrete proposals for a revised Brexit deal at the European Council meeting in October. Reynders said:
And he says Theresa May accepted the withdrawal agreement.
It is very difficult to react without any concrete proposals so we will see if it’s possible for Michel Barnier to receive something in the next days or in the next hours.
These are “homemade problems”, he says.
Asked what his message was for Boris Johnson, Reynders replied: “To come to the council and to come, maybe, with some ideas.”
He says he will not accept that EU leaders, or the European commission, are to blame for what happened.
There were two other important lines in Dominic Raab’s Today interview, in addition to what the foreign secretary said about it now being time for the EU to compromise in the Brexit talks. (See 9.07am.)
And that’s it. The protesters cheer as Bettel leaves.
Raab insisted that the UK was not considering extending the planned Brexit transition period. Under the withdrawal agreement negotiated by Theresa May, there would be a transition period after the UK left the EU during which it would effectively remain bound by EU law, to allow both sides time to adjust. Originally the transition was due to last 21 months, ending in December 2020, although there was an option to extend it for a year or two. It the UK were to leave on 31 October, as the government wants, it would only last 14 months. Yesterday Stephen Barclay, the Brexit secretary, hinted the government might want to use the option to extend. But Raab seemed to rule out the idea. He told Today:
I will post a summary and a verdict soon.
No, it is not something under consideration.
Q: Did Johnson say he would obey the law? He has implied he would not.
This may be more wishful thinking than a firm guide to the future. The plan was for the transition to last until the UK and the EU had negotiated a future trade deal. But Phil Hogan, who has just been appointed as the EU’s new trade commissioner, told the Irish Times last week that it would take him up to eight months to put a new negotiating team together. After that negotiating a trade deal with the UK would take “a number of years”, he said. Even if the UK and the EU were to agree a withdrawal agreement next week, it is impossible to imagine a full trade deal being completed by December next year.
Bettel replies:
Raab hinted that the government would want to test the Benn Act passed by parliament with the intention of ruling out a no-deal Brexit. Asked if the government would defy the law, as some briefing from Number 10 has implied, he replied:
This would not happen in Luxembourg.
The UK government is always going to behave lawfully. I think the suggestion otherwise is nonsense.
Bettel says before Brexit people said to voters in the UK that they would get money back, that Brexit would happen in 24 hours, and that it would all be fine.
But he also claimed that the legislation was “deeply, deeply flawed”. He went on:
No one called out the lies, he says.
So obviously we would look at all the implications and all the variables with it ...
That is because people in the EU were not strong enough to says that lies were being told.
I think the precise implications of the legislation need to be looked at very carefully. We are doing that.
Bettel accuses leave campaigners of lying during the referendum.
At the weekend Jolyon Maugham, the barrister and director of the Good Law Project who helped to organise the Scottish legal challenge against the prorogation decision, published a blog identifying a loophole in the act.
Q: What do you think of the proposal from Stephen Barclay for the transition period to be extended?
In case you missed it: how a flaw in the Act designed to stop No Deal leaves a clear pathway to No Deal. https://t.co/oY8T88HYHJ
Bettel says his citizens want certainty.
The Finnish European affairs minister, Tytti Tuppurainen, has said the UK has still not put forward any proposals that could “compensate” for the removal of the Irish backstop. Speaking as she arrived at a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels, she said:
This is a nightmare ...
We have to remain open and see what happens in the domestic politics of the United Kingdom.
Imagine you are a European citizen in London, and you don’t know what the future will look like.
Of course the European Union is always ready to negotiate when a proper proposal from the United Kingdom side is presented. So far I haven’t seen any proposal that would compensate the current backstop in the withdrawal agreement.
He says speaking about new delays is not in the interests of EU citizens.
Here is my colleague Peter Walker’s story about what Dominic Raab has been saying this morning.
Q: Do you think Brexit will actually happen?
Raab accuses EU of political posturing before Johnson talks
Bettel says Johnson told him there would not be a second referendum.
Boris Johnson goes to Luxembourg today for what might be one of the most important meetings he has had with any of his EU counterparts in his quest for a Brexit deal. He is having lunch with Jean-Claude Juncker, the outgoing president of the European commission, and although the EU October summit, which is seen by many as the place where an agreement may or may not get finalised, is more than a month away, in an article for today’s Daily Telegraph (paywall) Johnson claims the next few days will be crucial in determining whether a deal can be done. He says:
He says his own preference is for a deal.
If we can make enough progress in the next few days, I intend to go to that crucial summit on Oct 17, and finalise an agreement that will protect the interests of business and citizens on both sides of the Channel, and on both sides of the border in Ireland.
He says he cannot guarantee whether or not Johnson can get a deal through parliament.
In August, Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, appeared to give Johnson a 30-day deadline to come up with an alternative to the backstop that was acceptable to the EU and would allow the two sides to reach an agreement. Twenty-six days later EU figures are complaining that the UK still has not tabled any firm plans for a backstop replacement. But, in interviews this morning, Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary, insisted the EU knew exactly what the UK was proposing and that a plan had just not been tabled formally because that would become a “trap”. He told Sky News:
Bettel says his meeting with Johnson took longer than planned. He says he told Johnson: “I hear a lot, but I don’t read a lot.”
On all sides, for those that don’t want a deal, or who want to put pressure on the UK, there’s an attempt to elicit more and more concessions, and more and more detail, as a diplomatic pressure exercise. We are not going to fall into that trap.
He says he needs to see proposals in writing.
But I can reassure you that the details and the shape of the deal have been discussed at a political level, and Boris Johnson is out there talking to Jean-Claude Juncker today about that. They’ve been discussed at technical level.
He says the UK cannot blame the EU because they do not know how to get out of a situation they created.
Raab said it was now up to the EU to compromise. He told Sky:
Bettel says he was not here to negotiate. The negotiator is Michel Barnier.
So this isn’t about whether enough technical content has been provided. It is about whether there’s the political will on the EU’s side to do a deal which I still believe would be in both sides’ interests.
Q: Did you hear any new proposals from Johnson? Do you think you are making good progress?
And he delivered the same message on the Today programme, when he said it was up to the EU to show “pragmatism and flexibility”. He said:
Bettel says the only proposal on the table is the withdrawal agreement. He says the clock is ticking. The EU will not accept any proposal that undermines the Good Friday agreement. The Irish are part of the EU family, he says.
We’ve been clear [what the UK is proposing] and will continue to flesh out and respond to any questions. But of course, at some point, the EU is going to have to put up its hand and say: ‘OK, we know that there’s the requirement for some pragmatism and flexibility to get this deal over the line’, because the previous deal, which I understand why they want to stick to, failed so dramatically ...
Bettel says Luxembourg’s priority is to protect the single market.
I think it has come to that moment in time, as we lead into the October council, for the decisions to be made. We’re willing and able to do a deal on the terms I’ve described. The question now is whether the EU has got the political will to meet us to get that deal which is good for both sides.
He says the EU needs firm proposals.
I will post more from his interviews shortly.
He says the EU will not grant another extension to the UK just for the sake of it.
Here is the agenda for the day.
The UK has always been a close friend of Luxembourg’s, he says. That will not change because of Brexit.
11am: Downing Street lobby briefing.
But people need clarity and certainty. You cannot hold a country hostage for party political reasons.
11am: Paschal Donohoe, the Irish finance minister, gives a speech on Brexit in Dublin.
Gesturing towards the empty podium, he says the clock is ticking. Johnson needs to use his time wisely.
11am: Chuka Umunna, the former Labour MP who is now the Lib Dem foreign affairs spokesman, speaks at the Lib Dem conference.
Boris Johnson and Xavier Bettel have just left the PM’s office.
11am (UK time): Boris Johnson meets Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European commission, for lunch.
Bettel is speaking to the press alone.
1pm (UK time): Johnson holds a meeting with Xavier Bettel, the prime minister of Luxembourg. At around 2.15pm UK time they are due to hold a press conference.
He says demonstrating is a right in a democracy.
4.10pm: Sir Ed Davey, the Lib Dem deputy leader and Treasury spokesman, speaks at the Lib Dem conference.
He says he wants to thank Boris Johnson. It was important to listen to Johnson, and to hear concrete proposals from him.
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, although I will mostly be focusing on Brexit-related matter. I plan to publish a summary when I wrap up.
You can read all the latest Guardian politics articles here. Here is the Politico Europe roundup of this morning’s political news. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’s top 10 must-reads.
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