Michel Barnier defends Brexit transition deal agreed with Britain

EU chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has strongly defended the transition deal agreed with Britain in the last few days as a major advance.

On Ireland, he said what was important was Britain’s new commitment to put legally binding language on the “backstop” into the Withdrawal Agreement.

Mr Barnier was speaking after a meeting of European affairs ministers in Brussels which gave unanimous backing to the deal on transition, to some 70 per cent of a Withdrawal Agreement, and as well as proposed EU guidelines for the next round of talks.

The latter will now go to EU leaders meeting here on Thursday and Friday for their approval and to open the next phase of talks.

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Yesterday we were not pushing the issue back, long-fingering it, but advancing

Mr Barnier said there was now a clear engagement from Britain, confirmed by prime minister Theresa May’s letter to European Council president Donald Tusk, that an operational provision for a backstop would be made in the Withdrawal Agreement.

Legal uncertainty

Work on that would proceed in the next few weeks. They could not leave legal uncertainty on the issue in the agreement text.

The backstop, described by Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney as “our insurance policy”, provides that the North will maintain regulatory alignment with the South should no other broader free trade agreement between the EU and Britain prove possible.

Ireland remained one of the two big issues remaining to be negotiated in the Withdrawal Agreement, Mr Barnier told journalists. “Yesterday we were not pushing the issue back, long-fingering it, but advancing.” The accord which they had reached, he said, was “much clearer than December.”

In December, Britain and the EU had agreed a joint report on the outcome of phase-one discussions on withdrawal. The challenge now is to put that into legal treaty language.

Irish protocol

Britain had accepted the principle of a backstop but not in the form proposed by the Barnier task force. Mr Barnier also insisted that Ms May had spoken of her willingness to advance on other elements of the Irish protocol. He stressed that time was running out fast. “We are not at the end of the road, and the last miles are often the most difficult.”

Ireland’s Minister of State for European Affairs Helen McEntee said there had been unanimous support for the guidelines and its aim to agree an “ambitious free trade agreement”.

Text had been added on fishing and financial services, she said, emphasising that the guidelines remain a flexible document capable of amendment should Britain change its red lines.

“I believe we are all encouraged by the latest progress in the Brexit negotiations. We are going in the right direction. But nothing is agreed until everything’s agreed,” Bulgarian deputy prime minister Ekaterina Zaharieva said for the EU presidency.