Yahoo Finance EU accused of backdoor bid to keep UK in customs union
EU negotiators are seeking to use a deal over the Irish border backstop to keep the UK in its customs union permanently, a bombshell leak that threatens a delicate Brexit deal has revealed.
The UK and EU are on the brink of sealing a deal after a compromise over the backstop – the insurance policy to preventing a hard border in Ireland – was reached on Monday evening.
It would see the whole of the UK remain temporarily in a customs union with the EU if there was a gap between the end of the transition period and the start of a free trade agreement.
In a bid to push through a deal, Theresa May will tell an emergency Cabinet that this arrangement would last only a matter of months if it needed to be used at all.
MORE: EU and UK negotiators reach breakthrough on Irish border
But, in a development that will make the deal even more difficult for the prime minister to sell, it has been reported that the EU are trying to use the backstop as leverage for a permanent customs union.
It is claimed that Sabine Weyand, the EU’s deputy chief negotiator, made the suggestion in a briefing to EU ambassadors last week.
A leaked diplomatic note of the meeting reports that Weyand said the deal puts the EU “in the best negotiation position for the future relationship.”
“This requires the customs union as the basis of the future relationship,” it adds.
A source at the meeting with Weyand also told Politico the backstop deal “set a precedent” for the future.
Former foreign secretary Boris Johnson said the Cabinet should veto the deal in light of the reports.
Sabine Weyand in The Times clear: if agreed, the CU backstop will not be temporary but the minimum basis for our future trading relationship, with high alignment and 'EU control' – this means super-canada impossible.
Cabinet must live up to its responsibilities & stop this deal
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) November 14, 2018
But Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld hit back at the suggestion in an interview with the Today programme.
She said: “I’ve seen that, by certain politicians and media, it’s being presented as a sort of cunning plan – the devious Europeans to keep the UK in a customs union forever.
“We don’t do this kind of conspiracies. We’ve been negotiating in an honest manner.”
An EU source told Irish broadcaster RTE that the Times’ report was not a “fair” impression of Weyand’s words.
The controversy came as Weyand was set to address ambassadors of EU 27 member states on Wednesday about the progress made in talks.
If there are no substantial objections to the deal agreed at a technical level, Europe ministers from each member state will be summoned to Brussels next Monday before an emergency summit of EU leaders on November 25.
A European Commission spokesperson confirmed the diary of its president, Jean-Claude Juncker, was free on that weekend.
But he refused to comment on what he called an “ongoing process in Brussels and London” over a deal.
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