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Sunday 20 December 2020
Brexit pact in the last minute?
McAllister: no possibility of ratification
In order to properly approve a post-Brexit deal, the contract should have been in effect before midnight. It doesn’t, the EU and Britain still want to negotiate. Even if they do reach an agreement, the question remains how the agreement will be ratified.
After the renewed delay in negotiations on a Brexit trade pact, the European Parliament no longer sees any possibility of ratification in time before the end of the year. Brexit Commissioner David McAllister said. The Brexit group in parliament will discuss in the morning what options are left, said the CDU politician. Negotiators from the European Union and Britain had not reached an agreement over the weekend on the contract, which will regulate economic relations from January 1. Negotiations should continue on Monday.
The deadline set by the European Parliament has already expired: only if a terminated agreement had been in force before midnight on Sunday could it have been officially confirmed in a very abbreviated process. “Unfortunately, it is not yet clear whether the two parties can reach an agreement,” McAllister said. “Therefore, there can be no formal approval procedure in the European Parliament before the end of the year.” SPD Brexit expert Bernd Lange also emphasized: “The normal parliamentary procedure for a deal is no longer possible and there will be no further ratifications until December 31, 2020. Now we have to think very objectively about how we will handle the situation.” .
Now three variants are conceivable, but from McAllister’s point of view, all are legally difficult: if an agreement is still reached, it could be enforced for now. This is decided by the Council of States of the EU without the Parliament having a voice. The green deputies are calling for the deadline for negotiations and ratification to be extended. The third option would be a kind of technical break at the end of the year: “stop the clock.” If no deal or other deal is successful, tariffs, legal uncertainty and high trade barriers threaten since January 1.
