Brexit expert does not believe there is an agreement – VG

The clock is ticking relentlessly towards the Brexit deadline. But Prime Minister Boris Johnson has resigned because he believes the EU demands that Britain be held accountable for all commitments and has canceled further talks.

Britain’s Brexit negotiations with the EU are again teetering on the brink of collapse after Johnson re-exited on Friday and said his government had had enough and was prepared for a no-deal with the European Union.

His chief negotiator, David Frost, also canceled next week’s talks with his EU counterpart Michel Barnier, according to the New York Times.

This is a continuation of the war of words between the EU and the UK, which really took off when Brexit negotiations resumed after the summer.

The deadline for an exit agreement is still December 31, 2020, but there is a great rush to reach a negotiated outcome. Both sides believe that there should be a proposed deal by the end of October because it will be ratified in political decision-making bodies in both the EU and the UK, and that process will likely take several weeks. Johnson has even said that a deal should be ready by October 15, the day before the summit of EU countries this week.

At the summit, EU leaders made it clear, according to Sky News, that it is the British who must make the necessary changes to reach an exit agreement.

Boris Johnsons was upset by the leaders of the EU.

“They want to continue to control our legislative freedom and our fishing resources in a way that is clearly unacceptable for an independent country,” Johnson said after the EU summit on Friday, according to Reuters.

There is little indication that the UK, under Johnson, will meet these requirements.

– With great courage and full confidence, we will prepare to embrace the alternative, added Johnson.

And the “alternative” in this sense is a non-agreement with the European Union.

Disagreement within

But Britain’s Brexit Minister Michael Gove said on Sunday he is still waiting for a free trade deal, if the EU is willing to change its demands.

– I want an agreement and I want to complete one. But both parties must compromise so that we can reach an agreement. The EU is not doing this now, Gove told Sky News.

The statement comes despite Johnson actually saying on Friday he was ready to leave the EU without a deal.

“Not my preferred option,” Gove wrote of a no-deal in a Sunday Times publication.

– Don’t agree and no one will shoot

– Are the negotiations actually over?

– It has been said from Downing Street that the talks are over. But it is still unknown if this is another tactical maneuver or if there is really nothing else to talk about. But if you look at what’s being said, it’s over. They disagree and no one wants to fire, says Erik Mustad, editor of the britiskpolitikk.no website and senior lecturer in British and American studies at Agder University.

– What is needed for the parties to meet and reach an agreement?

– It’s about the EU having to comply with the requirements for the UK to now be an independent country and no longer comply with the EU and EU rules as they had to before leaving, says Mustad.

And here lies the core of the stalled negotiations.

– But the EU insists that the UK must engage with the EU internal market as the other 27 member states do, he says.

Fisheries resources and customs union

Boris Johnson delivered an irreconcilable and pathos-filled speech to the press at 10 Downing Street.

– We left the EU on January 31 (…) and since then we have been in a transition in which we have obeyed EU laws, paid our dues as non-voting members and worked for future cooperation, He said.

Johnson also said that, from the beginning of the negotiations, he did not want anything more complicated than an agreement that Canada has with the EU, based on friendship and free trade.

– What does a “Canadian deal” mean?

– This means that they get an agreement with the EU internal market and a duty-free trade with the EU. The problem for the British is that it took six years of negotiations to reach such an agreement with Canada, and not a few months as they have done now, says Mustad.

According to Mustad, the EU requires access to fisheries resources in British waters and that the UK must be part of the customs union to be able to access the EU internal market.

Australia solution?

Now there are only ten weeks to go until January 1 and the British prime minister said he felt the need to orient people towards reality for what he thought would be the likely outcome of the process.

– Given that they (EU, editor’s note) have seriously refused to negotiate in recent months and since the EU summit has declared that they exclude an agreement in line with what Canada has, I have concluded that as of 1 January 2021 It should prepare for a relationship with the EU that is more similar to Australia’s, based on simple global free trade, Johnson said.

– What does this mean?

– This means that in this case it is the trade rules of the WTO that apply. These are rules that all countries follow when they don’t have their own trade agreement, Mustad says.

For the British, an Australian solution will actually be a no-deal, he believes.

– Now it is speculated if Johnson has wanted this all along and that he has wanted a no-deal from the beginning of the negotiations. Because this is what the Brexitists basically wanted: to break all ties with the EU.

– Great Britain loses more

– So Johnson is not desperate for negotiations?

– No, it doesn’t sound like that. But British negotiator David Frost has said on several occasions that he wants a deal because it is important to the UK, says the keynote speaker.

– Do you think there will be an agreement?

– As it seems now, I don’t think so, says Mustad.

– Who loses the most in a non-agreement?

– I think Britain is the biggest loser, at least in the short term. This is because there are customs barriers, a hard border on the Irish island and a complicated trade bureaucracy that causes goods to pile up at the borders and complicate the relationship between the EU and the UK.

According to the Norwegian Government, we seek as close and complete cooperation as possible with the UK after the country leaves the EU. Here’s some information on how Norway works with Brexit.