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The president of the European Commission said Thursday that she was convinced a trade deal with the UK was still possible despite the “distraction” caused by Boris Johnson’s decision to violate the Brexit withdrawal treaty.
Ursula von der Leyen said Britain’s decision to apply prevailing legislation over the elements of the withdrawal agreement was a “very unpleasant surprise” for the EU and that it was up to London to restore confidence and remove the question mark that had put on the treaty.
But he said talks between the EU and the UK should continue, with the dispute kept on the sidelines of the parties’ future relationship negotiations, which focus on a trade deal.
“I am still convinced that it can be done,” Ms Von der Leyen said in an interview. “It is better not to have this distraction questioning an existing international agreement that we have, but to focus on getting this agreement, this agreement done, and time is short.”
The head of the EU’s executive arm’s comments reflect an emerging European strategy to keep trade talks with the UK alive as Brussels continues to challenge the British Prime Minister’s internal market bill that would nullify parts of the Brexit withdrawal treaty and therefore, it would violate international law.
EU diplomats said the bloc would not make decisions on whether to take legal action against the UK over the bill until after the next formal round of trade talks with the UK, which are scheduled for the end of this month.
The diplomats also stressed that the bloc was willing to channel the dispute over the bill to the joint EU-UK committee that is in charge of implementing the withdrawal agreement.
Maros Sefcovic, the EU’s top representative on the joint committee, wrote to his British counterpart Michael Gove last week to insist that the bill would violate the Brexit treaty “if adopted as proposed”.
In the 9/11 letter, Sefcovic reiterated Brussels’ call for the UK to withdraw from the bill measures that would nullify the treaty by the end of September.
EU diplomats said the language was carefully chosen to give the UK a ladder down the dispute, as Brussels is not demanding that the legislation be eliminated in its entirety, only substantially amended.
“We should not overreact,” said an EU diplomat. “We will continue negotiations because there are two separate tracks: one is the one the UK has decided to violate and the other is the future relationship.”
Brussels officials have noted progress in last week’s round of future relations talks, despite the dispute over the domestic market bill.
In a closed-door briefing with EU diplomats on Wednesday, a commission official noted that some progress had been made on the controversial issue of access to British fishing waters.
Fish aside, problematic topics in trade talks include a continuing stalemate on the EU’s demands for a “level playing field” to protect its businesses from unfair competition.
EU officials noted that while trade talks will continue, the bloc will never be able to sign and ratify a trade deal until the dispute over Johnson’s internal market bill is resolved. The European Parliament has already ruled out ratifying any deal until the UK backs down.
Ms Von der Leyen spoke to the Financial Times and a group of other media organizations on Thursday after her State of the Union address to the European Parliament the day before.
He insisted that the withdrawal agreement reached late last year with Johnson had been good business and that Britain should not reopen it now.
“As long as the domestic market bill tries to change the provisions of the withdrawal agreement, we will have a problem,” he said. “The ball is in the court of the UK to restore confidence.”
On Thursday, the Johnson administration released details of the concessions it had offered to rebel Conservative MPs to try to win parliamentary approval of the domestic market bill.
Johnson has agreed that MPs must vote to approve the implementation of ministerial powers to override the Northern Ireland protocol that is part of the Brexit treaty.
It would be up to the government to demonstrate to MPs that the EU was “engaged in a material breach of its duties in good faith, thus undermining the fundamental purpose of the IN protocol”.
The prime minister also agreed that the powers should be used “in parallel” with the “appropriate formal dispute mechanism” established under the Brexit treaty “with the aim of finding a solution through this route.”
But UK officials confirmed that this would likely irritate Brussels because it suggested Britain would act first and not wait for the arbitration to be concluded.
The concessions should ensure that the domestic market bill passes the House of Commons before the end of the month, but a much larger showdown awaits in the House of Lords in November.
Michael Howard, the former conservative pro-Brexit leader who had previously spoken out against the bill, told the BBC: “The government is still calling on parliament to violate international law. . . I don’t know what my colleagues will do, but as far as I’m concerned this is a matter of principle.
Some Tory MPs hope Johnson will use the time between now and November to resolve the dispute with the EU amicably before a showdown with the Lords.
Additional information on Mehreen Khan in Brussels
