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Hopes rose on Wednesday that a Brexit trade deal could be sealed within hours, as intense talks between EU and UK teams continued to secure a deal before Christmas.
British officials said that while the two sides were still arguing over fishing and other issues, including competition rules for a “level playing field,” a deal Wednesday night was “possible”, with Boris Johnson on close contact with the President of the European Commission. Ursula von der Leyen.
European diplomats agreed that a deal could be reached before the Christmas holidays, with one predicting a deal on Wednesday night.
Johnson and von der Leyen have taken personal control of the negotiations, which began in March with discussions focused on the distribution of fishing quotas in UK waters after Brexit. High-level negotiators from both sides were working on Wednesday morning at the EU commission headquarters in Brussels.
Although the issue of fishing is totemic in Britain and other coastal states, including France, haggling relates to catches worth only tens of millions of euros, a small fraction of the value of any trade deal.
The pound rose against the dollar and the euro as traders bet the UK would strike a post-Brexit trade deal with the EU before Christmas. The currency, which had hit a two-year high above $ 1.36 last week, advanced 1 percent on Wednesday to $ 1.3512 against the dollar and 0.9 percent against the euro at 1.108 euros. .
Derek Halpenny, currency strategist at MUFG in London, said: “Hopes have been raised once again that progress has been made and that an announcement could come as soon as tonight.”
France has said it is opposed to extending talks on a post-Brexit trade deal between the UK and the EU beyond the December 31 deadline, when the British Brexit transition period ends.
“I don’t want to go beyond the end of the year,” Clément Beaune, France’s European minister and confidant of President Emmanuel Macron, told BFM Business television. “We should be able to finish in the next few days; these negotiations were supposed to end in early November.”
Beaune also said that it would be better not to have a deal than a bad deal, although not having a deal is not a good result. “We must give some visibility to our businesses, our investors and our fishermen,” he said.
But a rare mood of optimism seeped into Wednesday’s talks as exhausted negotiators sought to offer the public some rare good news ahead of Christmas after a grueling 2020.
A person briefed on the talks said the two sides had made progress in establishing agreements on how future negotiations on fishing rights will be linked to market access for goods, a crucial issue in unlocking an agreement.
The pound rose against the dollar on Wednesday as traders bet the UK would strike a post-Brexit trade deal with the EU, while reacting to France’s reopening of its border with Britain.
Micheál Martin, Ireland’s Prime Minister, told reporters Tuesday night: “The feeling you would have is that given the progress that has been made, I think a deal is more likely than less likely.
“I would like it to happen before Christmas. It could go beyond Christmas Day. There are political factors at play here that will govern the schedule, the calendar. “
A future relationship agreement between the EU and the UK would guarantee duty- and quota-free trade in goods and create the framework for a partnership in security and other areas.
It would also mean that both parties concluded the Brexit divorce on reasonably friendly terms, offering the possibility for them to work together to manage trade frictions at the end of the transition.
Britain will leave the customs union and the single market in any event on January 1, creating paperwork and a multitude of checks, and many anticipate chaos at the border.
Beaune criticized the British side’s lack of preparation for January 1. “We have concerns about the preparations on the British side,” he said. “When you see what’s going on, the state of preparation is not necessarily good.”
UK Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick insisted on Wednesday that Britain’s contingency plans for Brexit upheaval in Dover and Folkestone had withstood an early test, following Macron’s closure of the French border on Sunday. amid fears about a new strain of Covid-19.
Additional information from Peter Foster in Brighton
