Eleventh Hour: EU, Britain Agree to Extend Brexit Talks Till 31st December

Brexit talks will go to the 11th hour after Boris Johnson stepped back from the brink of a No Deal departure today.

The Prime Minister announced that deadlocked free trade talks would continue, after holding talks with European Commission president Ursula Von de Leyen this morning.

Mr Johnson had suggested that today was a hard deadline for both sides to either finally make an agreement after months of wrangling or prepare for a hard departure by Britain on December 31. 

In a joint statement they said: 'We had a useful phone call this morning. We discussed the major unresolved topics.

'Our negotiating teams have been working day and night over recent days.

'And despite the exhaustion after almost a year of negotiations, despite the fact that deadlines have been missed over and over we think it is responsible at this point to go the extra mile.

'We have accordingly mandated our negotiators to continue the talks and to see whether an agreement can even at this late stage be reached.'

It came as UK supermarkets were told to start stockpiling supplies of vital foods and other necessities amid anic-buying fears ahead of a potential No Deal Brexit in less than three weeks' time. 

There were huge queues in Kent outside Dover yesterday, following similar tailbacks at Calais on Friday, as retailers and suppliers began 'stock-building' amid rising gloom at the chances of a trade deal with Brussels.

There are fears of shortages of vegetables - which predominantly come from EU nations - for months at the start of 2021 if negotiators locked in last-gasp talks today fail to bridge a gaping chasm on fishing rights and trade rules.

The Prime Minister spoke to European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen this morning about the future of the post-Brexit trade talks and is now holding a conference call with the Cabinet.

Ministers have drawn up plans for a £10billion bailout package for sectors of the economy that are set to be badly hit in the worst-case scenario. They include farmers and food producers, chemical suppliers, the car industry and fishing fleets, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

A supermarket industry source told the Sunday Times: 'There was a conversation a week ago when ministers said prepare for No Deal. This weekend the message is that it's No Deal.

'Supermarkets and ministers are hugely worried about panic-buying. They saw what happened over Covid when people started hoarding toilet rolls and know how quickly it can go wrong.

'That will be nothing compared to what will happen. Meat supplies will be fine and fruit comes from South America but there are likely to be shortages of vegetables for three months.' 

Last night Boris Johnson seized personal control of Britain's No Deal preparations as the deadline for historic talks with the EU expires today.

The move came as Government sources put the chances of negotiations failing as high as 80 per cent, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel being blamed for the European Union's hard line.

One source said that she was 'determined to make Britain crawl across broken glass' rather than reach a compromise. 

The Prime Minister will hold further talks with European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen today with hopes of an agreement currently very low.

His Whitehall intervention is aimed at protecting vital supplies of food and medicines after January 1. He will head a new 'super-committee' to run alongside the existing No Deal preparation group chaired by Michael Gove. 

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab this morning suggested that EU intransigence was being driven by Brussels' fears of UK success in the future.

'He told Sky's Ridge on Sunday: 'I think the EU is concerned that actually Britain might do rather well once we leave the EU and is worried about the competitive advantage, even on the normal global rules that apply.'

Addressing reports of stockpiling he told Times Radio: 'We've got diversity of supply. Fifty per cent of UK food comes from within the UK. The concern expressed about, for example, about the effect on prices and tariffs; actually the increase is only about two per cent made up of potential tariff increases. 

'It's much more likely to be affected by things like the cost of fuel and transportation but the bottom line is we're not going to see shelves running bare or any of the scaremongering stories we've heard.'

The Foreign Secretary said the UK had worked 'very hard' at a technical level during the recent negotiations in Brussels but argued that there needed to be political 'willing' to secure a Brexit trade deal. 

'First of all, as you'd expect, I'm making the case that if the EU had followed through on its commitments we'd have a free trade deal. It ought to be doable,' he said.

Mr Raab added that the Government 'do want to get a deal if it's at all possible'.

Asked if talks could continue into the new year if no agreement is found, the Foreign Secretary said he would not 'speculate on hypotheticals', adding: 'But the reality is for the EU, their point of pressure is now. After January 1, the idea that they are somehow going to win concessions later that they can't win now I think is for the birds.'

Later he claimed the EU has 'shifted the goalposts'.

He told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: 'We've just talked about this at the outset - the EU has shifted the goalposts.

'We were told a Canada-style agreement was available, you've just said it in your own terms, you've put it to me that the EU is not being now willing to offer us that.

'So let us be very clear, if we are forced into this position it is because the EU wasn't willing to treat us like any other independent third country would expect to be treated and, indeed, how the EU would expect to be treated.'

Mr Raab continued: 'Well I do think it is absurd that the EU has taken the approach that it has which means that German car manufacturers, French fishermen and women, the French farmers would suffer.

'And the common sense win-win in the free trade deal Canada-style is still there to be done. And it is not the UK that hasn't shown the flexibility, the pragmatism - in the context of Northern Ireland, the Joint Committee, we've resolved all those issues.'

Talks could theoretically continue up until Christmas Day, with the Commons even sitting on Boxing Day to put any deal on to the statute book. 

Mr Johnson is, however, adamant that the UK will not go back to the negotiating table after December 31, when the Brexit transition period expires.

Mr Johnson faced fury from Leave-backing Tory grandees last night. Former minister Lord Heseltine, writing in the Observer, said: 'This government will be – and should be – held responsible for quite simply the worst peacetime decision of modern times. I know personally of members of the cabinet who believe this as firmly as I do. I cannot understand their silence.'

 'Christmas is upon us and before the country goes back to work we are on our own. Sovereign, in charge, control regained. None of that creates a single job, one pound's worth of investment or any rise in living standards. We will have risked our trading relationship with the world's largest market which accounts for nearly half our imports and exports.'

Spain's foreign minister Arancha Gonzalez said a no-deal outcome to the post-Brexit trade talks should be avoided 'at all costs'.

She told Sky News' Sophy Ridge On Sunday: 'No-deal in the current circumstances would be extremely negative for our economies.

'And if you go by what economists are saying, and there is plenty of literature on that, the UK would suffer even more than the European Union.

'We both will suffer, more on the UK side, which I think is something we should try to avoid at all costs.'

Talks were continuing into this morning, but one Government source said: 'As things stand, the offer on the table from the EU remains unacceptable. The Prime Minister will leave no stone unturned in this process, but he is absolutely clear: any agreement must be fair and respect the fundamental position that the UK will be a sovereign nation in three weeks' time. If they want a deal, it has to be now.'

The talks have been paralysed by rows over fishing rights and the so-called level playing field 'ratchet' that would tie the UK to future EU standards.

It is understood that remaining hopes of a last-minute breakthrough hinge on discussions about a new body that could settle future disputes between London and Brussels about trade laws and tariffs.

British negotiators believe a personality clash has compounded the problem because the 'Lutheran' Mrs Merkel does not trust the 'libertine' Mr Johnson.

One Minister involved in the negotiations said that Mr Johnson was being 'strong and resolute', but claimed that Chancellor Rishi Sunak was 'wobbling' over the economic cost of No Deal and was in the 'sell-out camp'.

Under the No Deal contingency plans released last night: 

• More than 3,000 lorries a week will be mobilised to bring essential drugs and medical equipment into the UK;
• A total of 1,100 extra customs and immigration officers will be manning the border by March, while 20 telephone helplines will provide advice to businesses;
• Whitehall will 'war-game' its No Deal preparations within days in Operation Capstone, which will simulate the worst-case scenarios;
• An official 'playbook' has been devised to 'map out every foreseeable No Deal scenario', according to sources, with 'Minister-approved courses of action'; 
• Live exercises have been run to move fresh produce, fish and even day-old chicks from the EU to the UK;
• A bespoke phone app for hauliers will keep lorries moving by directing drivers to the closest of seven new inland border checkpoints, while a 'haulier handbook' on the changes has been translated into 13 languages; 
• A Border Operations Centre is being manned around the clock by expert officials to limit hold-ups; 
• A Fish Export Service will issue 'validated catch certificates' and technical support for the industry. 

Labour's Ed Miliband accused Boris Johnson of 'playing Russian roulette' with the livelihoods of people in the UK by threatening a no-deal Brexit.

The Shadow business secretary told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: '(Boris Johnson) has been cavalier. This is a man who is cavalier with our national interest and frankly Andrew, he is playing Russian roulette with the jobs and livelihoods of people up and down the country.

'How dare he say it'll be a wonderful outcome when we know the impact (of a no-deal) on our farmers.'

Mr Miliband continued: 'I think it is ideological Andrew, this, I think people have to understand this. This is about the vision of the country we have in the future.

'Do we want a country with high standards on the environment, high standards on workers' rights, or do we want a country where we race to the bottom, where we try and deregulate our way to economic success?

'It is about the vision of Britain this, it is in the end about what vision you have of the country and I say we don't deregulate our way to economic success.'

The UK's chief trade negotiator Lord Frost was yesterday seen leaving the European Union headquarters in Brussels via an underground car park following a meeting with his EU counterpart Michel Barnier.

The Prime Minister is being urged by Tory donors not to agree to any EU-backed extension to talks, with a number of big benefactors signalling that they would be happy with No Deal.

One insider said: 'The worst thing in the world would be an extension. Most donors would say no to that. People just want to get out. They think we voted to leave the EU, and that Boris got his 80-seat majority because of leaving the EU.'

Internal party polling has found that 75 per cent of Tory members oppose any extension to talks.

The so-called XO committee on preparations for the end of the Brexit transition period, chaired by Mr Gove, has met more 200 times. With just three weeks to go until the end of the period, it will now be supplemented by the larger 'Super XO' committee, chaired by Mr Johnson, to finalise the planning.

The Prime Minister faced criticism from his own backbenches last night after announcing that four Royal Navy vessels would be dispatched to protect British waters if a trade deal cannot be agreed.

Tory MP Tobias Ellwood, who chairs the Commons Defence Committee, described the threat as 'irresponsible', and former Conservative Party chairman Lord Patten accused Mr Johnson of being on a 'runaway train of English exceptionalism'.

However, Admiral Lord West, a former chief of naval staff, said it was 'absolutely appropriate for the Navy to do as it is told by the Government'.

The Ministry of Defence said it was prepared for a 'range of scenarios' after December 31.

Access to UK waters has been one of the main sticking points in the negotiations, with French President Emmanuel Macron saying he was unwilling to 'give up my share of the cake'.

The Government signed a £86.6 million deal with four ferry companies last year to allow up to 3,000 lorries full of drugs and medical equipment to be transported into Britain every week across 13 routes.

A Whitehall source said: 'With this new intelligence and investment at the border, we will keep goods and people moving smoothly and make our country safer and more secure.

'Having safeguarded the flow of critical goods, such as vaccines and vital medicines, through surging freight capacity, no one needs to worry about our food, medicine or vital supply chains. We will continue to work tirelessly to ensure everyone is ready.

'As with any major change, Deal or No Deal, there will be challenges and bumps to overcome. But we have laid the groundwork to minimise the disruption which occurs in either scenario.' 

This article has been adapted from its original source.