Only last month, the Government was still keeping up the pretence of being optimistic that Brexit trade talks with the EU could start by October. Now the hope of doing so is fading fast. The European Council president Donald Tusk used a trip to Downing Street today to deliver a stark message: ‘there is not sufficient progress yet’.
“No sufficient progress yet but we’ll work on it” – @eucopresident Donald Tusk on #Brexit talks with PM @theresa_may https://t.co/02trD6qbWH pic.twitter.com/M0VzhWyDIp — BBC News (UK) (@BBCNews) September 26, 2017
This is a blow to the Government, with ministers now resigning themselves for the next phase of trade talks being pushed back, possibly until Christmas or beyond. The Brexit department’s optimism – a spokesman said in August they were ‘confident we will have made sufficient progress by October to advance the talks’ – has now had a reality check.
Tusk pulled no punches in his message on the steps of Downing Street, saying that Britain’s ‘philosophy of having a cake and eating it, is finally at an end’.
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