Here we go. The European Commission draft guidelines for the Brexit trade negotiations have leaked – and, as expected, it doesn’t make all that pretty reading for the British government. Although Theresa May’s Brexit speech was well-received in the UK, in Brussels many of May’s arguments and proposals appear to have fallen on deaf ears.
Speaking today, Donald Tusk has warned that it is not his priority to make Brexit a success:
‘I fully understand and respect Theresa May’s political objective to demonstrate at any price that Brexit could be a success and was the right choice. But sorry, it is not our objective.’
The main takeaways from the text, obtained by Politico, are that there can be no ‘partial participation’ – aka cherry-picking – in the single market. It warns that May’s version of Brexit will have ‘negative consequences’. It follows that any services aspect to a deal – not a given in itself – would only be included with restrictions.
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