Theresa May and her ministers “never” threatened during negotiations with the European Union to take the UK out without a deal, Michael Barnier has claimed.
The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, who insisted the Withdrawal Agreement was the only way to leave in an “orderly manner”, said the UK would have to “face the consequences” if it crashed out.
In an interview with the BBC’s Panorama – recorded in May, before the start of the Conservative leadership contest – Mr Barnier was asked if the Prime Minister or her negotiators ever mentioned or threatened a no-deal exit.
He replied: “No, no, I never listened to such a sentence. Never.”
Mr Barnier said he believed the UK knew the EU would not respond to threats of a no-deal.
“I think that the UK side, which is well-informed and competent and knows the way we work on the EU side, knew from the very beginning that we’ve never been impressed by such a threat. It’s not useful to use it.”
He added: “We have put in the document (the Withdrawal Agreement) with the UK – not against the UK, with the UK – the legal answers to each and every point of uncertainty created by Brexit.
“That is the point.”
READ MORE: Boris Johnson to travel to Scotland early in premiership to set out his devotion to Union
The European Commission’s top official, Martin Selmayr, told the same programme the UK was unprepared to leave without a deal.
“We have followed the British debate and the British preparations very, very closely and we have seen what has been prepared on our side of the border for a hard Brexit – we don’t see the same level of preparation on the other side of the border.
“You would have to establish a lot of authorities in the United Kingdom that you don’t have at this moment in time so I think the European Union have been very well-prepared for that – we could live with a hard Brexit.
READ MORE: Gordon Brown: Boris Johnson could be last PM of the UK
“We don’t think the same level of preparation is there on the UK side.”
David Lidington, the de facto deputy prime minister, also told the programme that the EU offered to put Brexit on hold in 2018 for five years and proposed a “new deal for Europe”.
He said: “Martin (Selmayr) sort of said ‘Look, why don’t we have a deal whereby we just put all this on ice for five years? … Let’s see how things go, let’s get the UK involved with France and Germany, let’s see how the dust settles and let’s talk about whether we can come to a new deal for Europe’.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel