The British parliament’s vote on Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit deal will determine the future of the country, the chief EU Brexit negotiator said on Thursday, insisting that the deal was the only route to secure an orderly withdrawal from the EU.
“If there is no withdrawal treaty, there is no transition, no basis of confidence that we need with the British regarding the future relationship,” Michel Barnier told representatives from cities and regions in the European Union.
Barnier told the gathering of the European Committee of the Regions that it was key now that the withdrawal treaty agreed between Brussels and London be ratified.
“Now is the moment for everyone to bear their responsibilities. You know the British parliament will give its verdict on this text and on the future relationship in the coming days.
“It is a vote in which the future of their country is at stake,” he said.
The British parliament is due to vote on May’s Brexit deal on Tuesday, with the odds looking stacked against her government winning that vote.
Many of May’s Conservatives are particularly sceptical about the fallback arrangement, or “backstop”, to guarantee that there is no return to a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland, seen as essential to preserving peace.
Supporters of a clean break with the EU say the backstop could leave Britain forced to accept EU regulations indefinitely, or Northern Ireland treated differently from the rest of Britain.
“This backstop,” Barnier said. “We will do everything we can to avoid using it.”
He repeated his view that the Brexit deal that May wants the British parliament to back is the best Britain will get to arrange its orderly withdrawal from the EU.
“The agreement that is on the table – the withdrawal agreement and the agreement on the future relationship – are, in our view, the only and best possible [way] to organise an orderly withdrawal,” he said.
May suggested on Thursday that MPs may get to decide whether Britain eventually joins the “backstop” plan to avoid post-Brexit border checks with Ireland.
May told BBC Radio that she was looking at allowing lawmakers a vote on the arrangement, which would keep the country in a customs union with the European Union after the end of the proposed Brexit transition period in December 2020.
Meanwhile, the EU’s top court will say on Monday whether Britain can unilaterally halt Brexit, potentially offering a boost to those opposed to leaving the European Union.
The Court of Justice in Luxembourg said on Thursday the justices would deliver a ruling at 9am on Monday in a case brought by Scottish politicians who argue Britain can simply withdraw its plan to leave in March, without waiting for the approval of the other member states.
Acting with almost unprecedented speed in a case that the court took up only in October, and on which it held a hearing only last week, a legal adviser to the court has said that Britain could indeed make a U-turn entirely of its own accord.
Such advice is usually but not always followed by the judges.
The legal clarification of Article 50 of the EU treaty, under which May 2017 triggered a two-year countdown to departure, matters because opponents of Brexit want to hold a second referendum that would give Britons a choice of staying in the EU.
According to an advocate general at the court, that choice is entirely theirs to make and does not need EU approval.