Barnier to UK: will you keep EU rules?
-
Michel Barnier set out the basis for any future relationship with the UK (Photo: European Commission)
By Eszter Zalan
The EU's future relationship with the UK should be based on common rules, and Britain needs to decide if it will continue to follow EU rules, the bloc's chief negotiator Michel Barnier said Thursday (9 November), as a sixth set of Brexit talks got under way in Brussels.
"There is no future partnership without common rules of the game. There will be no close commercial relationship without [a] level playing field," Barnier said at a conference in Rome.
Join EUobserver today
Become an expert on Europe
Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.
Choose your plan
... or subscribe as a group
Don't miss out on
Our exclusive news stories and investigations. Influential. Investigative. Independent.
Why join?
Watch our founder Lisbeth Kirk explain the reasons in this 30-second video.
Already a member?
He insisted that the UK should decide if it wants to align itself in a post-Brexit world with the European regulatory model.
"This rules of the game are not so easy to establish, because for the first time in negotiating with a third country, the issue will be more about managing regulatory divergences than encouraging convergence," he said.
"The United Kingdom has chosen to leave the European Union. Will it also want to move away from the European model? That's another question," Barnier stated.
"It is up to the British to tell us whether they still adhere to the European model. Their answer is important because it drives the discussion on our future partnership and the conditions for its ratification".
The EU negotiator noted that comments like the one by US commerce secretary Wilbur Ross, calling on the UK to break away from EU rules on food, environment, sanitary, fiscal and social issues, "raise questions".
Ross warned on Monday (6 November) in London that any post-Brexit trade deal with Washington will depend on the UK scrapping rules set by Brussels.
Talks on the future relationship and trade issues will not start until the EU and the UK reach sufficient progress on the key issues of citizens' rights, the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland and the financial settlement.
The UK hopes EU leaders will give the green light to the second phase of negotiations at their December summit.
During that second phase of talks the EU and the UK need to decide what sort of a relationship the two want. Discussions on a specific trade deal can only start after that.
Barnier warned of the consequences of the UK leaving the single market and the customs union.
He reiterated that the UK cannot "cherry-pick" from the rights and responsibilities that came with the single market and customs union.
Barnier was speaking in Rome, traveling back to Brussels later on Thursday. Brexit talks got underway in the Belgian capital in the meantime.
The EU wants the UK to spell out what it is willing to pay from the financial commitments it has made as an EU member.
