Unable to get consensus on a final Brexit deal, 62-year-old British Prime Minister Theresa May got tentative approval from European Council President Donald Tusk for a two-month extension on the U.K.’s March 19 deadline to officially leave the European Union. There’s still plenty of issues to satisfy the British Parliament on the issue of the Northern Ireland border. As it stands now, a permanent customs union would prevent the current soft border allowing for passport free travel between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. Brexiteers hoped that the soft border could be preserved between the EU member Irish Republic and British territory of Northern Ireland. When Tusk and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker handed May the final EU Brexit deal Dec. 11, there didn’t seem like any room for negotiation. May has persisted to finally get the EU to grant and extension of Article 50.
Meeting in Sharm el-Sheik Egypt in the Sinai Peninsula Feb. 23-24 for an Arab League Summit, May managed to get Tusk to agree in principle on a two-month delay in Article 50 [the exit clause] to work out final details on a mutually acceptable Brexit deal. EU officials actually want a seamless transition to guarantee EU contracts in the U.K., and, at the same time, preserve as many economic deals as possible for the U.K. Speaking the sidelines of the Arab League summit, Tusk agreed with May that a deal is of utmost importance to the EU and U.K. “I believe the situation were are in, an extension would be a rational solution but Prime Minister May still believes she’s able to avoid this scenario,” Tusk said a closing summit press conference. May wants more negotiations especially of the so-called backstop, an insurance policy by the U.K. to keep the Northern Ireland border open.
EU officials have so far balked at a permanent backstop giving rise to objections in the British Parliament to the overall Brexit deal. May hopes that a two-month extension on Article 50 would given the EU and U.K. enough needed time to resolve the backstop, to keep the open border policy that currently exists between Northern Ireland and the Republic. May signaled in Sharm el-Sheikh that she wasn’t sure the current Brexit deal would be approved by Parliament in the next three weeks before the March 12 deadline. “We will face an alternative chaotic Brexit or an extension,” Tusk said, supporting the two-month extension of Article 50. Getting the backstop confirmed would go a long way in convincing MPs to support May’s deal, without the political infighting between Tories and Labor that has resulted in no deal. Neither May nor the EU wants a “no-deal” Brexit, something that could prove chaotic.
Giving May more time allows her to work on the backstop and other trade arrangements that benefit the U.K. and EU. When the British Parliament rejected the EU’s final offer Jan. 15, it became clear to EU officials that more work was needed to pull off an orderly transition. Tusk and Juncker’s “take-it-or-leave-it” deal looks likes its softening, giving May some more wiggle room before the March 12 deadline. Showing flexibility about a two-month extension give the British Parliament more breathing room to come up with a deal that works. “No matter which scenario, all 27 [EU countries] will show maximum understanding and good will,” said Tusk, showing a different attitude that before Brexit was rejected Jan. 15 by the Parliament. Tobias Ellwood, a member of May’s Tory Party in Parliament, sees recent developments as a positive sign for an eventual Brexit deal.
Ellwood sees that MPs from the anti-EU European Research Group [ERG], should fall into line with a verifiable backstop deal. “You need to wait and hear what she [May] has to say when she gets back” from her discussion with the EU in Egypt. Ellwood speaks for conservative in the Tory Party but not members of the Labour Party, controlled by Jeremy Corbin. Corbin and the Labor Party hoped that Brexit would be May’s undoing, surviving two no confidence votes, one Dec. 12, 2018 with the Tory Party and the other Jan. 16 with the British Parliament. No matter how bad the Brexit deal, no Tory is willing to hand the reigns to Corbin or any other Labour leader, preferring instead to work out a suitable Brexit deal with the EU. Labour leaders thought May was done politically, not realizing that the only thing Tories hated more than Brexit was Jeremy Corbin and Labour Party.
Getting closer to squeezing out a guarantee from the EU on a backstop, May looks closer to getting enough votes in Parliament to approve the Brexit deal. “She may get the necessary concessions and legal agreement concerning the backstop, but, ultimately, the clock is ticking down. If we cannot get this deal across the line, we are facing the prospect of having to extend,” said Ellwood. No one in the Tory Party wants a no-deal Brexit, with all the uncertainty on financial markets that would result. As time runs out on Brexit, Tusk and Juncker appear to show the flexibility needed to get May the right deal before the deadline. Guaranteeing a backstop arrangement would go a long way in convincing undecided MPs currently sitting on the fence. Skeptical members of the ERG and Labour party look more poised to get over objections if Tusk and Juncker guarantee the backstop before March 12.
