Yesterday the government’s EU (withdrawal agreement) bill, the legislation that will take the UK out of the EU next week, cleared parliament. This was a foregone conclusion ever since Boris Johnson won the general election with a near-landslide majority and, in a curious paradox, the Brexit deal that paralysed parliament for more than two years, and brought down a PM, barely made the news as it finally got over its last parliamentary hurdle. In response, Johnson put out this statement:
Parliament has passed the withdrawal agreement bill, meaning we will leave the EU on 31 January and move forwards as one United Kingdom.
At times it felt like we would never cross the Brexit finish line, but we’ve done it.
Now we can put the rancour and division of the past three years behind us and focus on delivering a bright, exciting future – with better hospitals and schools, safer streets and opportunity spread to every corner of our country.
But ‘crossing the finishing line’ may be a tad optimistic, given that the government still has not resolved what its final trade relationship with the EU will look like, and last night a senior EU official used a speech in London to make this very point. Stefaan De Rynck, the senior adviser to Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, said what came next would be “more complicated” and that a “dose of realism” was needed. As Jack Blanchard reports in his London Playbook briefing for Politico Europe, De Rynck said:
There should be no misunderstanding of the fact that the next phase will be more complicated to negotiate than the withdrawal agreement.
The construction of the text for the withdrawal agreement wasn’t always easy — but compared to the construction of the text for the future relationship agreement, we are talking about two different kinds of exercises. The limitation of time must lead to some dose of realism on what can be achieved.
I will be filing more on De Rynck’s speech shortly.
We will hear more on Brexit in the Commons later, because Liz Truss and Jacob Rees-Mogg are both taking questions. Otherwise it looks like a quiet day.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Liz Truss, the international trade secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
After 10.30am: Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, takes questions in the Commons on next week’s business.
Lunchtime: Boris Johnson meets Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband, Richard Ratcliffe, in Downing Street.
As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I plan to post a summary when I wrap up.
You can read all the latest Guardian politics articles here. Here is the Politico Europe roundup of this morning’s political news. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’s top 10 must-reads.
If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.
