Newington’s Joe Knight summarises Brexit Secretary David Davis' statement on the third round of Brexit negotiations.

Brexit Secretary David Davis MP (Con, Haltemprice and Howden) gave an oral statement on 5 September updating the House of Commons on the third round of Brexit negotiations completed in Brussels.

The statement updated the House on progress in matters pertaining to:

• The rights of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens abroad
• Privileges and immunity of EU staff/institutions in the UK
• Sharing of confidential information
• Handling on nuclear material
• Civil-judicial cooperation
• Trade in goods currently on the market
• Northern Ireland and the border
• The financial settlement

Davis concluded his statement with the claim that the UK’s withdrawal deal and deal on any future relationship should be negotiated in parallel, because there are some aspects of the withdrawal deal (Phase 1) that cannot be settled until the terms of any future relationship (Phase 2) is known, citing the key example of the Irish border. The Brexit Secretary’s view contrasts with that of the European Commission, which insists that there must be “sufficient progress” on the terms of withdrawal before discussion can begin on the terms of the future relationship.

Key points

The rights of EU citizens

• Reciprocal agreements were reached on;
  • the rights of frontier workers
  • social security obligations, such as pensions
  • rights of citizens to set up and manage a business within their member state of residence
  • healthcare rights, such as EHIC arrangements

Privileges and immunities of EU staff/institutions in the UK

• According to the Secretary of State, “agreement is close.”

Handling of nuclear material

• The Government is attempting to agree a “comprehensive new partnership” between the UK and Euratom.

Civil-judicial and criminal judicial cooperation

• “Good progress” has been made on the principles of this agreement.

Trade in goods currently on the market

• Both sides agree on the need to provide certainty for businesses and consumers.

Northern Ireland and the border

• Davis said there had been detailed discussions based on the position paper published by the UK a fortnight ago, with a “high degree of converge on key issues.”
• The EU agreed that a continuation of the Common Travel Area (CTA) after Brexit did not impinge on the rights of its citizens and the two sides will draw up “shared principles” on the CTA.

Financial Settlement

• Davis reaffirmed the UK’s commitment to paying a financial settlement on departure. He said the exact figure should be worked out by analysing the UK’s obligations under EU law.
• Davis admits that the two sides have “very different legal stances” when it comes to this analysis, and that the EU negotiators might have been given a “shock” by his team’s “line by line” rebuttal of the EU’s position paper.

Parallel negotiations

• Davis reasserted that negotiations on the UK’s withdrawal and future relationships must happen in parallel. Davis later claimed that the EU was insisting on holding separate negotiations as a “pressure tactic to make us pay.” He said the Irish border issue gave support for this stance, since arrangements for the border cannot be decided until future customs arrangements are known.
• He noted further that because a future partnership deal may see the UK continue to pay in to some EU programmes, the size of the financial settlement could not be agreed until the outline of any future partnership deal had also been settled.

Analysis

Labour Shadow Brexit Secretary Keir Starmer MP (Lab, Holborn and St Pancras) began the subsequent debate, bemoaning the slow progress of negotiations, claiming that on some issues the two sides “appear to be getting further apart.” He blamed this on position papers that were “riddled with fantasies” and the Government’s steadfast commitments to “flawed red lines”, on issues such as the ECJ. He asked Davis what he was doing to ensure real progress in the next round of talks and called for further position papers on “key issues,” presumably referring to the absence of a paper on the financial settlement. Interestingly, he echoed the claim that some aspects of Phase 1 talks cannot be settled without progress on Phase 2 talks. 

A number of MPs that had campaigned to leave the EU offered up softball questions that allowed Davis to repeat some of his key talking points. John Redwood MP (Con, Wokingham) asked Davis if he agreed that trading with the EU on WTO terms, the consequence of a ‘no-deal’ scenario, would “work fine” for the UK. Davis then concurred with Labour MP Kate Hoey that anyone voting against the EU (Withdrawal) Bill would be “betraying the will of the people.” As expected, Jacob Rees-Mogg criticised the EU’s handling of the financial settlement, with Davis agreeing that the “legal basis” on the EU’s figures were flawed.

The Whips’ would have been paying close attention to the questions from their own benches, but would have been reassured. The questions from the Tory Remain camp were not overly critical, despite stressing genuine policy differences with the Government on important issues and certainly gave no indication that they would rebel and vote against the EU (Withdrawal) Bill.

Indeed, to the Government’s delight, vocal remainer Anna Soubry (Con, Broxtowe) used the bulk of her question to press on Labour’s internal divisions over Europe. She was joined by a number of Conservative colleagues, who noted that Keir Starmer’s commitment last week to Single Market membership during a transitional period contradicted the party’s general election manifesto. This line of attack is likely to continue as the Tories look to split Labour MPs with Leave voting electorates from the substantial wing of the party that back continued single Market membership. 

Questions from Labour MPs largely focused on the economic impact of a “no-deal” scenario. Many followed up the question of Angela Eagle (Lab, Wallasey), who gave a vivid portrayal of the impact on the car industry in her constituency. However, there were no direct calls to maintain Single Market membership despite the growing momentum of this campaign within the party. There was also some forensic questioning on the Irish border, with a number of MPs challenging Davis on the lack of detail in his plans. These echoed concerns expressed by Michel Barnier and Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney in a press conference earlier this week and is clearly an area where Labour thinks it can harm the Government.

Next steps

The Secretary of State for Brexit David Davis faced DExEU questions on the morning of Thursday 7 September, before opening the second reading debate on the EU (Withdrawal) Bill later that day.  Debate is scheduled to last for two days and MPs are due to vote on the bill at midnight on Monday 11 September.

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