The European Union is considering allowing any trade agreement with the UK to be ratified after the event, to prevent an accidental no-deal Brexit on 31 December.
European Commission secretary general Ilze Juhansone told diplomats from the 27 member states today that the deal on post-Brexit relations with the UK was 95 per cent complete, but said wide gaps remain on the key issues of fisheries, governance and a level-playing field for standards.
And with just 41 days left before Boris Johnson’s deadline for a deal, officials have floated proposals for an agreement to be provisionally implemented at the end of 2020 before being given formal approval later by the European Parliament.
Monday is believed to be the deadline for agreement if the deal, stretching into hundreds of pages of complex legal text, is to be translated into all the EU’s official languages as required before the end of the UK’s transition period.
But France is understood to have raised objections to approval of an English-only treaty text, insisting it must be translated into French before going to MEPs for scrutiny.
Even if a deal is reached in the short time remaining, failure to ratify could leave the UK in a position where disadvantageous World Trade Organisation tariffs and other barriers would apply for a period.
Retrospective ratification would get round this problem but is likely to run up against objections from MEPs that new arrangements should not come into effect before they have given their seal of approval.
And it remains to be agreed whether the deal requires the endorsement of the European Parliament, or whether it must also go to votes in national and regional parliaments across the continent.
Negotiations continued via video link today, after face-to-face discussions were halted on Thursday when a member of chief EU negotiator Michel Barnier’s team tested positive for coronavirus.
It is expected remote arrangements will continue early next week, with a possible return to in-person talks pencilled in for the end of the week.
Ms von der Leyen said that progress would be possible in video talks because legal texts had been brought to a point where “there is now substance where you can go through line by line”.
In a more optimistic assessment than has been seen in recent weeks, she told reporters : “We’ve seen in the last days, better progress, more movement on important files. This is good.
“Within the frame of the level playing field, progress for example has been made on the question of state aid, but there are still quite some metres to the finish line so there’s still a lot of work to do.
“Where the timelines are concerned time pressure is high, without any question at the moment. Good is that before that legal text was on the table so there’s a lot to work on, because there is now substance where you can go through line by line, word for word.
“The whole team is engaged and working tirelessly day and night to reach the natural deadline we have to be done by the end of the year.”
However, key elements of the text are understood still not to be finalised in the areas of energy, road haulage, aviation, rules of origin.
France, Belgium and the Netherlands are understood to have pushed at a virtual leaders’ summit this week for the publication of emergency contingency plans to deal with disruption in case of a no-deal Brexit.
Mr Johnson’s official spokesman said: “We have been clear that we want to reach a free trade agreement as soon as possible. That has been our position throughout the negotiations and it remains our position.”
