NO-DEAL Brexit is currently looking “very likely” as the European Union are so “rigid” and “uncompromising” in their stance on the backstop, claims professor David Collins.
Britain is beginning to see that it was “never really possible” to negotiate with the EU in a “pragmatic way”, claims an expert. David Collins, a professor in International Economic Law at City, University of London, added that a no-deal Brexit is now looking “very likely”. Speaking on the possibility, Professor Collins told RT: “No deal is looking very likely at this point. Now I hope that isn’t what happens, I hope that some kind of deal is organised and I’ve said all along I’d like there to be a free trade agreement.
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“But I think now it’s looking very unlikely, the EU is so unwilling to negotiate, they’re so rigid in their position, they’re so uncompromising and that’s really frustrating.
“I think we’re now beginning to see all along that it was never really possible to negotiate with them in a pragmatic way.”
The City University lecturer added: “I think the EU would be harmed by a no deal quite possibly worse than we would be, and that’s not the outcome that we want.
“But I think, and again, the EU seems to be so reluctant to give in, it also seems to be a point of policy with them though, we just don’t negotiate.
Brexit news: an International Economic Law Professor said no deal is “very likely” (Image: RT UK/Twitter/Getty)
“But if they do it will be at the very end.”
Referring to the likelihood of the EU altering the wording on the backstop earlier in the programme, Professor Collins said: “Well if they do it it will be likely at the very last minute I think, and it will be a question of who blinks first.
“But I have a feeling what the EU ultimately offers is still not going to be not very much.
“I don’t think they will remove the backstop so the question is if they put a time limit on the backstop of three, five years is that enough to get through Parliament, and I strongly doubt it really.”
The comments come as Ireland’s Deputy Prime Minister is preparing to travel to Washington as Dublin seeks backup from Congress to block a no-deal Brexit.
Simon Coveney, who also serves as foreign minister, will make the trip to the US next week to meet with Irish-American lawmakers behind a move to oppose the return of a hard border in Ireland.
The planned talks come just days after MPs in Westminster voted to scrap the backstop designed to avoid a hard border and replace it with “alternative arrangements”.
On the day of the vote, congressman Brendan Boyle put forward a resolution which, if backed, could see the US Congress formally oppose the reimposition of border checks in Ireland, The Irish Times reports.
Mr Boyle told the Irish newspaper: “I felt that this was the right time for the US Congress to state publicly what many of us have been saying privately for some time.
“The Good Friday Agreement is one of the great foreign policy achievements of the 20th century. It eliminated the hard border that then existed between Northern Ireland the rest of Ireland.
“Now Brexit threatens this.”
