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Theresa May has learned that DUP leader Arlene Foster is now "ready" to unleash a hopeless Brexit and considers it "the most likely outcome" as a result. a "hostile and difficult" exchange with the chief negotiator of the EU, an explosive. set of disclosed government emails reveal.
Foster appeared in Brussels after a meeting with Michel Barnier, French head of the EU's negotiating team, convinced that the prospects for an agreement on Brexit were fading so quickly that Given the position taken by Brussels on Northern Ireland, an agreement had become the least probable outcome. Senior government advisers were quickly informed that the DUP leader was "ready" for the UK to separate from the EU without an agreement.
According to a private mail exchange between senior British officials, seen by the ObserverFoster had expressed his deep disappointment over his meeting with Barnier and exposed his broader ideas at a luncheon with Conservative MEP Ashley Fox. "She described Barnier as being difficult and hostile at his meeting today …", explains the email that was leaked by a counselor involved in the Brexit discussions. "A F [Arlene Foster] said the DUPs were ready for a no-deal scenario, which she said was now most likely. "
The manager added in his email, distributed at the highest levels, that it was not clear whether Foster was seeking to threaten the government or simply to inform him of his plans.
Last week, the DUP, whose 10 MPs back the May government, said it would be ready to vote against the budget this month, if it decided to reach an agreement on Brexit which would bring Northern Ireland from the European Union closer to the rest of the Union. Great Britain. Losing a vote on the budget would plunge the government into a crisis.
The news of e-mails comes amidst new internal bickering in the May Cabinet over Brexit. The Prime Minister will launch a final call for ministerial unity Tuesday at a cabinet meeting, while more and more senior ministers may soon follow Boris Johnson and David Davis out of government.
Several cabinet ministers, including Andrea Leadsom, Leader of the House of Commons, and Esther McVey, Secretary of the Superannuation and Retirement Section, are seen as "seriously pondering their positions," believing that the current May would leave open the possibility of the United Kingdom. stay in the EU customs union for good.
Ministers said that if this were the case, the UK would never leave the EU fully. One source said eight or nine ministers had serious concerns.
Tensions have arisen because the EU has made it clear that it will refuse to sign a global withdrawal agreement – paving the way for a transition agreement and opening negotiations on a trade deal between the EU and the UK – if the UK insists on specifying a date that the 'support' customs regimes intended to prevent a hard border in Northern Ireland must end.
The Eurosceptic ministers, however, insisted that a date had to be specified in any agreement, to reassure people of the seriousness with which the United Kingdom wanted to leave the structures of the EU. the Observer understands that the Prime Minister will try to reach an agreement on a compromise position, in which the intention of the United Kingdom to leave the EU customs procedure as soon as possible will be specified without indication of date.
Government sources said the rumors that Brexit secretary Dominic Raab could leave his post were out of proportion. May will try to finalize the terms of a withdrawal agreement at a summit in Brussels that will begin Wednesday night.
At the same time, the difficulties that the Prime Minister will encounter in getting any agreement likely to be concluded by the Parliament are underlined by a new analysis suggesting that it will have to count on the support of more than a dozen Labor MEPs for to prevent his agreement on Brexit from being torpedoed. According to researchers who have examined sources such as public statements, interviews and minutes of votes of every MP in the House of Commons, May will need at least 14 Labor MPs to support her plans at Brexit they should be adopted at a vote that should take place at the end of the year.
If the DUP were to stop supporting the government, it should reach at least 24 if the month of May were to sign a Brexit withdrawal agreement that treats Northern Ireland and Britain differently.
The study by the public affairs consulting firm Edelman revealed that although it needs 320 votes to get the majority, May can only count on 277 deputies out of the 314 Conservative MPs and two former Conservatives who currently sit as independent.
He predicts that 18 of the 37 Tory Brexiters are "potentially persuasive".
However, even with them, with the DUP and another North Irish separatist unionist, the month of May still does not have a 14-vote majority.
Pawel Swidlicki, the Brexit analyst who led the Edelman study, said, "The good news for the Prime Minister is that it has a narrow path towards the majority. The bad news is that this requires not only to reconcile the DUP with the security system, but also to win a group of very pro-Brexit Conservative MPs and a handful of Labor rebels. "
