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BRITISH PRIME MINISTER Theresa May heads to President Emmanuel Macron’s “summer Elysee Palace” on the Mediterranean coast, seeking to soften resistance to a Brexit plan which has upended her government while failing to win over sceptical EU negotiators.
She and Macron will hold an “informal” two-hour meeting at Bregancon, a 17th-century fort long favoured by French presidents as a summer retreat.
“The plan was to go to Bregancon, which is to be a summer residence but also a place for working, and since May was finishing her vacation in Italy we proposed hosting her here,” a source said.
May is going to lay out “London’s position on the Brexit talks and its future relations with the EU,” the source said. “It will be the occasion to clarify this proposal and discuss the political context.”
There will be no press statement afterwards, because “there is absolutely no intention to speak in place of Michel Barnier,” the EU’s designated Brexit negotiator, the source added.
Barnier yesterday wrote in a number of European newspapers about the ongoing Brexit negotiations, saying that the EU is “ready to improve the text” of the backstop plan.
The backstop, which was a bone of contention, but ultimately agreed between the EU and UK last December, provides for regulatory alignment between the Republic and the North if there was a hard Brexit and is a last resort option to avoid customs checks and a border.
Barnier said the text could be changed this in the context of speaking about trade between Ireland and Northern Ireland post Brexit.
“The biggest Brexit risk is on the island of Ireland. We must ensure that Brexit does not create a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland and that the Good Friday Agreement, which brought peace and stability to Northern Ireland, is maintained,” Barnier wrote.
Today, trade between Ireland and Northern Ireland is within the EU’s common framework. As we will not know yet in the autumn of 2018, when finalising the withdrawal agreement, what will be the nature of the future relationship between the EU and the UK, we must foresee in the withdrawal agreement a solution of last resort, which can be improved later. The United Kingdom shares this view.The EU proposed that Northern Ireland remain in a common regulatory area with the rest of the EU for goods and customs. We are ready to improve the text of our proposal with the United Kingdom.
In addition to Barnier hinting that elements of the backstop could be changed, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told reporters during the week that the Irish government could be “flexible” on the backstop.
Allies
The negotiations have heaped pressure on May to win allies on the continent after her “Chequers plan” prompted two top ministers to resign in protest last month.
The prime minister has just a few months before an agreement on Britain’s divorce from the EU — set for 29 March, 2019 — must be forged in principle ahead of a European summit in mid-October.
Barnier has already shot down May’s proposed solution to keeping the border between the UK and EU member Ireland open without a “hard border”.
Under May’s proposal a dual system of taxation would be introduced which would see taxes levied by each side of the Irish border for the benefit of the other.
Flexibility?
European leaders have steadfastly voiced support for Barnier, who wrote in a piece published in French and German newspapers Thursday that Britain and the EU “are 80 percent in agreement on an exit deal.”
“But 80% is not 100%,” he warned. “Let’s be frank, the United Kingdom, having decided to leave the single market, cannot be as economically close as the rest of the EU.”
France is seen as taking a particularly hard line in the Brexit negotiations, especially on financial services, with Paris already expecting to get about 3,500 new banking jobs as leading players move operations out of London.
Companies in other sectors have also warned they might move operations out of Britain, which could prove a boon for economies on the continent.
Barnier has maintained that any Brexit accord “must conform with the economic interests of the 27 remaining EU members, and the president has always supported this as well”, the source in Macron’s office said.
But Macron also wants to avoid a “messy divorce”, which Britain’s foreign minister Jeremy Hunt has warned will happen in case of a “no-deal exit”.
“France and Germany have to send a strong signal to the Commission that we need to negotiate a pragmatic and sensible outcome that protects jobs on both sides of the Channel,” Hunt said in a British press interview before visiting Paris and Vienna this week.
The British charm offensive continued Thursday, when Brexit minister Dominic Raab said he held “constructive” talks with France’s Europe Minister Nathalie Loiseau in Paris, saying they had discussed “the progress of negotiations with Michel Barnier.”
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I want to laugh I really do..but its tragic. We’ve clowns absolute clowns running the country
the names tell it all need i say any more people
It’s a fcukin joke of a government.
Arthur Cox.
The guy that represents Ulster Banks Repo department and a guy who owes IBRC a lot of money (amongst other things)
http://namawinelake.wordpress.com/2013/03/11/arthur-cox-and-the-ibrc-liquidation/
Sorry to ask an obvious question but
is there not a slight conflict of interest here Mr Noonan???
Are you just giving the over indebted villains of the boom and their “advisers” discreet bailouts with these 100 million Euro contracts???
What no mention of KPMG?
Irish Nationwide’s auditors?
Aka IBRC’s/Irish Naitionwide’s “Special” Liquidator????
KPMG aka that “upstanding” big 4 accountancy firm of “experts” that gave Irish Nationwide a clean bill of health when it was in truth bust????
KPMG that “fine team of professionals” that go around the country terrorising small taxpaying business owners,
as KPMG have now got huge contracts from our government that has them now acting as receivers for our bust banks.
More jobs for your inept greedy boys, Noonan???
If Bernie Madoff lived in Ireland he’d be Taoiseach.
That Sh1t colored gravy train goes on!!
I agree and they had the Gaul to blame The other shower ….. Well one is as bad as the other…. Still the same sh1t and it stinks to the high heavens .
SeanJohn
If you have the Gaul to make such an error I’m not too sure you would understand anything of the substantive matter anyway.
The lunatic rodgers has awoken and back to “attack the poster not the post”.
But they’re not even running the country, they have to hire consultants to do it! What the hell do the Dept of Finance actually do?
The money was recouped from the taxpayer not the banks
You only have to look at that photo to know you’re right!
Why is this clown allowed keep his account active he just churns out pure crap over and over its accounts like this that muddy any polls or forums. Its plain to see can you just kick it to the curb already
Fool me once shame on you, Fool me twice shame on me.
aren’t all these CLOWNS the same people who oversaw the last crash…what a fu##ing joke…….eat up pixieheads your porridge is getting cold….
The Irish people are the f ing clowns that keep sitting on there holes letting this stuff happen
Pete what are you going to do about it
They pay 100 million of our money to bankers to ask them what to do with bankers debt…that’s how much of a joke this world has become.
Hey Noonan
Here is some free advice … They are Crooks hellbent on suiting themselves
But you already know that !
Hes one of them.
More money well spent by our Government..
What a shower of muppets.
They should have just put the €100 million on 16 Red…..
The time for revolution is here. How can any citizen of this benighted country not weep on reading this article? I feel ashamed at the bunch of useless, inept gobdaws we have allowed to sit in authority over us. The reality is any dog on the street could assume leadership of this country given that all important decisions are made by (handsomely) paid consultants. I volunteer for the job.
We need to bring in a few Consultants from the Ukraine, to advise us how to get rid, by peaceful means of a Democratically elected Government not governing Democratically. The interests of the people are being usurped, and abused, in the interest of the few- the same old preferred, and incompetent elite.
Johnny, no truer word was ever spoken. Now, how do we import some actual spine, you know, that thing that makes you willing to take actual, personal, risks to change this shitty situation?
Why don’t you set up a Facebook page, nothing the government fears more :D
Goldman Sachs – perhaps heavily vested interests in paying off all bondholders.
Arthur Cox – perhaps partners and clients up to their eyeballs in property and anglo loans.
I wonder what sort of advice they would have provided? Burn the bondholders? Liquidate the bank and call in all the loans?
Deja vu- it’s nothing new! Same old patronage. The Sinners are still the Winners!
Hey, advice to open something, advice to keep something open and advice to close something and all from the same over paid advisors and costing over €17,000 per day. Some one remind me why we have ministers again please?
What a joke this hell hole of a country really is
Speechless….
The Offences against the State Act is still on the statute books isn’t it?
“encouraging people not to pay their lawful taxes”
Sleepless nights for some Accountants perhaps?
“Undermining the legal authority of the State”
Well now where to begin with that one!
Seems Banksters, Developers and some TDs should examine their conscience… Assuming they had one!
Wouldnt be too bad if the advice was any.f*****g good (the banks went bust!)
Idiot bankers …idiot government looking after their idiot consultants pals & we taxpayers foot the bill. We have keystone cops, a muppet government, a justice system that jails pensioners while they let sex offenders & murders roam free. This country is sad place to live in now
Wakey wakey paddy
They should have spent the money on Arthur Guinness, much better value
An excellent example of government policy: bleed the majority of every spare cent they have in tax hikes, new charges and pay cuts while the elite are fed from the trough. And labour continue to stand idly by, traitors.
Thats what happens when we vote for people who are totally unsuitable for the. How many school teachers are in the Dail? That is the reason they have to hire ” consultants”. Imagine being hired as a carpenter and then having to hire someone to show you you how to hang a door. That is what we do every few years!
I’m in the wrong job!
Joshua
No sir! I would suggest that your in an appropriate type of employment.
How many if these consultants also work for the banks??? Do they have to declare if they do? Often large solicitors firms work for banks and revenue and they don’t declare it. Girds who they share the insider information with??!!!
So we vote a government in, in turn they hire people to do jobs who in turn have to get consultants in to tell them how to do the job.
Hmm wouldn’t it be better to just hire the consultants and skip the middle man?
100 million in over two years, that’s well over 100,000 per day, to tell people that should know what to do anyways how to do it.
Old Boys club!
Here is how ,,,,, not there fuc@ing money
It’s pretty bad that we have this gravy train to companies like these but is there even a tendering process where consultants compete or does the government just pick one and give them a blank cheque.?
All carried out by bankers! Oh, the folly!
100 million is a collosal amount but irish banks have paid the government over 10 billion in roughly the same time frame.
They may as well close the Department of Finance seeing as they can’t give sound financial direction.
I’m still trying to get my head round why we came 21st least corrupt country in the world. 21st most corrupt seems more like it!
How do we as the ultimate payers gauge what outcomes/ value we gain from the government’s spend? Crazy money
Corruption at its best in Ireland and yet nobody knows just what to do about it.
We need a new party in this country kick out shell and take it over so cheaper fuel by 50%
Kinsale oil and gas as well barry roe oil start pumping it plenty of skilled people looking for work
Bring interment back for politicians all party’s who lie for financial gain .
If they protect the chosen few strip them of all assets including business they buy back for nothing from Nama And get family members to buy them for cents .
Amazing plan.
And what advice did they get,
A) you must give more money to banks;
B) you must not give mortgage holders a break;
C) you must pay up front for advice.
In other countries, vomit inducing reports like this would have people on the streets protesting about the stupidity of it all, trying to remind the government that they were elected to serve the citizens, not the corporations.
But not here, here the citizen gets strapped to a table, gets rodgered repeatedly and relentlessly, gets lied to incessantly by being told that it is all for your own good, and accepts it without a murmur.
It’s no wonder the country is fcuked.
All modern day irish politicians are interested in are the three p’s, the power , the perks, and the pension. I have a feeling i will be waiting a long time to be convinced otherwise.
Good advice is expensive
We also give away 620 million euro to foreign aid .money that should be spent on work like the athy kildare housing project . Rebuilding of unfinished estate . 35 families rehoused
All our modern day irish politicians are interested in are the three p’s, the power , the perks, and the pension. They are just a bunch of corrupt conmen who have run this country into the ground, and disgraced it’s good name. I have a feeling i will be waiting a long time to be convinced otherwise.
If I understand the comments correctly, most people would prefer that governments not seek advice on anything, and instead just make everything up as they go along. You may get your wish.
People should stop commenting on things they don’t understand.
Clearly back scratching needs to be done to get us out of this.
It’s being done.
Michael Noonan is a national hero and a patriot.
These handful of millions will pay huge dividends in the future generations.
have your say