Britain is free to change its mind and stay in the EU, but would have to give up special perks including the hard-fought budget rebate, the European parliament’s coordinator on Brexit has said.
The Liberal MEP Guy Verhofstadt picked up on comments made by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, on Tuesday that the door to the EU would remain open to Britain during Brexit negotiations.
“I agree,” he said. “But like Alice in Wonderland, not all the doors are the same. It will be a brand new door, with a new Europe, a Europe without rebates, without complexity, with real powers and with unity.”
The Belgian politician, who leads the liberal group in the parliament, is a staunch federalist and has long objected to the British rebate negotiated by Margaret Thatcher, which gives the UK a generous discount on EU membership fees.
Opposition to the British rebate is widely shared in the EU and the issue was bound to have been on the table in the next round of EU budget negotiations if Britain had planned to stay.
The UK also enjoys a permanent opt-out from joining the single currency and can pick and choose on some justice and police policies – special arrangements that irritate some politicians who think they make the EU too complicated.
Macron and Verhofstadt were clear that the door would close once Britain formally leaves the EU at the end of Brexit negotiations in March 2019. From that moment, the door is shut and Britain would have to apply for membership if it wished to rejoin.
Verhofstadt was speaking at a debate before an EU summit next week, which will be the first time Theresa May faces all EU leaders since her humiliation at the ballot box.
As is now customary, the 27 leaders are expected to meet without the British prime minister for an update on Brexit. But the agenda is dedicated to defence and migration, two areas the EU prioritises for deeper cooperation. EU diplomats are unwilling to allow Brexit to derail the rest of the EU’s plans as they seek to stress that the bloc is moving on without Britain.
Jean-Claude Juncker, the European commission president, did not refer to Brexit during his address to MEPs as he called for action on his latest defence cooperation plan. “The simple truth is that no European country alone can tackle the scale and complexity of the challenges we face,” he said. “Neither can we rely on any foreign power to do it for us. We cannot outsource our own security.”
Juncker’s chief of staff has said the commission leader will spend no more than half an hour a week on Brexit.
