Boris Johnson raised his arms high in the air in an apparent expression of triumph this evening on his return from unexpectedly encouraging talks with European counterparts.
Both Emmanuel Macron today, and Angela Merkel yesterday, gave the British PM a glimmer of hope of pulling off his plan to leave the EU with a deal which does not include the hated Irish backstop.
Glimpsed as his ministerial car pulled up to Downing Street today following lunch with the French President in Paris the PM was seen to hold both raised fists aloft.
Today the French president gave his reluctant backing to Angela Merkel’s plan to give the UK 30 days to come up with an alternative to the backstop.
Boris Johnson was seen raising both fists in the air over his head this evening upon his return from Paris
The PM returns from two days of bilateral talks with the leaders of Germany and France having made considerably better progress towards leaving the EU with a deal acceptable to Parliament than many had predicted
The PM’s hopes of renegotiating the terms of Britain’s divorce from the EU received an unexpected boost when Mr Macron was warmer on the prospects of breaking the current impasse than had been expected.
And Mr Macron’s approach appeared to put the PM in a good mood as he put his feet up on on a table as the pair met inside the Elysee Palace.
Ms Merkel had told Mr Johnson in Berlin last night that she was open to hearing how the UK proposed to replace the backstop and today the French president said he would follow her lead.
However, he did strike a less optimistic tone than his European counterpart as he poured cold water on the idea that Britain will be able to come up with something substantially different to the existing border insurance mechanism.
Meanwhile, Mr Macron insisted that any changes would have to be made within the framework of the existing deal in comments which appeared to dash Mr Johnson’s hopes of a complete overhaul.
The French president said: ‘We will not find a new Withdrawal Agreement within 30 days which will be very different from the existing one.
‘It is just that what Michel Barnier has negotiated can be amended while complying with the integrity of the single market and [stability in Ireland]… then we can find a solution.’
However, in a sign of the difficulties Mr Johnson could face in satisfying the EU, Mr Macron described the current backstop as ‘indispensable’.
Mr Johnson insisted his preference is for the EU and UK to strike a deal but he added: ‘We must come out of the EU on October 31 – deal or No Deal.’
Ms Merkel today rejected the idea that she had set the UK a 30 day time-limit and said that the true deadline for a Brexit solution remained Halloween.
Mr Macron had set the stage for a frosty meeting with Mr Johnson after he told reporters yesterday that renegotiating the Withdrawal Agreement struck with Theresa May was ‘not an option that exists’.
The combination of Mr Macron’s comments with those made by Ms Merkel will give Number 10 hope of a future breakthrough but a deal between the Britain and Brussels remains a long way off.
The EU will be deeply sceptical that the UK will be able to come up with alternatives to the backstop which are strong enough to ditch the insurance policy which was designed to ensure there is not a return to a hard border on the island of Ireland in the event no agreement is reached on future trading terms.
Emmanuel Macron welcomed Boris Johnson to the French capital this lunchtime for showdown Brexit talks and the British PM was quick to make himself at home
The pair addressed the media before a working lunch. Mr Macron appeared to rule out deleting the backstop as he described it as ‘indispensable’
Mr Johnson urged Mr Macron to listen to Angela Merkel’s comments from last night after she said the UK had 30 days to provide an alternative to the backstop
Mr Johnson has vowed to take the UK out of the EU ‘do or die’ by October 31 and with or without a deal.
He has said the UK will never agree to a deal with the EU that includes the backstop which he has described as ‘anti-democratic’.
But the path to a deal appears fraught with difficulty after Mr Macron struck a cautious tone on the way froward.
He said he was open to a ‘useful’ month of talks between the two sides but insisted that any new ideas must be compatible with the framework of the existing divorce deal.
He said: ‘What Angela Merkel said yesterday and which is very much in line with the discussions we have had from the very beginning is that we need visibility in 30 days.
‘I believe that this also matches the goal of Prime Minister Johnson. No one will wait until October 31 to find the right solution.’
He said the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier could be involved in finding an answer ‘without totally reshuffling the Withdrawal Agreement’.
‘We should all together be able to find something smart within 30 days if there is goodwill on both sides and I believe there is,’ Mr Macron said.
The French president said he believed he was always portrayed as a ‘hard boy’ in the EU over Brexit but he believed that was because he was always clear on his position.
Mr Macron said the ‘two goals’ the EU has with the backstop are maintaining the integrity of the EU single market and upholding the Good Friday Agreement.
He explained: ‘The Irish backstop, as we call it, is a point that has been negotiated in the context of the geography of Ireland and the past political situation.
‘So it is an important element that allows us first of all to guarantee the stability in Ireland and also the integrity of the single market. These are our two goals.
‘When you talk about flexibility, well let me be very clear with you, these two goals have to be met.
‘We therefore have to find a solution that guarantees the integrity of the single market.
‘We have to be able to guarantee to companies, to citizens and consumers in Europe that we comply with the rules of the European Union and whatever comes from a market that is not in the European Union is controlled.’
He outlined just how important the backstop is to the EU and suggested the bar will be set very high for it to be deleted.
He added: ‘The key elements of this [Withdrawal] Agreement – including the Irish backstop – are not just technical constraints or legal quibbling, but indeed some genuine indispensable guarantees to preserve the stability in Ireland, to preserve the integrity of the single market which is the foundation of the European project and this is fully part of this accord negotiated by the United Kingdom and the European Union.’
Mr Johnson told Mr Macron that ‘of course I want a deal’ and that he believed the two sides could ‘get a deal and a good deal’.
But he continued: ‘As you yourself have just pointed out, Emmanuel, it is vital for trust in politics that if you have a referendum then you should act on the instructions of the voters and that is why we must come out of the EU on October 31 – deal or No Deal.’
Mr Johnson told Mr Macron before they entered the Elysee Palace in Palace: ‘I think we can get a deal and a good deal.
Mr Johnson stressed that his preference was for a deal to be done with the EU but he warned the French president ‘we must come out of the EU October 31 – deal or No Deal’
MJr Johnson now faces a race against time to come up with workable and practical alternatives to the backstop
The French president yesterday spent two and a half hours talking to reporters, spelling out his opposition to reopening the Withdrawal Agreement.
Mr Macron told them: ‘Renegotiation of the terms currently proposed by the British is not an option that exists, and that has always been made clear by President [Donald] Tusk.’
Mr Macron also rubbished the idea that a US trade deal could save the UK in the event of a No Deal split and suggested an accord with Mr Trump would leave Britain humiliated.
He said: ‘Can [the cost of a hard Brexit] be offset by the United States of America? No. And even if it were a strategic choice, it would be at the cost of a historic vassalisation of Britain.
‘I don’t think this is what Boris Johnson wants. I don’t think it is what the British people want.
‘The British are attached to being a great power, a member of the Security Council.
‘The point can’t be to exit Europe and say “we’ll be stronger” before, in the end, becoming the junior partner of the United States, which are acting more and more hegemonically.’
The difficulty facing Mr Johnson in Paris today was also illustrated by comments made by a French presidential aide yesterday who said No Deal was now viewed as the most likely outcome.
Mr Johnson, pictured alongside Ms Merkel in Berlin last night, was given an unexpected boost after the German chancellor suggested she was open to listening to backstop alternatives
Ms Merkel said that she hoped a deal could be done but insisted Germany is ready for No Deal
Mr Johnson welcomed her 30 day timetable as he told the German chanceller: ‘I am more than happy with that’
The aide also insisted the UK will pay all of the £39 billion Brexit divorce bill even if it quits the bloc without an agreement.
‘The scenario that is becoming the most likely is one of No Deal,’ the official said.
‘The idea of saying “there’s not a deal, so I won’t pay” does not work. We cannot imagine that a country like the UK would back out of an international commitment.”
The official added: ‘There’s no magic wand that makes this bill disappear.’
Ms Merkel raised hopes of a Brexit resolution last night as she addressed the media in Berlin alongside Mr Johnson before a working dinner.
She said the backstop had always been a ‘fallback position’ and would only come into effect if no other solution could be agreed that would protect the ‘integrity of the single market’.
But she then added: ‘If one is able to solve this conundrum, if one finds this solution, we said we would probably find it in the next two years to come but we can also maybe find it in the next 30 days to come.
‘Then we are one step further in the right direction and we have to obviously put our all into this.’
Mr Johnson said the ‘onus is on us’ to produce solutions for the Northern Irish border issue and he welcomed the ‘blistering timetable of 30 days’ proposed by Ms Merkel in which to come up with the answers.
He added: ‘I think what we need to do is remove it whole and entire – the backstop – and then work, as Chancellor Merkel says, on the alternative arrangements.
‘There are abundant solutions which are proffered, which have already been discussed. I don’t think, to be fair, they have so far been very actively proposed over the last three years by the British Government.
‘You (Mrs Merkel) rightly say the onus is on us to produce those solutions, those ideas, to show how we can address the issue of the Northern Irish border and that is what we want to do.
‘I must say I am very glad listening to you tonight Angela to hear that at least the conversations that matter can now properly begin.
‘You have set a very blistering timetable of 30 days – if I understood you correctly, I am more than happy with that.’
Ms Merkel said she wanted to ‘continue to have very close relations between the UK and the EU’ once Britain has left the bloc and that her preference was for a deal to be done before October 31.
But speaking about the prospect of a No Deal split, she said: ‘We are prepared for it.
Today Ms Merkel said she had not set a 30 day deadline for a backstop solution as she addressed a news conference in the Hague.
‘I said that what one can achieve in three or two years can also be achieved in 30 days,’ she said.
‘Better said, one must say that one can also achieve it by October 31.’
Despite the boost, Number 10 greeted Ms Merkel’s words with caution with one official telling Politico: ‘Whitehall has put far too much hope in Merkel for a decade and we have no illusions.’
Norbert Rottgen, chairman of the German parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, responded to Ms Merkel’s timetable by saying it was ‘not realistic’ to expect an alternative solution to the backstop to be found in the next 30 days.
He told Channel 4: ‘I can only state the reality that so far and since years now, nobody has found a solution so far.
‘I think we can realistically expect this mechanism to be found in one year, two years, or three years, but I think it is not realistic to expect this to be found in the next 30 days, what has not been found in the last three years.’
Mr Johnson had used his opening remarks to initially try to charm Ms Merkel as he said it was ‘obvious’ that his first foreign trip as PM should be to Germany.
But he then struck a tough tone as he said he wanted to be ‘absolutely clear’ about what needed to happen to allow the UK and EU to strike an agreement.
He said: ‘We in the UK want a deal. We seek a deal and I believe we can get one.
‘But clearly we cannot accept the current Withdrawal Agreement, arrangements that either divide the UK or lock us into the regulatory and trading arrangements of the EU without the UK having any say on those matters.
‘We do need that backstop removed. If we can do that I am absolutely certain we can move forward together.’
Despite Ms Merkel’s comments on the backstop she insisted that it would still be for the EU as a bloc to negotiate the way forward from a ‘uniform, consistent position’.
As Ms Merkel and Mr Macron signaled a potential way forward the EU and UK became embroiled in a war of words.
Jeremy Corbyn, pictured on Tuesday in Stevenage, has invited senior MPs to anti-No Deal talks on August 27
Phil Hogan, the Irish EU Commissioner, reportedly slammed Mr Johnson as an ‘unelected prime minister’ and claimed the PM was nothing like his political hero Winston Churchill.
He was quoted in The Times as saying that Mr Johnson viewed himself as a ‘modern-day Churchill’ but ‘in the event of a No Deal Brexit, the UK government’s only Churchillian legacy will be: never have so few done so much damage to so many’.
A UK government source hit back and said: ‘Deliberate personal attacks like this are just the kind of negotiation ploys that led to the failure to secure a deal last time.
‘The commission should stop playing these kind of games and instead work towards changes that could make a deal possible.’
It came as Jeremy Corbyn made a fresh move to try to stitch together an anti-No Deal coalition in the House of Commons.
The Labour leader wrote to senior MPs from all parties yesterday afternoon to invite them to sit down with him on Tuesday next week.
He said in the letter: ‘The chaos and dislocation of Boris Johnson’s No Deal Brexit is real and threatening, as the government’s leaked Operation Yellowhammer dossier makes crystal clear. That’s why we must do everything we can to stop it.’