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SPRING 2018 BREXIT NEGOTIATIONS: PROGRESS AND FUTURE PROSPECTS
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that no agreement on future relations is to be
signed until the UK officially becomes a third
country. Separating the UK’s exit from the EU
from what are expected to be tricky negotiations
over future relations is seen as a means of ensur-
ing its “orderly withdrawal” from the Union.
The EU has insisted from the beginning of
the process that, Brexit being a national deci-
sion, it is up to the British government to pre-
sent a proposal for future relations
26
. Initial
statements by British officials indicated that
May’s government believed the UK could retain
its current privileged status in the EU internal
market while reclaiming sovereignty over na-
tional borders and legislative and judicial mat-
ters, ceasing to contribute to the EU budget and
enjoying the freedom to negotiate its own trade
agreements with third countries. The articula-
tion of the EU negotiating position on future
relations disabused them of this notion and
forced them to assimilate the reality that na-
tional sovereignty in these areas would only be
possible at the heavy price of leaving the Single
Market and EU Customs Union.
In her notification letter and subsequent
Lancaster House and Florence speeches Theresa
May repeatedly stressed her intention to work
towards a “new deep and special relationship”
with the EU based on a “comprehensive, bold
and ambitious free trade agreement”
27
. This
vague if grandiloquent statement did little to
conceal acute differences of opinion within her
26
Juncker, J. C.:
Speech to the plenary session of the Euro-
pean Parliament on the result of the referendum in the Unit-
ed Kingdom,
Brussels, 28 June 2016, (SPEECH 16/2353).
27
See respectively: May, T.:
Letter to Donald Tusk triggering
Article 50,
London, 29
th
March 2017;
Speech on the Gov-
ernment’s Negotiating Objectives for Exiting the EU,
Lan-
caster House, London, 17 January 2017;
A New Era of Co-
operation and Partnership between the UK and the EU,
Florence, 22 September 2017.
cabinet concerning the UK’s future relationship
with the EU that remained unresolved until
February 2018. May set out the British position
in two successive speeches. The first, delivered
on 17 February 2018 at the Munich Security
Conference, was devoted to cooperation on se-
curity and defence issues and the second, given
at Mansion House on 2 March, outlined her vi-
sion of a future economic and trade partnership.
During her speech in Munich, May acknowl-
edged the deep existing interdependence be-
tween the UK and the EU regarding security and
proposed striking an unparalleled agreement
grander in scale than any previous third country
security agreement negotiated by the Union
that would make it possible for the two to
maintain current levels of operational coopera-
tion on law enforcement and judicial matters
such as the European arrest warrant, data ex-
change and joint investigation
28
. In terms of co-
operation on external security, she offered to
enter into a three-level strategic partnership to
function in tandem with NATO. At the first or
diplomatic level, this would entail establishing
channels for regular consultation, coordination
and joint sanctions. At the operational level, she
suggested that mechanisms be developed for
coordinating field operations related to both cri-
sis management situations and development
programmes. The third leg of her proposal con-
cerned cooperation on the further development
of joint defence, cyber and space capacities.
The long and detailed proposal for an eco-
nomic and trade partnership laid out by May at
Mansion House represented a substantial change
of tack in her government’s negotiating position
for being its first public acknowledgement of the
28
May, T.:
Speech at the 2018 Munich Security Conference,
Munich, 17 February 2018.