Jon StoneVerified account

@joncstone

Europe Correspondent at jon.stone@independent.co.uk

Brussels
Joined March 2009

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    EU officials are "confident" that UK/EU future relationship deal will NOT have to be approved by national parliaments because it's likely to be an associated agreement with more EU-only content than national content.

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  3. Retweeted
    2 hours ago

    After reading the full official Government review into I'm posting a long thread on exactly what is in it. This isn't a complete version but will be (when finished) a pretty comprehensive list of anything of significance. So here goes...

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  4. EU official: "It's not a choice, its reality - if it's a question of EU law it's for the ECJ to do that"

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  5. EU official: "The European Court of Justice's role is important: it will apply to the whole agreement. Whenever there is a question of interpreting EU law, the only court that can do that is the ECJ … international agreements are EU law”.

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  6. EU and UK negotiators have already agreed that talks will take place both in Brussels and in London, EU official says

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  7. Michel Barnier lays out EU stall for Brexit trade talks: – UK will have to uphold EU standards including 'future developments' – No deal without access for EU fishing fleets – Spain given veto over Gibraltar

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  8. Barnier says if UK wants trade deal it must "uphold the high standards we have on social, environmental, tax, and state aid matters today and in their future developments” – note FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS. EU wants to go beyond non-regression clauses; looking for eg dynamic alignment

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  9. Michel Barnier: "When you're not a member of the European Union, then objectively speaking your position is different and less favourable. We now have to address the implications of the choices that the United Kingdom has made."

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  10. Michel Barnier: "Our aim is to conclude an ambitious partnership with the United Kingdom, but we will remain clear-headed. The most ambitious partnership is the one that we had, because we were in the same union."

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  11. Unveiling the mandate, Michel Barnier says “there is nothing in this document that will surprise you”

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  12. The EU has published its negotiating mandate for trade talks with the UK, you can read it here

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  13. Some more Charleroi photos

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  14. also worth nothing that under the withdrawal agreement Boris Johnson has negotiated, failing to negotiate zero tariffs and quotas with the EU customs area means…. tariffs and quotas on goods moving between different parts of the United Kingdom 🤯

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  15. this isn’t just nitpicking- the UK points to the obligations the EU imposes on Canada with CETA and says ‘can’t we just do that’? but it does not achieve its stated objective, and the EU wants more obligations in exchange for more access, to ensure its producers can’t be undercut

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  16. boring trade tweet: the UK says it wants zero tariffs and quotas with the EU, but also that it wants a free trade agreement like Canada’s. this is contradictory because Canada’s free trade agreement (CETA) doesn't eliminate all tariffs and quotas

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  17. Charleroi station is quite cool, too

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  18. Also the English language audioguide (which is supposed to be a miner who witnessed the disaster showing you around) is done in a broad Yorkshire accent to simulate the effect of a Walloon accent to a French speaker

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  19. The museum is really well done (get the audioguide) and as well as being a memorial to the disaster it’s also partly about migrant labour - the workers killed were from 12 countries, most from Italy - many came to Belgium after WWII on a guest worker programme to help rebuild

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  20. Charleroi in Belgium has a reputation for being a bit bleak (‘ugliest city in Europe’) and to be honest it is a bit... but you should go anyway and visit Le Bois du Cazier, a great museum of industrial history on the site of a coal mine where 262 miners died in a disaster in 1956

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