LONDON (CU)_The United Kingdom says the country’s relations with the European Union is not yet at a ‘gin and tonic’ stage since the trade deal agreed between the two parties came into force six weeks ago.
Comparing the situation to a bumpy start to a flight, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s top minister on Brexit affairs, Michael Gove, said: “We all know that when an aeroplane takes off, that is the point where you sometime get an increased level of turbulence.”
The Minister nevertheless claimed he is confident that relations between the parties will improve overtime.
“[…] eventually, you then reach a cruising altitude and the crew tell you to take your seatbelt off and enjoy a gin and tonic and some peanuts.”
“We are not at the gin and tonic and peanut stage yet, but I am confident we will be,” he added.
However, the UK’s chief Brexit negotiator Lord David Frost claims that the relationship between London and Brussels has been “more than bumpy” and more “problematic” than he had hoped.
Citing “niggling border issues” and the EU’s recent threat to increase controls on vaccine exports to Northern Ireland, as examples, Lord Frost called for “a different spirit” from Brussels going forward.
The post-Brexit trade deal agreed between the parties on Christmas Eve came into force on January 1.
Lord Frost said the United Kingdom’s vision for future relations with the EU is a “friendly cooperation between sovereign equals”. “I don’t think it has been quite the experience of the last few weeks, if we are honest about it,” he noted.
Speaking to a Lords committee on the EU, London’s chief Brexit negotiator noted that the bloc’s indefinite ban on UK shellfish, as well as criticism of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Coronavirus vaccine by EU figures, including French President Emmanuel Macron, added to the problems of border issues and threats to restrict vaccine exports to Northern Ireland.
Although none of these issues are in themselves dramatic, however, some of them have been “very, very serious,” he noted.
“I think it has been more than bumpy in the last six weeks, I think it has been problematic.”
Nevertheless, Lord Frost said he thinks the EU is still adjusting to “the existence of a genuinely independent actor in their neighbourhood”, adding that he hoped the parties would get over this.
“It is going to require a different spirit, probably, from the EU, but I am sure we are going to see that and some of this subside as we go forward.”
