Brussels Rejects British PM Theresa May's Brexit Plan

By Peyton Rhodes

The Brexit debate between the U.K. and the EU sharpened recently, with the U.K.’s Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab attacking the EU’s negotiating position on October 1.

This comes after Theresa May responded to Jean-Claude Juncker and the EU’s rejection of her Chequers plan with an indignant televised statement on September 13. She declared it “not acceptable” to turn away her solution without offering a new one. The statement came one day after European Commission President Juncker officially denied May’s proposal for new economic relations between the EU and the U.K.

More than a year after the U.K. officially voted to leave the EU in a referendum, the future of the two entities’ relationships remains unclear.

According to the Guardian, Juncker rejected May’s Chequer plan because of fears that it would give the United Kingdom an unfair economic advantage over EU member states.

May’s plan proposed the free trade of goods across the U.K.-EU border. However, since the U.K. will no longer be a member of the EU, they will cease to be subject to EU environmental and safety restrictions. This loophole would allow the U.K. to bypass expenses incurred by these restrictions, allowing cheaper manufacturing and exportation of British goods, reports the Guardian.

Just a day after Juncker revealed the official European position on the Chequers plan, May blasted the EU for their inability to provide an adequate answer to her proposal. According to France24, May considers the ball to be in the EU’s court now.

In her televised statement, May stated, “We now need to hear from the EU what the real issues are, what their alternative is, so that we can discuss them. Until we do, we cannot make progress,” France24 writes.

EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier is drafting an answer to the Chequers plan, but in the meantime, EU member states and May’s government remain in the dark about possible alternate solutions, the Guardian wrote.

The tension and uncertainty surrounding the future of U.K.-EU relations only mount with this new frustration of May’s proposal — and both entities’ insistence on the other’s provision of a solution seems unlikely to change soon. In response to May’s comment about the ball being in the EU’s court, an EU official responded that the ball was “just as much in the U.K.’s court as the EU’s,” reports the Guardian.

The fact that some of May’s fellow British leaders share Europe’s disdain for the Chequers plan may further complicate future decision making. Among others, Jeremy Corbyn, Opposition Leader of the Labour Party, and Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister of Scotland, both made official statements calling May’s plan “dreadful” and “a disaster” France24 reports.

It remains to be seen whether the release of Barnier’s counterpoints to the Chequers plan will clear up any disputes. May and Juncker will continue to pursue a consensus on the status of U.K.-EU relations before the fast-approaching spring of 2019 when the U.K. will officially leave the European Union.