The UK and the EU have reached last-minute deals that have been significantly reset in relations after breakthroughs in checking fisheries rights and food and other produce.
Under the contract, Brussels, which was finalised several hours before the London Crunch Summit, has dropped its request to link the term of the contract over food and produce with fishing rights.
According to EU sources, access to UK fishing waters is recognized as an extension of 12 years until the end of June 2038. But in return, the agreement on easy checks of food, animals and other agricultural products known as the Sanitation and Plants Organisation (SPS) will remain indefinite.
The length of the fishing rights trade has led to criticism from conservatives and reformed Britain. However, Downing Street will oppose the EU’s demand for a time-limited SPS trading and permanent arrangements regarding fishing, and will argue that the UK’s objectives have been achieved.
One UK official said the deal would not change current access to fish to the UK or changes to UK or EU allocations, thus protecting the fishing community.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenok said the 12-year range of the contract showed the UK as “a rule taker from Brussels again.”
Officials from the UK government said the UK’s fishing contracts were “not about an annual renegotiation merry-go-round where EU boats can never be seen without discerning, but about protecting their rights and long-term security.”
The summit is also expected to set up closer defence cooperation, including ways to enable EU travelers to participate in faster EU access via E-Passport Gates, as Kielstarmer hosts European Commission Chairman Ursula von del Reyen at the Lancaster House in central London.
Other sets of issues, including the shape of mutual youth mobility schemes, have not been determined. This continues with regard to the UK’s claim that the EU is opposed.
Another complexity of the youth mobility scheme is understood to be related to the EU’s demand for the UK to return to the Erasmus+ University and Vocational Training Exchange Scheme.
UK officials are concerned that automatic returns to the programme mean that EU citizens are eligible to pay lower domestic fees at UK universities, rather than high-rat students that resonate with foreign students who may cost the sector.
EU sources said they were “optimistic” and still could see the deal being put on in the coming months.
Badenoch tweeted in his initial response to reported details of the transaction: “12 years of access to British waters will be three times longer than the government wanted, and we are once again becoming rule takers in Brussels.
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davy said Britain should not be caught up in “the Brexit war of the past” and that British reform leaders Badenok and Nigel Farage should be compared to “dinosaurs fighting the old battle.”
Downing Street says that meetings in London can continue to discuss on unanswered subjects rather than a single event, but the overnight negotiations are similar to the occasional, chaotic talks on the original Brexit departure.
In addition to fishing and easier processes for food exports between and the EU, the discussion focuses on better access to British companies’ EU defence funds, youth mobility schemes, and how UK travelers can access the EU more quickly via E-Passport Gate.
Fisheries are a large part of the fishing industry despite relatively low industry contributions to UK GDP, with conservatives and reforms warning against contracts that will sell out the UK’s fishing fleet.
Mike Cohen, chief executive of the National Federation of Organising Fishermen, said Monday morning that industry responses will depend on what has been secured in return for any voluntary access to British waters.
“If the transaction was made over a long period of time, the question for me is: What did you achieve in return?” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today program. “If we have any benefit to the fishing industry, the fishing community, it may be worth doing, and it is all about the details.
“If we had nothing in return, it would have been a very poor deal from our perspective for the fishermen and their businesses, the communities that depend on them.”