Boris to Take Command at Brexit Talks, Tells Remainers to ‘Move on’ over Cummings

Prime Minister Boris Johnson will return to Brussels next month to take command at the trade negotiating table after tensions increased between the UK and EU in recent weeks.

Speaking to MPs at the Future Relationship with the European Union select committee on Wednesday, the UK’s chief negotiator David Frost suggested the prime minister would meet the presidents of the European Council and the European Commission to address the state of talks and to feel for whether there was room for compromise.

Mr Frost said: “It’s fair to say that we have a fundamental disagreement, at the moment, on most aspects of the level playing field. I would like, soon, to be in discussions where we’re genuinely seeing if we can move forward… but we’re not quite at that stage yet.”

“The expectation on both sides is that these are done at leader level. And, therefore, yes, the prime minister would attend,” he added in comments reported by The Times.

Tensions have increased between Mr Frost and his European counterpart, Michel Barnier, with the British negotiator writing to the Frenchman last week saying that the UK would not accept the EU’s “low-quality” deal that no “democratic country could sign”, resulting in Barnier responding that he did not like the Englishman’s “tone”, rejecting calls for a better trade agreement.

The British have also maintained that they will not continue to surrender UK territorial fishing waters to the EU. Despite reports that the EU is considering backing down from its demands for the same access, Frost said on Wednesday: “I’m beginning to think we might not make it [an agreement on fishing] by 30 June.”

Prime Minister Johnson’s planned intervention into the negotiating progress came as he continued to stand by his senior adviser Dominic Cummings, who has been the subject of Europhile and media witchhunt over claims he broke lockdown rules.

Speaking to MPs on the liaison committee on Wednesday, Mr Johnson said that it was time to “move on” and rejected calls for a Cabinet Office inquiry, saying that he did not think it was a “very good use of official time”.

The resurgence of the prime minister as the leading figure in the Brexit trade talks also comes after Mr Barnier had reiterated an offer to extend the transition period by up to two years.

Mr Barnier made the offer in response to a letter from to a coalition of anti-Brexit MPs from separatist, leftist, and Europhile parties, led by the Scottish Nationalist Party’s Ian Blackford, who had called for a Brexit delay.

Blackford, the SNP’s chief in Westminster, is also a leading figure in the campaign to have Mr Cummings fired.

Media reports from earlier in the month revealed that while both the prime minister and Cummings were on their sickbeds with coronavirus, they had squashed a plot to extend the transition period beyond December 31st, 2020, “concocted by underlings”, part of the plan being for the EU to first offer the delay to Brexit.