The European Union agreed Monday to offer the United Kingdom a 21-months period in 2019 after Brexit, during which the country will be allowed to keep “status quo” of EU membership.
“The Council, meeting in EU27 format, adopted supplementing negotiating directives for the Brexit negotiations, which detail the EU27 position regarding a transition period. These negotiating directives provide the Commission, as the EU negotiator, with a mandate to start discussions with the United Kingdom on this matter,” the Council of the European Union said in a statement.
According to Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva, the document was adopted “speedily.”
This was also confirmed by Sabine Weyand, the deputy to EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, who said on Twitter that it took ministers a few minutes.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the UK prime minister noted that the United Kingdom and the European Union have a number of differences in their stances on the conditions for the post-Brexit transition period.
“The formal directives will be released this afternoon. This will be a negotiation and there will naturally be some distance in the detail of our starting positions,” the spokesperson said at a briefing.
The EU Council decision was taken amid the expected heated debates in the United Kingdom, reasoned by the EU withdrawal bill, which should turn EU legislation into domestic law by Brexit day in March 2019. The remain-supporters in the House of Lords of the UK Parliament are scheduled to vote for a motion of regret that the nation doesn’t have another say over the Brexit decision.