Theresa May offered 'final lifeline' to convince EU leaders of Brexit plan
The European Union plans to grant UK Prime Minister Theresa May a "final" chance to sell her Brexit plan directly to the bloc's leaders in September.
Brexit secretary Dominic Raab is in Brussels on Thursday to meet the European Commission’s chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, for another round of talks ahead of the autumn deadline to agree a draft withdrawal treaty.
But the EU has agreed to a special summit in Salzburg in September, The Times reported, which would be a "final chance" for May to push her blueprint after it was all but rejected by Barnier last week.
The PM will address European leaders at a special summit in Salzburg as part of the country’s EU Council presidency schedule, which had otherwise been scheduled to address security issues.
Salzburg could give Brexit negotiations a kickstart after coming to a standstill in recent weeks after May and her warring ministers seemingly agreed a plan to present to the EU just days before David Davis resigned as Brexit Secretary and Boris Johnson quit the Foreign Office in protest.
The issue of the Irish border is also one of the major bumps in the Brexit road with EU and UK officials unable to agree on a workable solution for both sides.
Due to these problems, optimism for a workable deal has dropped in the past few weeks as both Europe and the UK have been planning for a no-deal scenario. The European Commission recently ordered member states to step up their preparations for Britain leaving the block without an agreement.
Newly-appointed Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said on Monday the EU risks forcing the UK out without a deal – and warned that the country will not "blink" in negotiations.
At a press conference in Berlin, Hunt said: "When it comes to Brexit, there is now a very real risk of a Brexit no-deal by accident. And this is because I think that many people in the EU are thinking that they just have to wait long enough and Britain will blink, and that’s not going to happen."