On Friday 20 October, far from the reports made by the media, the European leaders meeting in Brussels sent a signal of encouragement about their resolve to reach an agreement with London on the UK's withdrawal from the EU, which theoretically will take place in March 2019.
The leaders thus made concessions on the preparation of negotiations for the future trade relationship that will link the EU and UK, and they agreed on adopting guidelines in December if the British government brings the last clarifications required, particularly on the budget balance.
By then, they will begin their scoping work which will enable them to be ready in December to give a new mandate to the EU's chief negotiator Michel Barnier, if they consider that progress has reached a sufficient level. According to a European source, the atmosphere in the meeting room of the EU27, and at the dinner of the EU28 the previous evening, was quite "positive" as regards things being done by December.
Officially, the first phase of the divorce has not been settled. Progress is still needed on each of the three big principles – European and British citizens' rights after March 2019, the issue of Ireland and Northern Ireland, and the budget balance – the European leaders stated on Friday.
But the atmosphere seems to be warming. For European Council President Donald Tusk, this European summit aimed "to rebuild trust and goodwill, and I think we succeeded", he said at the end of summit.
Will London give all the guarantees in December? British Prime Minister Theresa May did not answer this question directly at this summit. She nevertheless gave assurances that her government would engage "line by line" on the financial commitment that she promised to honour in her speech in Florence, Italy, on 22 September (total commitment until 2020, then a calculation for the rest). She certainly said she was "optimistic" and positive about the fact that the two parties were working to reach an agreement.
Ireland's Prime Minister Leo Varadkar also spoke of a "certain degree of trust" in the fact that sufficient progress will be made in December, even if it is impossible to "predict the future". A hard Brexit could certainly be avoided with a transition period that would enable the necessary changes to be made for the member states and also for the citizens, he said at the end of the summit on Friday.
"Mr Barnier's report showed that a significant financial effort still needs to be made by the UK. We are far from what is needed", France's President Emmanuel Macron stated. "The move to phase 2 is in Ms May's hands", he added. In Macron's view, May nevertheless gave signs of openness on the three subjects during this summit.
According to Luxembourg's Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, it will be important not to postpone the budget balance issue "indefinitely", and in December the EU27 could decide to move ahead all the same if they obtain clear commitments, for example on the method of calculation, without necessarily receiving precise figures from London. "If in December we don't have an exact figure but a list of commitments, I agree that we can move forward on this", Bettel commented.
Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel arrived in Brussels on Thursday 19 October speaking about "encouraging" progress in the negotiations. At a press conference on Friday, she said the transition phase of around two years that was requested by May in Florence was "an interesting idea", even if it is not part of the first phase of the negotiations. But, like Macron, Merkel considers that there is still much work to be done on the UK's financial commitments, and that the steps May must take on this to enable a move to the second phase of negotiations are "very clear".
Italy's Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni does not want the issue of the British budget payment to drag on indefinitely either or to become a sword of Damocles hanging over all the negotiations, especially during the trade talks phase.
The conclusions of the EU27 were adopted in 90 seconds on Friday morning, with the leaders then speaking for just over an hour about the challenges of the negotiations and even beginning to speak about future trade partnership. In their scoping work, the Europeans are expected to start looking in more detail at the British documents on the subject.
As a European source stated, the goal of the EU27 on Friday was not to "make Theresa May's life more complicated" than it already is. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic with editorial team)