The President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, has called on the British Prime Minister, Theresa May, to provide “clarity” and more details about the kind of relations her country wants with the European Union after Brexit.
During the debate during the European Parliament plenary session on Tuesday 13 March, ahead of the adoption of a resolution on these future relations by MEPs (see EUROPE 11979), Mr Juncker called on London to translate words into a effective action, particularly with regard to the “treaties”. Mr Juncker also highlighted the determination expressed over recent days by Ms May to negotiate a “constant” partnership, which would not be renegotiated on a recurrent basis. He said that this was also what the EU wanted.
The former Luxembourg Prime Minister repeated his regret about the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU after 40 years of working together. Nonetheless, he did warn that things would not be able to remain "unchanged" once the United Kingdom has become a third country and that the British would not be able to continue cooperating with the EU in the areas that exclusively interested them, without having to assume the consequences of their “cherry picking". (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)