Brexit bill expected to total €55bn-€60bn
Michel Barnier is to make his first detailed public statement on Brexit since taking up the role of the EU’s chief divorce negotiator, as a senior EU source confirmed that the bill for leaving the bloc was expected to total €55bn-€60bn (£46bn-£51bn).
Barnier, a former French foreign minister, has made almost no public comment since taking up his post on 1 October. Instead he has been in listening mode, touring the EU’s national capitals to sound out opinions on Brexit.
So far, he has visited 18 of the EU’s 27 remaining member states, a grand tour that has taken him from the granite splendour of the Irish taoiseach’s office in Dublin to the palm-tree fringed government buildings in Nicosia.
Barnier has pointedly refused to start talks with the British government, although David Davis was permitted a half-hour “courtesy coffee” when the Brexit secretary made a cloak-and-dagger trip to Brussels last month.
Although he has pronounced on none of the big questions, he has chosen to tweet a few dry jokes at the UK’s expense, including a picture of himself standing outside the Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb.
Last month, an aide to the Frenchman tweeted a picture of Barnier and the deputy negotiator Sabine Weyand enjoying a glass of prosecco between meetings in Rome. Days earlier, Boris Johnson was ridiculed for telling the Italian economics minister that Italy would want to grant the UK access to the single market to avoid seeing British imports of prosecco dry up.
On Tuesday, the Frenchman is likely to repeat the EU’s mantra of “no negotiations without notification” at his first official press conference, billed as a chance to give an overview of his Brexit work.
Barnier’s officials have drawn up a Brexit bill totalling £46bn-£51bn, a source has told the Guardian, confirming earlier reports. The bill would cover the UK’s share of EU staff pensions, unpaid bills on infrastructure projects, and the cost of decommissioning nuclear power plants. But the number varies considerably depending on assumptions about what the UK is liable for.
