Brexit deal news live: Latest EU updates as Tory ERG lawyers to study text

The National Crime Agency (NCA) said it welcomes the Brexit trade deal with the European Union, which set out terms on security and information sharing.

An NCA spokesperson said: “This will allow us to retain access to the majority of EU law enforcement criminal justice tools that benefit law enforcement across Europe.

“We will work with our law enforcement and government partners to facilitate the transitions necessary.”

It was hardly surprising that Boris Johnson wrapped himself in the Union Flag as he began his campaign to sell the UK’s trade deal with the EU, writes Andrew Grice.

Or that he replayed his greatest hit by recalling the Brexit referendum. “This deal expresses what the people of this country voted for in 2016,” he told a Downing Street press conference.

“I’m going to send a Hail Mary email to Matt Hancock, but I know what the answer is.” This was a message from one of my staff to our office WhatsApp group the day before our office closed for Christmas Day, writes Jess Phillips.

That morning he’d heard the desperate voice of a critical care nurse asking us if, as she was working on Christmas Day, there was any way she could postpone her Christmas Day and the visitors she had arranged to 27 December. The question had broken our hearts because we knew the answer.

A senior member of the UK’s negotiating team has defended the fishing compromise set out in the post-Brexit trade deal with the EU after coming under criticism.

The unnamed official, quoted by the PA news agency, said: “Fisheries was one of the areas where we had to compromise somewhat. Both sides have had to. But the crucial thing on fisheries policy is that although there is a transition, at the end of the transition it returns to normal arrangements and we have full control over our waters.

“There’s a transition to that point and ideally we would’ve got out of it a bit faster but where we’ve got to is acceptable and offers gains for the fisheries industry in the short run and a huge right to control everything and work within that after this five-and-a-half-year transition.”

The UK government is “forcing” Scotland in the “wrong direction” with Brexit, Nicola Sturgeon has said.

The Scottish first minister, speaking as the deal on the future relationship between the UK and the EU was published, complained that promises made to the country’s fishing sector had been “broken”.

She also insisted it was “extraordinary” that Boris Johnson had decided to “inflict a hard Brexit” on the UK in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and resulting recession.

Ms Sturgeon spoke out on the issue after the Scottish government warned the agreement reached by the prime minister could cost Scotland £9bn by 2030.

Analysis by the Scottish government indicated GDP could be reduced by about 6.1 per cent, compared to staying in the EU.

With Scotland having voted to stay in the EU in the 2016 referendum, Ms Sturgeon stressed that Brexit was happening “against the wishes of most people in Scotland” and said it would “hit jobs and living standards at the worst possible time”.

Despite the deal, unanswered questions linger in many areas, including security cooperation — with the UK set to lose access to real-time information in some EU law enforcement databases — and access to the EU market for Britain’s huge financial services sector.

Many others areas, from fishing to wine, require subsequent negotiations, proving that the issue of Brexit has not been settled.

Downing Street’s chief Brexit negotiator Lord Frost has said the trade deal with Brussels should herald a “moment of national renewal”.

After the publication of the treaty, the peer said it was “one of the biggest and broadest agreements ever” that he said ensures the UK “sets its own laws again”, without mentioning the added bureaucracy and friction for people and businesses that Brexit will bring, from customs paperwork to limits on where Britons can live and work.

“The way we’ve achieved that is there’s no more role for the European Court of Justice, there’s no direct effects of EU law, there’s no alignment of any kind, and we’re out of the single market and out of the customs union just as the manifesto said we would be,” he said.

“This should be the beginning of a moment of national renewal for us. All choices are in our hands as a country and it’s now up to us to decide how we use them and how we go forward in the future.”

The European Commission has produced a Q&A for the deal.

On the question of free trade, it states:

Trading under ‘FTA’ (free trade agreement) terms – even one as ambitious as this one, with zero tarifs or quotas – will inevitably be very different compared to the frictionless trade enabled by the EU’s Customs Union and Single Market.

-rules of origin will apply to goods in order to qualify for preferential trade terms under the agreement;

-all imports will be subject to customs formalities and will need to comply with the rules of the importing party;

-and all imports into the EU must meet all EU standards and will be subject to regulatory checks and controls for safety, health and other public policy purposes.