May I just carry on for a little while?

I think there was probably much to and fro between the UK Government and the European Council in terms of seeing each other’s drafts and commenting, and already a degree of, if not of negotiation, at least mutual feedback. That doesn’t appear to have happened with the devolved administrations, and I share some of the First Minister’s regrets about that. But he must understand that there is no Government in Northern Ireland, and that the Scottish Government is an SNP Government whose leader is committed to breaking up the United Kingdom.

I urge him once more to protect the interests of Wales: please seek substantive, wide-ranging, bilateral discussions, in private, between the Welsh Government and the UK Government, to try and push some of these issues in the interests of Wales. I’d also encourage him to take up Julie Morgan’s plea that not just UK Ministers but key Members of these Assemblies, who have made commitments or at least suggested certain things would happen for the benefit of Wales outside the European Union, particularly on the financial side—I would urge him to work with those people who campaigned for ‘leave’, not just those who campaigned for ‘remain’, including those who may have influence with the UK negotiating partner.

I’m encouraged by the draft negotiating mandate that came back from the European Council, as well as by the article 50 letter. It refers to the fact that negotiations under article 50 will be conducted as a single package. It then says that the framework for the future relationship could be identified during the second phase of the negotiations under article 50, as soon as sufficient progress has been made in the first phase. And yes, financial discussions are part of that, but there’s a whole range of issues, including the rights of EU nationals in this country, which we’re very keen to settle and push forward and show good progress on. So, I think the link of those is encouraging.

I also think, in terms of the role of the European Court of Justice—. The relevant paragraph on that is paragraph 16:

‘The withdrawal agreement should include appropriate dispute settlement mechanisms’.

But the council then refers to these ‘bearing in mind’ the union’s interests, and the ECJ, which I think is something we can work with in discussing what would be an appropriate settlement procedure.

We then have the section on Gibraltar, which there’s been a lot of coverage of. I actually think people may be missing quite a key implication of this paragraph 22 of the negotiating mandate: that, after the United Kingdom leaves the European Union, no agreement may apply to Gibraltar without the agreement of Spain.

Now, that phrase would be otiose, unnecessary, unless it were considered that agreement would be by qualified majority, at the European Union. If it is to be, as the First Minister is afraid, a mixed negotiation, post-exit, that would leave the unanimous agreement to member states, and, potentially, of regional parliaments, then there would be no need to give that specific protection to Spain, who would already have a veto over such agreement.

So, I think it is encouraging that the European Union is looking at those trade and related arrangements post Brexit as potentially being negotiated by qualified majority. And I think the fact that these negotiations, at least after a bit, can proceed in parallel is good, to the extent, say, the Canada agreement was a mixed agreement that had to go the regional parliaments and be unanimity. But the mixed elements in any trade agreement we could potentially deal with with article 50, and the trade one would be where the European Commission had exclusive competence. So, again, that would be by qualified majority voting. I think that does make agreement potentially easier.

I also think it’s interesting that the EU is saying that it’s the successor to all the agreements. Even where we as 28 or 27 member states negotiated on behalf of the EU because it lacked legal personality, the EU says, well, that’s its agreement and it doesn’t bind us. So, for example, on the WTO EU commitment in terms of the quota free of tariff for New Zealand lamb, they are implying that that’s a matter for the EU, and they want us to take our share of international agreements, but that’s for us to agree with them, and isn’t something that they consider to be binding on us. So, I think that’s promising.