(Bloomberg) -- U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May’s efforts to push her Brexit divorce deal through parliament may be aided by the European Union’s uncompromising stance toward extending the process, the U.K.’s former envoy to the bloc said.
EU President Donald Tusk said on Wednesday that a short Brexit extension is possible -- but it’s conditional on “a positive vote on the withdrawal agreement in the House of Commons.”
Tusk’s comment may help “because in a sense it amplifies the message she’s trying to give to people that it’s my way or the abyss,” Ivan Rogers said to reporters in Dublin Wednesday. According to Rogers, the attitude of some in the EU may be that “she’s going to go to meaningful vote three, we have to get through to these people that either this withdrawal agreement goes through or the whole thing collapses.”
Still, May’s request for only a three month delay increases the chances of a so-called accidental no deal Brexit, he said.
“What she’s done today in asking for only a short extension makes a no deal outcome more likely, more is at risk now,” he said. There is very real risk of no deal in the summer “because we end up there with nowhere else to go.”
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