Yahoo News Government has 'wasted first year of Brexit negotiations’
Theresa May has been accused of wasting the first year of Brexit negotiations because of her “control freak” regime.
Senior civil servants told the Financial Times that the Prime Minister had alienated other countries with her stance on Britain’s EU divorce.
They claim that policies were promoted without Cabinet discussions and Mrs May was protected from any “difficult” news from Brussels.
John Kerr, a cross bench peer and former head of the Foreign Office, told the paper: “It has been a completely wasted year while the Tories negotiated with themselves.
“There has been a sort of policy paralysis where Number 10 imposed a control freak freeze.”
One unnamed senior official added: “There has been a failure of diplomacy.
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“We have had the Prime Minister talking about no deal being better than a bad deal and Boris Johnson suggesting we aren’t bothered about getting a deal.
“The mood on the other side of the Channel is awful.”
Downing Street officials and those in Mrs May’s inner circle have rejected claims that the first year has been a waste of time.
David Jones, a former junior minister in the Department for Exiting the EU, blamed David Cameron’s refusal to come up with a Brexit strategy before the referendum, while a Number 10 spokesman described the reports as “misleading”.
He added: “We’ll make no apologies for doing the necessary preparation for triggering Article 50 so we could start the negotiations in the best possible position.
“In the last year we have made real progress towards delivering the outcome of the EU referendum and setting out how we will grasp the opportunities of Brexit.”
