European hopes of negotiating a new Brexit deal have been put on hold after a “disastrous” week of talks in Brussels in which it became clear that both sides were moving further apart, EU sources have warned.

The gloomy outlook formed after two rounds of talks in Brussels last week at which EU negotiators said that the British team had still failed to table any concrete or workable proposals to deliver an alternative to the Irish backstop.

With more than half of the “blistering” 30-day timetable set last month now expired and the political situation in London in chaos, both diplomats and officials briefed on the talks warned that nascent optimism after Boris Johnson’s summer visits to Berlin and Paris had now faded.

During talks, Mr Johnson’s EU adviser David Frost floated the idea of a stripped down Irish backstop, focussing on the possibility of Ireland aligning on agricultural rules while ignoring other aspects of the border, such as customs, VAT and standards.

The UK also made clear that it was seeking only a “Canada Dry” type of trade deal with Europe and would not accept EU demands to align on social, environmental and state aid regulations to maintain the so-called ‘level playing field’.