Status quo to be maintained in a few sectors for nine months as No 10’s claims of more talks dismissed

A bare-bones plan for keeping flights in the air and money flowing for nine months after of a no-deal Brexit is to be published by the European commission as officials dismissed the British government’s claims of further negotiations.

Downing Street had said it would be sending the government’s most senior legal officer, Jonathan Jones, to Brussels this week to open talks on further “legal and political assurances” over the hated Northern Ireland backstop.

Quick guide Brexit and backstops: an explainer Show Hide A backstop is required to ensure there is no hard border in Ireland if a comprehensive free trade deal cannot be signed before the end of 2020. Theresa May has proposed to the EU that the whole of the UK would remain in the customs union after Brexit, but Brussels has said it needs more time to evaluate the proposal. As a result, the EU insists on having its own backstop - the backstop to the backstop - which would mean Northern Ireland would remain in the single market and customs union in the absence of a free trade deal, prompting fierce objections from Conservative hard Brexiters and the DUP, which props up her government. That prompted May to propose a country-wide alternative in which the whole of the UK would remain in parts of the customs union after Brexit. “The EU still requires a ‘backstop to the backstop’ – effectively an insurance policy for the insurance policy. And they want this to be the Northern Ireland-only solution that they had previously proposed,” May told MPs. Raising the stakes, the prime minister said the EU’s insistence amounted to a threat to the constitution of the UK: “We have been clear that we cannot agree to anything that threatens the integrity of our United Kingdom,” she added.

But on Monday the European commission’s chief spokesman ruled out such talks with the UK, in what appeared to be a deliberate contradiction of claims emanating from Downing Street.

“The deal that is on the table is the best and only deal possible, we will not reopen it, it will not be renegotiated,” the commission spokesman said. “As [the European council’s] President [Donald] Tusk said, the European council has given the clarifications that were possible at this stage so no further meetings with the UK are foreseen.”

During her defence of her leadership last week, Theresa May promised rebellious MPs that she would secure guarantees from the EU that Britain would not be trapped indefinitely in a customs union envisaged as the last resort solution for avoiding a hard border on the island of lreland.

The prime minister even persisted in that claim at the end of a leaders’ summit last week, despite failing to secure such substantive legal guarantees, or even the prospect of talks upon them.

It has been suggested by the former minister Jo Johnson that May is failing to be honest about the state of the discussions out of a desire to “run down the clock” so as to present MPs with the stark choice between voting the withdrawal agreement through and the economic consequences of leaving the EU without a deal.

The stark consequences of the UK leaving without a deal are likely to be spelled out on Wednesday when Brussels publishes its latest contingency plans.

Brussels is planning to maintain the status quo in just a few sectors, for up to nine months, so that its member states can avoid the most disruptive consequences of the UK crashing out.

But it has warned that it will bring those “transitory measures” to an end when it wishes, and without negotiation with its British counterparts.

Under the contingency planning, British citizens in a EU country would be allowed a grace period in order to normalise their status.

The EU is to allow its traders to use UK-based clearing houses, which act as a middle-man in most of world’s trade in the $530tn (£420n) market for derivatives contracts, cushioning users from the risk of default.

Flights between the UK and the bloc would also continue for a period, although British carriers would not be allowed to operate between EU airports.

A senior official said, however, that the “contingency measures [would] not be replicating membership or a transition period so we’re not about to undo Brexit through preparation of the exit”.

The official added of a no-deal Brexit that “disruption there will be because it’s an essentially disruptive event that will take place in this case – and these measures will only be taken in the interests of the [EU]27”.