The EU's chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has suggested that PM Theresa May has been reduced to "pleading" for market access to the EU for financial firms after Brexit.

He dismissed the UK's overtures for a special access regime based on a broad commitment to adopt the same rules as the EU.

Barnier said that the UK's desire to set its own regulations on financial services while it enjoyed special access to the EU was "not something that any country in the world would accept."

He also dismissed suggestions made by Bank of England governor Mark Carney and others that the EU stands to lose more from a bad deal on financial services than the UK.



LONDON — Theresa May has been reduced to "pleading" for a Brexit deal for Britain's financial firms which is unrealistic and unworkable, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has suggested.

Speaking in Sofia on Thursday, Barnier said that the UK was seeking a deal which allows Britain to continue selling financial services into the EU's Single Market without following European regulations, and dismissed May's plan for a special access regime based on a broad commitment to adopt the same rules as the EU.

"I can perfectly see the UK's logic and interest in pleading for a system of 'mutual recognition' and 'reciprocal regulatory equivalence.' This is, indeed, what the Single Market achieves!" he told an audience at a financial conference.

"The EU understands that the UK does not want to become a 'rule-taker'. But the UK also needs to understand that the EU cannot accept mutual market access without the common safeguards that underpin it."

Barnier added that the UK's desire to set its own regulations on financial services while it enjoyed special access to the EU was "not something that any country in the world would accept."

The speech was the second time this week that Brussels has rebuffed the UK's proposals for special market access for the City of London. The EU's finance commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis told an audience this week that EU and UK finance regimes could only co-exist together after Brexit if London follows European rules without having a role in the decision-making process.

He also dismissed suggestions made by Bank of England governor Mark Carney and others that the EU stands to lose more from a bad deal on financial services than the UK.

"Some argue that the EU desperately needs the City of London, and that access to financing for EU27 business would be hampered – and economic growth undermined – without giving UK operators the same market access as today," he said.

"This is not what we hear from market participants, and it is not the analysis that we have made ourselves."

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