May has said she will not show her hand before starting the talks, giving few details of what her government wants when it leaves the EU.
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May seized on his words, suggesting Labour had turned away from free trade, styling post-Brexit Britain as a champion of globalisation.
Mrs May’s spokeswoman said Mr Davis was expressing a personal opinion on the single market rather than official policy.
And, responding to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, she said: “It’s free trade that underpins our growth”.
When the Article 50 countdown begins, Britain will be at a major negotiating disadvantage (expecially since other European leaders have an incentive to make this as unpleasant as possible for Britain in order to discourage any countries from getting similar ideas), so they’re trying to get as many concessions as they can now, before the clock officially starts running.
The complexity of the challenge posed by Brexit was underlined by Australia’s warning that it will be unable to strike a free trade deal with the United Kingdom for at least two and a half years.
The EU is waiting for the United Kingdom to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, the formal step required to start the departure process, which is supposed to take two years.
Mrs May said she wanted a “smooth” Brexit process and told Mr Tusk they had “serious issues” to discuss.
But with the United Kingdom unable to sign deals while still in the European Union, he said an agreement would not be able to happen until the United Kingdom left the European Union in two-and-a-half years’ time.
“And let me be clear: I don’t believe there is any deal that [UK Prime Minister Theresa] May can do that will be better for Britain than being a member of the EU”.
“Any new deals will be more comprehensive if the United Kingdom has maximum access to European markets, which means membership of the single market”. “I hope our party clarifies its position in support of United Kingdom membership of the single market, and continued close engagement with Europe”.
In practice, the two-year process will focus on unravelling UK-EU treaty obligations, in particular contributions to EU budgets but also including issues like liability for pay and pensions of British EU staff. Discussions would also take place on the future “framework” for trade relations, but a deal on that may take much longer to agree.
The prime minister bluntly ruled out replacing free movement of people from the European Union with a points-based immigration system, one of the central promises of the Leave campaign, telling MPs that such a system would not help to control immigration.
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“That uncertainty and division has been made worse by the Government’s ministers’ political posturing and often very contradictory messages which doesn’t seem to add up to a considered position”, he said.
