Britain clinched a historic deal with the European Union on Thursday as both sides managed to thrash out a post-Brexit free trade agreement (FTA) just days before the December 31 deadline.
1000s of pages of legal text accompanies the deal, with details of the agreement set to emerge in the course of the next few days, including the final ratification of the FTA by Parliaments on both sides.
“The deal is done,” was the message posted on social media alongside an image of a jubilant Prime Minister Boris Johnson with his arms in the air moments after news of a post-Brexit free trade agreement (FTA) hit the headlines.
He soon took to the podium at ten Downing Street to declare that he had kept his promise to the British electorate, who had voted for Brexit in a referendum in June 2016 and then handed him a thumping majority in December 2019 on a manifesto that centred around getting Brexit done.
“We have concluded the biggest trade deal yet and delivered on what the British people voted for, said Johnson, visibly in much higher spirits than he has seemed at these briefings usually dominated by COVID-19 infection rates and tougher lockdown measures.
Declaring that the UK had taken back control of its “destiny, money, borders, laws and waters”, Johnson hailed the new “comprehensive, Canada style, free trade deal” that will allow goods to be sold “without tariffs and without controls in the EU markets”.
“We will be able to decide how and where we are going to stimulate new jobs and new homes in free ports and new green industrial zones. For the first time since 1973, we will be an independent coastal state with full control over our waters,” he said.
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