Treaty will ‘turn history on its head’, CM says

As the July 15 target date for provisional implementation of the Gibraltar treaty approaches, Chief Minister Fabian Picardo is finalising the last details ahead of signature, likely just days before the agreement takes effect. 

Mr Picardo is also due to deliver his final budget in Parliament on Tuesday, with the debate set to run through the week as work continues on the final treaty arrangements. 

There has been no official announcement on the signing date, but speculation has focused on July 13 or 14, just ahead of the deadline. 

Speaking to the Chronicle, Mr Picardo said that when the European Council formally adopted the treaty last week and cleared the way for signature, he had an emotive conversation with other members of the negotiating teams, both in Gibraltar and elsewhere. 

But he said the focus remained on the remaining technical details and the practical arrangements around signing the agreement, not on emotion. 

“There are a lot of emotions that I'm sure all of us are feeling as we come towards this seminal moment, and I'll express those emotions when the time comes,” Mr Picardo said. 

“But this moment is not about my feelings or my emotions.” 

“It’s about what we’re delivering for the people of Gibraltar, the people who work in Gibraltar, and how we're turning history on its head.” 

Asked what it felt like to take decisions that would affect generations of Gibraltarians, Mr Picardo said the process had not been undertaken lightly. 

“It's a big, big thing,” he said. 

“But I would challenge your characterisation.” 

“The cabinet together are taking decisions that are going to change the landscape for generations.” 

“And the cabinet represents many generations of Gibraltarians.” 

“It represents older Gibraltarians of the evacuation and cross frontier generation, like Joe Bossano.” 

“It represents Gibraltarians who are younger and of the future, like Christian Santos and Gemma Arias [Vasquez].” 

“And it represents generations of Gibraltarians born in the frontier closure and brought up in the frontier closure, like Joseph Garcia, Nigel Feetham and me.” 

“And that generation that had been born and lived their teenage years with a closed frontier, like John Cortes and Pat Orfila.” 

“I think that is why we are the cabinet of Gibraltar, because we represent, even by however small a measure, the finest cross section of the people of Gibraltar to make these decisions together and to take this forward together for the Gibraltarians.” 

Even so, Mr Picardo acknowledged that there had been moments of doubt and uncertainty. 

“Look, if you are going to be entrusted with making decisions of the magnitude that a Chief Minister and a Government make on all issues, you would be failing your sacred duty to ensure that you make the right decision every time, if you didn't cross check every decision and didn’t start it with doubt and end it with a healthy dose of scepticism to ensure that you push yourself to check every decision, however minor,” he said. 

Having gone through that process, however, he said he remained convinced the current path was the right one for Gibraltar. 

He said he had long believed Gibraltar’s future lay in Schengen and the free movement of goods, a view he had expressed publicly before Brexit. 

He pointed, for example, to a speech in 2014 at the Garrison Library during a visit by the then Chief Secretary to the UK Treasury, Danny Alexander. 

“Back then we weren't even thinking about these developments,” Mr Picardo said. 

“So my thinking was clear. It's been clear for a long time and I'm very, very pleased to see us on the cusp of achieving that.” 

Since 2016, Gibraltar has largely avoided the worst effects of Brexit, both economically through a bilateral market access deal with the UK, and physically at the border through a constructive relationship with successive Spanish governments. 

But Mr Picardo said that had also created a challenge in explaining that the alternative to a treaty was not the current status quo, but a hard border and the full impact of Brexit that Gibraltar had so far avoided. 

“I think it's been one of our greatest successes to stave off the worst effects of Brexit whilst we negotiated the treaty that avoids Brexit,” Mr Picaro said. 

“But it has also, of course, meant that people might not fully appreciate what this treaty means because they haven't understood or they haven’t experienced what it helps them to avoid the closer we get to July 15th.” 

“But look, my job is to keep the Gibraltarians away from harm, both on a temporary basis and on a permanent basis. And that is what we have done.” 

“That is what the Llamas, Garcia, Picardo team has done with the support of this cabinet and with the support of the previous cabinet and all of the people in the wider Gibraltar Government and Whitehall that have helped us to get this over the line.” 

As the deadline approaches, Mr Picardo said he was “100% confident” Gibraltarians were behind the Gibraltar Government, even if there was understandable unease at the prospect of change. 

“I sense excitement, trepidation, an element of concern, fear, and also the confidence that the people of Gibraltar will succeed through this, that the Government of Gibraltar and the security infrastructure of Gibraltar, from BCA, Customs and the RGP, is going to be there to ensure that Gibraltar is an even safer place in the future,” he said. 

“I'm very clear that although we will all gulp at midnight on the 15th, me first, we're gulping because we're knowing that the step we are taking is the right step in the right direction at last.” 

“And don't tell me that Neil Armstrong didn't gulp before he stepped on the moon.” 

Mr Picardo said provisional implementation on July 15 would not mark the end of the process, but the start of a new phase that would bring both challenges and opportunities. 

One of those challenges is the possibility of a change of government in Spain next year, with polls pointing to a Partido Popular victory supported by Vox. 

The treaty negotiations have taken place against the backdrop of a socialist government in Spain, a factor that may change after the next election. 

Speaking recently to Spanish journalists, Mr Picardo said Spain’s opposition parties would be “foolish” to row back on the treaty if elected. 

“Usually, political parties of any complexion who criticise things that have been done by opposing parties in government, when they are elected, ramp up the rhetoric about how terrible what the previous government has done is and then remind people that they're stuck with it and continue to run with it,” he said. 

Mr Picardo noted that the PP did not close the border when it won the 1997 general election in Spain and said the Córdoba agreements were a different type of arrangement to the treaty now on the table. 

“They were political agreements which were written down but never signed because they were not treaties and they were not legally binding,” Mr Picardo said. 

“This is a completely different order of magnitude.” 

“Nothing is impossible and I'm not going to crystal ball gaze, but you’re dealing with a treaty between the United Kingdom and the European Union and that is already hugely important.” 

Mr Picardo said he was also focused on political developments in the UK and the possibility that an anti-European government there could seek to unpick the work of recent years. 

Protecting against that, he said, had been one of his priorities in recent weeks and months. 

“We have to be careful with the rise of the far right everywhere in Europe, not just in Spain and not just with the anti-EU right in the UK,” he said. 

“We need to be aware of how the dynamics of the rise of the far right might affect the composition of the European Parliament in future.” 

“Those are the real issues, not loud-mouth Vox statements.” 

“That's rhetoric. The politics of this is much deeper than just Santiago Abascal shouting about Gibraltar.” 

Once signed, the treaty will need to be ratified by the House of Commons and the European Parliament. 

Mr Picardo said no difficulty was envisaged in Westminster, where Gibraltar has strong cross-party support and Labour holds a solid majority. 

He was also confident the treaty would secure the support needed in the European Parliament. 

“I envisage that that will play out like any democratic process in any parliament, with arguments for and against and with the need to obtain a majority, which I'm very confident we will obtain,” he said.