Cross Frontier Group will seek meetings in Brussels and London
Archive image of a pedestrian border queue last month. The cross-border workers’ association Ascteg highlighting its concerns about lengthy delays experienced by many at the border over the Christmas period, though border flow appears to have eased since then.
The Cross Frontier Group will seek meetings with the European Commission and the UK Government to explain firsthand the fears and uncertainties faced by communities on either side of the border against the backdrop of negotiations for a UK/EU treaty on Gibraltar.
The group’s representatives have already met with Chief Minister Fabian Picardo and Spanish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Jose Manuel Albares.
Now they hope to meet with a Foreign Office minister and the team led by Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic.
“We want them to have the full perspective from the people who are living through this,” said Darren Cerisola, who currently holds the chair of the group.
The Cross Frontier Group brings together unions and business organisations from both sides of the border, and can offer a unique insight into the impact not just of the ongoing uncertainty, but of what a ‘no deal’ outcome would mean in practice.
“They need to really understand and hear it from our mouths,” Mr Cerisola said.
“The lived experience is very different to seeing it from afar.”
The group’s board met earlier this week to review the current situation, expressing satisfaction with the meetings held already with Mr Picardo and Mr Albares.
Those meetings also provided an opportunity for the group to be updated on the present state of play in the negotiation, which they said was in its “final stage”.
But in a statement, the group members said that “although there is a willingness to reach an agreement between the parties, the final obstacles could jeopardise the much-anticipated deal.”
“After overcoming many disagreements, it would be unacceptable for the negotiations to fall apart due to issues we consider minor in nature,” the statement added.
“The Cross-Border Group has conveyed to government officials its continued commitment to an agreement that provides certainty to the citizens and turns the political commitment outlined in the ‘New Year’s Eve Agreement’ into a legal text.”
“As representatives of civil society, we consider it essential to reach an agreement to enable the removal of the border crossing and the development of the long-promised ‘Shared Prosperity Zone’.”
