Socialist MP Ruiz Boix urges treaty negotiators to avoid ‘immovable positions’ in search of deal

Juan Carlos Ruiz Boix, the Socialist MP and Mayor of San Roque, urged negotiators for a UK-EU treaty on Gibraltar to avoid “immovable positions” and “finally” reach agreement on a deal that benefits Gibraltar and the 300,000 inhabitants of the Campo de Gibraltar.

Speaking to reporters this week, Mr Ruiz Boix said he remained hopeful of positive news “in the coming weeks”.

He did not comment in any detail on the final stumbling blocks in the negotiation, although one key issue appears to be Spain’s insistence on including the airport in any deal.

“Fixed criteria cannot be maintained at these moments on the cusp of closing an agreement,” Mr Ruiz Boix said.

“The challenge is that we create an area of shared prosperity between the more than 300,000 citizens that make up the Campo de Gibraltar and the city of Gibraltar.”

Mr Ruix Boix urged flexibility with the common aim to protect the interests of citizens on both sides of the border.

“So from here, from the [Socialist] party in the province of Cádiz, as mayor of San Roque and as a resident of the Campo de Gibraltar, I beg all the members of that negotiation table to work on both lines, because we all have to move from our positions which cannot be unchangeable, in order to obtain shared benefits which I hope and wish are imminent,” he said.

“We have seen that in the last two months, different rounds of negotiation took place, some in Málaga, another in London, three in Madrid, and we, the residents of the Campo de Gibraltar, are waiting expectantly to know what the fruits of that negotiation are.”

Mr Ruiz Boix also referred to recent delays at the border and questioned why it was not possible to find “the cooperation and agility needed at a border where the challenge is to dismantle it”.