Greetings from Brussels.
At least it’s bright for the 6.50am red-eye flight to Brussels since the hour went forward. Feels less like travelling in the middle of the night. Mind you, at the rate things are going, the UK will still be a member when the hour goes back again in the autumn.
Political leaders, their entourages of officials and advisers, and their journalist camp followers are once again descending on Brussels this morning for the emergency Brexit summit called by Donald Tusk.
The weary summiteers nod knowingly at one another in the queues: here we go again. It’s only two weeks since the last migration to the EU’s capital.
On the agenda today is a single item: another article 50 extension for the UK, delaying once again the British departure from the EU, almost three years after the country voted to leave.
British prime minister Theresa May has requested an extension until June 30th, with the possibility of leaving before then if - a big if, everyone here believes - she can get the withdrawal agreement, the treaty she agreed with the EU, passed in the House of Commons. She has already tried three times - and failed three times.
Scepticism about Mrs May’s capabilities are widespread among her colleagues, to put it mildly.
Tusk, the cautious but forthright Pole who chairs the European Council of EU leaders (the bloc’s supreme leadership council, if you like), wrote to all the heads of government last night proposing a longer extension “which would last only as long as necessary and no longer than one year”, rather than Mrs May’s asked-for short extension.
Crucially, Mr Tusk proposes that although a longer extension should be granted, the UK should be able to leave as soon as the withdrawal agreement - and the accompanying necessary legislation at Westminster - is passed.
This would have three advantages: it takes Brexit off the agenda of EU leaders for the immediate short-term - and they are, as far as one can gauge these things, heartily sick of it - while it still maintains the incentive for Mrs May to get on with it. And, at the same time, it opens the possibility for the UK to rethink the entire Brexit undertaking, if that is what it decides to do.
The text of Tusk's letter is here.
Most people knocking about the Council headquarters this morning seem to think that is the most likely outcome of this evening’s deliberations. But with no pre-agreed outcome yet - and a strong chance the EU leaders will take over the drafting of the conclusions, as they did at the last summit - there is no guarantee that events will pan out so agreeably.
There are considerable anxieties on the part of some EU countries, especially the French, that if the UK remains in the EU for the medium term, it could be a disruptive presence at a decisive time in the EU’s multi-year calendar, which will see a new parliament, a new commission and a new seven-year budget. So most here anticipate strict conditions attached to any extension.
However, it’s hard to see how these could bind a future prime minister - Boris Johnson, say - because when you’re a member, well, you’re a member with all the rights and status that entails. When you’re out, you’re out. But when you’re in, you’re in.
Meanwhile, our Europe Editor Paddy Smyth sets the scene here.
Lara Marlowe and Derek Scally report on Mrs May's meetings in Paris and Berlin yesterday.
And the Taoiseach's warnings that there's no point offering Mrs May an extension to which she cannot agree.
If that happened, or if things go off the rails later, remember that as things stand in law, the UK exits on Friday night at 11pm Irish time. We’ll have more throughout the day.
