#Brexit: Tusk slaps down UK MPs, for 'arguments that have nothing to do with reality’

Michael Tomlinson, Conservative MP for Mid Dorset and North Poole, has received a response to his letter to European Council President Donald Tusk (pictured). The letter raised his concern for the status of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens living and working in Europe, writes Catherine Feore.

Anyone still labouring under the illusion that the EU-27 will buckle to all UK demands and sign up to the ‘having your cake and eating it’ plan, will be shocked by the tone and content of Donald Tusk’s response. There is almost a touch of glee.

Tusk, who is a former prime minister of Poland, reacted with mock wide-eyed surprise: “We assumed that one of the main reasons for the vote for Brexit was the rejection of the free movement of people and all the rights it entails.”

However, he doesn’t hang around, and in the second paragraph he writes that the "anxiety and uncertainty for the UK and EU citizens living in one another's territories" is of the UK’s own making and that to suggest otherwise is, in Tusk’s words "nothing to do with reality". This is a little harsh - and even though we are meant to be post-truth - it is difficult to describe it as being anything other than true.

Nonetheless, in a demonstration of European largesse, Tusk attempts to come to Tomlinson’s assistance and suggests – a bit like the Kippers and the hardline Tories – that the UK  can reduce uncertainty by triggering Article 50 of the Treaty at the earliest opportunity. Tusk reiterates that the EU was ready to start negotiations on the day following the referendum. Indeed, Tusk taunts Tomlinson and says, how about December?

Tomlinson seems to be ignorant of his own government’s position (he is a Conservative MP) arguing that people should not be used as ‘bargaining chips’. In her meeting with Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydło, the British prime minister made it very clear that as long as the rights of British citizens living across the EU are guaranteed across the EU she would guarantee the rights of those Poles (800,000) living in the UK. Tusk, on the other hand, concurs with the British MPs and writes that this should not happen if there are ‘precise and comprehensive solutions’ to the freedom of movement. He scathingly suggests that "nice-sounding expressions" will not provide citizens with genuine guarantees they need.

Still in doubt about the views of your negotiating partners, UK? YouGov, the British-based polling organization, carried out the following poll:

"Yours sincerely,

Donald Tusk."

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