Halibut and guinea pigs as Barnier dines privately

 It's now got to 'private dinners'!

UK Brexit negotiator meets EU counterpart in bid to revive talks

David Frost and Michel Barnier will dine on halibut at Downing Street private dinner

Some privacy! The Graun found the menu 'perhaps surprising given that fish are one of the most contentious issues between the two sides'. I wonder if it will be piped in and served on Union Flag plates while racist plebs deplore French hygiene?

Being the Graun, we obviously get a preparatory Barnier press release, dutifully 'reported' by a Lords Committee:

the EU negotiator accused the UK of continuing to seek“the advantages of being a member state” but with the right to diverge on regulations....He also warned that no deal would mean a cliff-edge [welcome back old friend -- can a car crash be far away?] for British exporters from 1 January as the EU had no intention of phasing in border controls like the UK....“We will not delay things. As of 1 January, all products coming into the single market – coming from any third country anywhere in the world, including yours, because you are a third country – will be checked,” he said.

 Then on to another symbolic animal:

Meanwhile, MPs have heard that EU citizens settled in the UK are being used by the Home Office as guinea pigs for a future digital-only immigration system....They will also face “significant problems” after Brexit unless the government provides them with a physical card to prove their right to remain in the UK legally, parliament’s Brexit select committee was told.

 Is there any particular reason to think they will not be so provided?

The rights of EU citizens have already been enshrined in the withdrawal agreement signed in January but the Brexit select committee heard that anxiety about their future rights remained high.

 Entirely disinterestedly, a lawyer said:

 “There is a lot of mistrust in the way that government does things, particularly the Home Office, and that has come about … because of a legacy of mistakes and because some very, very bad things that have happened to human beings. And I think a lot of EU citizens are very worried that this will happen to them,”... “Words like angry, anxious, alienated, annoyed, unwanted, upset and unwelcome,” were the feelings cited in a [probably that old pre-Brexit] survey of 3,000 EU citizens, which also found that 89% said they wanted a physical card [never got in to digital stuff, these Continentals]

 A Home Office spokesperson noted:

“The EU settlement scheme also protects the rights of EU citizens in UK law and gives them a secure digital status which, unlike a physical document, cannot be lost, stolen or tampered with.”