BRUSSELS, April 5 -- Donald Tusk will push the EU27 to offer Theresa May a one-year “flexible” extension to article 50 with an option to leave the EU once the withdrawal agreement is ratified by parliament, according to senior EU sources. The European council president will tell leaders at a summit on Wednesday the “flextension” idea would avoid the heads of state and government having to consider extra Brexit delays every few weeks. The EU27 will need to unanimously agree to the plan, which Tusk is backing after hours of preparatory meetings in recent days, senior EU sources said. The former Polish president is determined to give Downing Street as much flexibility as possible to avoid any suggestion that Brussels is seeking to trap Britain in the EU. There will be concerns in some EU capitals about both the length of the extension, given the potential for the British government to meddle in the EU’s long-term planning, and the uncertainty it would create about the UK’s position in the bloc. The failure of the parliament to coalesce around a post-Brexit vision will also be a source of frustration for Emmanuel Macron, the French president, who has insisted that the UK must have a “credible plan” for the EU to offer any further extension at all. The UK would have to hold elections to the European parliament on 23 May under the Tusk plan, but British MEPs would leave the chamber once the UK had left the bloc. A set of elected MEPs from the other 27 member states would then step in, UK sources said. The development comes as the attorney general, Geoffrey Cox, said he thought the offer from the EU was “likely to be a long one”, in an interview with the BBC. The current legal position is that the UK is to leave the EU at 11pm GMT on 12 April. The prime minister had said earlier this week that she would seek a short extension until 22 May to allow cross-party talks with the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to come to fruition. But speaking to the European parliament within 24 hours of May making her intent clear, the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker rejected it. He instead set an “ultimate deadline” of 12 April for the Commons to approve the withdrawal agreement. “If it has not done so by then, no further short extension will be possible,” he said. “After 12 April, we risk jeopardising the European parliament elections, and so threaten the functioning of the European Union.” With the Commons now tying the prime minister to avoiding a no-deal Brexit, and the EU preparing an option that it believes will suit Downing Street, the threat of the UK crashing out of the bloc is heavily diminished. The chancellor, Philip Hammond, has in recent days backed the idea of a flextension. Meanwhile, May is expected to write to Jeremy Corbyn to set out the government’s offer on Brexit, with negotiations due to resume in Downing Street on Friday. With five days to go before the prime minister travels to Brussels to request a Brexit delay from EU leaders, little progress appeared to have been made on finding a compromise deal both Labour and the Conservatives can back.
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