What can break the Brexit impasse?

The Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab travelled to Brussels this afternoon, but not to shake on a deal. Rather, he was there to tell Michel Barnier that there are bits of the Irish protocol that the UK cannot accept. If the two sides can’t come to an agreement on this, then there will be ‘no deal’—an outcome that neither the UK or the EU 27 wants but is now more likely than it has been at any point since the UK triggered Article 50.

So, what happens next? Well, there’ll be many on the EU side—particularly, in the Commission—who think that if they just sit tight, the UK will come to them. They reason, with some justification, that the UK hasn’t prepared anywhere near seriously enough for no deal and so as the clock ticks down, they’ll end up taking pretty much any deal.