France sends double warning to UK over Brexit: FT

PanARMENIAN.Net - France would relocate its migrant camp from Calais to Britain and roll out “a red carpet” for bankers fleeing London if the UK leaves the EU, the Financial Times cited French Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron as saying.

Speaking ahead of an Anglo-French summit, Macron said the bilateral relationship could change abruptly in the event of a Brexit, including the creation of new obstacles to trade between the two countries.

Macron said that Brexit could scupper a bilateral deal with France, known as the Le Touquet agreement, that allows Britain to carry out border controls — and keep unwanted migrants — on the French side of the Channel.

In an interview with the Financial Times, he also said he expected financial services workers in London to relocate to France once their institutions lost the “passport” rights that allow them to operate across the EU.

“The day this relationship unravels, migrants will no longer be in Calais and the financial passport would work less well,” Macron said, according to FT.

Echoing David Cameron’s invitation to French companies to relocate across the Channel when France raised taxes in 2012, Mr Macron said: “If I were to reason like those who roll out red carpets, I would say we might have some repatriations from the City of London.”

Macron warned that Britain would lose full access to the single market if it left the EU. “People deciding to leave the single market will not be able to secure the same terms.”

He added that the EU’s “collective energy would be spent on unwinding existing links, not re-creating new ones” if British voters rejected membership.