‘Great reluctance’ among EU leaders to delay Brexit further

There would be a “great deal of reluctance” amongst European leaders to grant the UK another Brexit extension, the Irish premier has warned.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar (Photo by Sam Boal - Pool/Getty Images)

Leo Varadkar said a lot of European countries had become very frustrated at the rolling extensions in the Brexit process.

It comes as Irish Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney warned that the chances of a no-deal outcome have never been higher.

The Irish Government will publish an updated Brexit preparedness plan today. Mr Varadkar said: “There would be a great deal of reluctance among European prime ministers to grant another extension beyond October 31.

“We certainly wouldn’t rule it out... but I think a lot of other countries have become very frustrated at these rolling extensions so if there was another extension it would have to be for a particular reason.”

It came as reports emerged that hundreds of civil service staff shifted to emergency Brexit preparation duties before the original 29 March deadline have since been stood down - with many now set to be re-assigned back to the job of gearing up for no-deal ahead of the new October 31 exit date.

In total 1355 total were reassigned to no-deal preparations - with 1036 being listed as having returned to their regular duties.

Joe Owen, of the Institute for Government said: “This ‘hokey cokey’ of staff moves is clearly going to damage some of the other work of the civil service.”