UK public will blame EU for no-deal Brexit, says Jeremy Hunt

The foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has said there is a risk of the UK leaving the EU without a deal because of stalling by Brussels negotiators and that British views of Europe could sour as a result.

On his first overseas trip since replacing Boris Johnson, he claimed there was now a very real threat of ending up with no deal by accident, which could alter British public attitudes toward the EU for a generation.

After talks in Berlin, Hunt told his German counterpart Heiko Maas: “This is because many people in the EU are thinking that they just have to wait long enough and Britain will blink.”

In a marked shift in tone from his predecessor, who implored Tory colleagues not to be afraid of crashing out of the EU on World Trade Organisation terms, he said that only the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, would welcome a no-deal Brexit.

The government is planning to reach a deal with the EU on withdrawal by October, but the compromise proposals agreed by the cabinet at the Chequers summit two weeks ago are so far finding little support in Brussels or in parliament.

Theresa May, in the north-east for a cabinet awayday designed to shore up her Brexit plans, insisted she was having constructive talks with EU counterparts ahead of a concerted push by ministers to sell her Brexit blueprint across Europe.

The prime minister claimed that EU partners were starting to focus on the detrimental impact to their own economies, some of which traded heavily with the UK, if they fail to reach agreement before Britain leaves in March next year.

“What I see is people focusing their minds now on the impact the future relationship will have on their economies as well as ours,” she said. “We’ve had some constructive responses so far. I won’t say that you won’t hear some negative things being said. So we’re going to sit down and talk to people about it.”

She sidestepped a question from factory workers in Newcastle over what would happen if parliament rejected any agreement, although she confirmed ministers were stepping up preparations for a no-deal Brexit. “My aim is to bring forward a deal that parliament will support,” she said.

In Berlin earlier, Hunt directed his comments over the head of Germany’s social democrat foreign minister toward Brussels. “Without a real change in approach from the EU negotiators we do now face a real risk of a no deal by accident, and that would be incredibly challenging economically,” he said.

“Britain would find that challenging, but in the end we would find a way not just to survive but to thrive economically. But my real concern is that it would change British public attitudes to Europe for a generation.”

Visiting Berlin at a time when governments and businesses on both sides are scaling up preparations for a disorderly Brexit in March 2019, Hunt tried his best to praise the health of Anglo-German relations.

“Germany is not just one of Britain’s best friends in Europe, it’s one of our best friends in the world,” he said at a press conference that contrasted with Johnson’s frosty reception in Berlin in 2016. “Since 1945, Britain and Germany have stood shoulder to shoulder to support the rules-based international order.”

Maas told reporters: “The consequences will be noticeable on both sides of the Channel, which is why it’s very important that Britain and the European commission are currently talking about ways for an orderly exit to take place.”

After the north-east awayday, which was also aimed at underlining May’s commitment to the northern powerhouse, several cabinet ministers, said to include the transport secretary, Chris Grayling, had their return journeys delayed by a fire on the tracks near York.