British and Spanish foreign ministers discuss the stumbling blocks in the path to Gibraltar treaty

José Manuel Albares met with David Lammy in what he described as a productive meeting

L.V.

Cadiz

Tuesday, 1 April 2025, 13:57 | Updated 14:02h.

The Spanish minister of foreign affairs, European Union and cooperation, José Manuel Albares, and his British counterpart, the secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth and development affairs, David Lammy, had the chance this week to discuss the final hurdles that remain on the road to the agreement on Gibraltar that will regulate the Rock's relationship with the EU after Brexit.

This was one of the issues discussed by the two ministers at their bilateral meeting during Lammy's trip to Madrid to take part in the G5+ ministerial meeting, which also brought together Germany, France, Poland and Italy.

Albares himself indicated in a message on X that they had held a "productive meeting". "We both want an agreement in relation to Gibraltar," said the Spanish minister; no information about the bilateral meeting has been released from the British side.

It was in October 2021 that Brussels began negotiations with London on the agreement that will regulate Gibraltar's relations with the EU following the departure of the UK. After numerous rounds of negotiations, a year ago it was decided to hold meetings at the highest political level to give new impetus to the agreement.

Previous meetings

The last of these meetings, in which European Commissioner Maros Sefcovic, in charge of negotiating the agreement on behalf of Brussels, Albares on the European side and Lammy and the chief minister of Gibraltar, Fabian Picardo, on the British side, took place in mid-September, but since then there have been no new developments, nor is a new meeting in this format planned for the time being.

On 18 March, the Spanish secretary of state for the EU, Fernando Sampedro, stated in Brussels that there are "reasons for optimism" regarding the prospects of an agreement on Gibraltar between the Union and the United Kingdom. He also denied that the negotiations have reached an impasse, despite the fact that it has been six months since the last round, stating that there are fluid contacts at a technical level, although the conditions for a new meeting at a political level have not yet been met.

Meanwhile, Picardo travelled to London last week with deputy chief minister, Joseph García, "to continue negotiations" on the agreement, although no details of what was discussed with the British government have been revealed.

However, the Gibraltarian government did report that the chief minister stayed longer than initially planned and also met with the Conservative shadow foreign secretary Priti Patel, among other contacts.

The government stressed last week that maintaining "the status quo we have enjoyed post-Brexit is not an option" adding that "no deal would be better than a bad deal".

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