BRUSSELS, May 27 (Xinhua) -- "The United Kingdom must look at the reality of the European Union (EU) in the face. He must also face the reality of Brexit," Michel Barnier, EU's chief Brexit negotiator, told the XXVIIIth Congress of the International Federation for European Law Saturday in Lisbon.
Commenting on the General Regulation on Data Protection (GDPR) which came into force Friday, Barnier said Brexit is not and will never be in the interest of EU companies.
"And above all it would be contrary to the interests of our companies to give up our autonomy of decision. This autonomy allows us to set standards for the whole of the EU but also often to see these standards taken over the world," he noted.
"It is the normative power of the Union or what is often called 'the Brussels effect'," said Barnier.
After four years of preparation and debate the GDPR was approved by the EU Parliament on April 14, 2016 and was enforced Friday.
Replacing the Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC, the GDPR was designed to harmonize data privacy laws across Europe, to protect and empower all EU citizens data privacy and to reshape the way organizations across the region approach data privacy.
According to the first position presented and published by Britain this week on data protection, the United Kingdom wants its supervisor to remain on the European Data Protection Council set up by the GDPR, stay in the one-stop system as Britain "believes that all this is in the interest of EU companies."
In response, the EU chief Brexit negotiator said "We can not, we will not be able to share this decisional autonomy with a third country, undoubtedly a former member state but which no longer wants to be in the same legal ecosystem as us."
He further listed three problems posed by Britain's ideas, namely "who would launch an offense against the United Kingdom in case of misapplication of the GDPR?"
"How to ensure that the United Kingdom updates its data legislation every time the EU itself updates the GDPR?"
"How to ensure uniform interpretation of the data protection rules on both sides of the Channel?"
"It must respect the fact that the European Union will continue to operate on the basis of this system, which has enabled us to build a single market, and which will enable us to deepen this unique market in response to new challenges," he said in the speech.
"And, with regard to personal data, he (Britain) must understand that the only possibility for the Union, as indicated in the guidelines of the European Council, will be to ensure their protection through adequacy decisions," said the negotiator.
"It's one thing to be inside the Union, it's another thing to be outside," he said.
Meanwhile, for Britain, the Brexit talk is a two-way thing instead of a one-way business.
"I fear that many see Brexit as a challenge for the Brits to sort out. This has to be two-way conversation. It can't just be about British prosperity, it has to be about our European partners. Candidly, if European leaders don't want it, then it won't happen," British finance minister Philip Hammond said Thursday during the European Business Summit here in Brussels.
The long-awaited Brexit talks was launched on June 19, 2017, nearly one year after Britain voted to leave the bloc by a narrow margin on June 23, 2016.
The British Prime Minister Theresa May sent a notification letter to the EU in late March last year, triggering a two-year countdown to Britain's withdrawal of the bloc after more than 44 years of membership.
