Address by the Deputy Chief Minister, The Hon Dr Joseph Garcia CMG MP

University of Gibraltar – Friday 20th March 2026, 10:00am

 

INTRODUCTION

Good morning.

Thank you for being here.

It is a privilege to speak at the University of Gibraltar.

An institution born of a political dream, now firmly rooted in reality.

A University that embodies ambition:

to engage,

to learn, and

to assert Gibraltar’s place in the Commonwealth and the world.

I am very grateful to the Vice Chancellor, to Dr Darren Fa and to the team for the kind invitation to deliver this address.

And I am particularly proud to continue my association with the University as an Honorary Researcher.

This morning I want to tell a story about a small community shaped by decisions taken far away.

It is a story of how Gibraltar became a casualty of ideological battles over Europe fought within the political class of the United Kingdom.

These were internal policy battles.

Gibraltar had no voice.

No vote.

No say.

So “Gibraltar and Europe: Past, Present and Future”.

A topic that could scarcely be more pertinent,

given the publication three weeks ago of the full text of the treaty to govern Gibraltar’s relationship with the EU.

And a topic too which is intensely political, strategic but also emotional.

Because 53 years ago, the United Kingdom joined the European Economic Community.

And Gibraltar followed.

And ten years ago, the United Kingdom left the European Union.

And Gibraltar followed.

We did not make that choice.

We did not shape it.

We could not stop it.

But we had to deal with the consequences.

I will argue that Gibraltar was a victim.

That those decisions, taken over a thousand miles away, set us on a remarkable journey.

It is a story of a small people shaped by borders.

Sometimes open, sometimes closed, and often weaponised.

It is also a story of how the impact of global politics cascade into very local consequences.

A story of how the UK’s internal war on Europe, waged over decades, ultimately swept Gibraltar along with it.

First to leave the European Union.

And then to negotiate a future relationship with it.

This was not an easy journey.

It was unexpected and without precedent.

No Member State had left the European Union before.

Needless to say, we were heavily constrained by our connection to one particular Member State.

So in developing a number of relevant themes, I propose in part to structure this chronologically.

As a historian, you will probably expect nothing less.

And as we dwell upon where we have been,

where we have ended up and

where we are going,

a decade on from the Brexit Referendum is a good moment in which to reflect on such questions.

 

GIBRALTAR BEFORE MEMBERSHIP

I want to set the context with a few words first about the period before membership.

This was the time before 1973.

It was a different world and a different Europe.

A Continent divided by ideology, symbolised by the Berlin Wall.

When Gibraltar lived a blockade of its own in this small corner of Europe.

 A fascist, military dictatorship next door and a closed border.

That was a time when some 60% of our economy was based on UK defence expenditure.

When the largest employer was a naval dockyard.

And when we were physically cut off from the European Continent in every material respect.

Franco’s deliberate policy of coercion and isolation proved to be a failure of course.

At the time, the European ideal was very much in its infancy.

For Gibraltar, Europe was not a space of opportunity or rights.

It was distant, theoretical and physically unreachable.

And it is essential to understand this background in order to better appreciate what came later.

So while in the UK debates about the European Economic Community were beginning to stir;

in Gibraltar the wider prospect of European membership was neither discussed nor imagined.

The reality of living under siege made the demands of the present far more immediate than the political experiments of the future.

Parity of wages with the United Kingdom was, for example, a far more practical concern.

 

UK AND GIBRALTAR JOIN THE EEC

The European Economic Community was established with the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957.

And six years later the UK decided to join.

It is not well known that they tried two times, in 1963 and again in 1967.

On both occasions they were shut out by France.

General de Gaulle vetoed UK entry.

And at the time, he rather ominously predicted that Britain was “incompatible” with Europe;

that it had an “island mentality”; and

that the United Kingdom harboured a “deep-seated hostility” to any pan-European project.

This left a bad taste.

And the irony was not lost on anyone.

The General had more reason than most to be grateful to the UK.

His double veto dented the perception of France and of Europe in the United Kingdom itself.

So for the UK, in the end, it was very much a case of third time lucky.

The moment finally came when, together with Denmark and Ireland, they finally joined what were then the European Communities on 1 January 1973.

There was an immediate impact on Gibraltar as well.

UK membership applied to Gibraltar under Article 227(4) of the Treaty of Rome.

This stated that its provisions “...shall apply to the European territories for whose external relations a Member State is responsible”.

Gibraltar opted for a very substantial membership of the EEC.

And it became the only British Overseas Territory that was a part of the European club.

The application of the Treaties to Gibraltar was, as we know, subject to certain exemptions.

Those were set out in Articles 28 – 30 of the 1972 UK Act of Accession.

These exemptions were that Gibraltar,

remained outside the Common Agricultural Policy;

remained outside the Common Fisheries Policy;

applied no VAT;

and remained outside the Customs Union.

It was a unique status.

A form of tailor-made, a la carte membership that reflected Gibraltar’s geography, economy and political reality.

In the context of the proposed Treaty relationship today there are two important points worth noting.

The first is that the new relationship will also be unique and tailor-made.

And the second that Gibraltar will connect with Europe in areas which we were excluded from during our time of membership.

But more of that later.

An important marker in this story is that within eighteen months of joining the EEC, the United Kingdom held a referendum to establish whether they wanted to leave.

Deeply held views on the question of Europe this time divided the Labour Party.

In their manifesto for both the February and October 1974 general elections Labour had promised voters to renegotiate the UK’s EEC membership.

The Party was split on the issue.

The Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, made use of the referendum as a political tool to manage those internal divisions.

They say that history sometimes repeats itself.

Fast forward.

Some forty years later Prime Minister David Cameron was to apply the same solution to the same problem.

An important difference, as we know only too well, was the outcome in each case.

In June 1975 67.2% voted in favour of continued membership.

But that the referendum took place so soon was quite remarkable.

In any case, Gibraltar was not included in that vote.

A reminder that our European destiny has often turned on UK domestic politics, not on our own choices.

So the truth is that the impact of joining the EEC proved to be very limited for Gibraltar.

The land border with Spain was physically shut.

There were no overland trade routes between Gibraltar and Europe.

Spain itself was not in the European club.

This facilitated the negotiation of that tailor-made status for Gibraltar.

The Gibraltar Government, for its part, was consulted on our terms of membership.

And Sir Joshua Hassan told me that they acted largely on advice from the United Kingdom itself.

Times have changed of course.

We are now lucky enough to have our own home-grown experts in European law.

Primarily, of course, the Attorney General Michael Llamas, who is a pillar of knowledge and experience.

Very ably assisted by the Director of Gibraltar House in Brussels Daniel D’Amato.

They have guided us expertly and professionally though the complex minefield of EU exit and the future relationship negotiations.

On 1 November 1993, the European Economic Community became the European Community.

That already made a statement.

And in 2009 it became the European Union.

An even stronger statement.

Each successive treaty development rung alarm bells among the anti-Europeans in the United Kingdom.

But for Gibraltar, the period from 1973 until 1986 was by and large pretty uneventful.

Gibraltar was able to benefit from four fundamental freedoms;

the free movement of people;

the freedom of establishment;

the free movement of capital;

and the freedom to provide services.

And generally speaking, people here were pro-European in outlook

 

SPAIN JOINS THE EEC 1986

But the European Community remained a distant entity.

It was only when Spain joined in 1986 that Europe finally came to our doorstep.

A taste of what was to come was delivered by Madrid almost immediately.

It was not enough for them to open the border in exchange for EU membership.

They demanded and obtained a negotiating process on the sovereignty of Gibraltar as well.

And if that too were not enough,

less than 24 hours after signing the Accession Treaty,

with the ink not yet dry on Spain’s signature,

Madrid promptly sent a despatch to the UK Foreign Office.

This set out that their accession to the EC did not imply any changes with regard to Spain’s position on Gibraltar.

London simply took note.

So there were two distinct phases to Gibraltar’s European experience.

The first from 1973 until 1985 which was generally calm.

And the second from 1986 until 2020 which was far more turbulent than the previous one.

For Spanish accession turned Gibraltar’s membership on its head.

They sought to probe, challenge and undermine the status which Gibraltar had enjoyed in Europe.

Processes, procedures and institutions which had not been questioned for over a decade were suddenly placed under scrutiny.

Gibraltar found itself as a target for newly elected hostile Spanish MEPs.

In the firing line of nationalistic Spanish Commissioners.

Even in the sights of Spanish judge or two.

This same sovereignty debate had played out at the United Nations for decades.

In 1986 it spread from New York to Brussels as well,

where Spain found a new institutional arena in which to advance its claim.

That arena became the corridors of the European Commission,

the committees of the European Parliament and

the meeting rooms of the European Council.

 

OPENING OF THE BORDER

So Spanish membership gave rise to a whole range of issues as a consequence of their ongoing claim to the sovereignty of Gibraltar.

But before any of that,

indeed, even before they formally joined,

the Gibraltar-Spain land frontier had to be addressed.

The gates had been slammed shut by General Franco in 1969.

They remained closed for nearly ten years after Franco's death.

They opened in February 1985, ten months before Spanish accession.

And they opened because they had to.

It is significant that the frontier had been closed for longer by a democratic Spain than it had been under the dictatorship.

And this did little to inspire confidence.

But in retrospect, the United Kingdom committed a serious strategic error.

This was not merely a missed opportunity; it shaped the next four decades of Gibraltar’s experience in Europe.

London could have insisted that all restrictions against Gibraltar were lifted unconditionally as the price of Spanish entry.

It is the firm approach General De Gaulle took with the UK in 1963 and again in 1967.

In this case, however, the United Kingdom adopted a more conciliatory posture in the hope that Spain would reciprocate.

This turned out to be a serious error of judgment.

The result of this failure of UK policy soon became only too apparent.

And successive Spanish Governments came to see the European project as a vehicle through which to progress their claim to Gibraltar.

 

THE AIRPORT – PAST AND PRESENT

This became clear almost at once.

If there is one issue that encapsulates Gibraltar’s troubled relationship with Spain inside the EU, it is the airport.

Within 18 months of joining Spain vetoed an air liberalisation package on the basis of its application to Gibraltar Airport.

The UK was at first critical of the actions of Madrid.

However, six months and one u-turn later, the UK too agreed to suspend Gibraltar airport from the measure.

The interests of the UK took primacy over the interests of Gibraltar.

This was not only about winning Spanish good will.

The aviation package was expected to be of considerable financial benefit to UK airlines.

And faced with the choice, the UK chose itself.

So Gibraltar Airport was excluded.

Except that it was called a suspension.

A suspension which would only be lifted when Gibraltar applied an Anglo-Spanish agreement on the airport which had been concluded in December 1987.

When Gibraltar challenged this in the European Court, the Court declined to consider the substance of the case, ruling it inadmissible on technical grounds.

However, the 1987 deal was never implemented.

And Gibraltar remained excluded from successive aviation measures.

It was not until 2006 with the Trilateral Forum for Dialogue that flights between Gibraltar and Madrid resumed.

And Spain agreed that it would no longer seek the suspension of Gibraltar Airport from EU civil aviation legislation.

It was also agreed that all measures that Gibraltar had been excluded from would be extended to it.

And that Gibraltar would construct a new air terminal parallel to the frontier fence with direct access to another building on the Spanish side.

Gibraltar kept to its side of the bargain.

The new terminal opened at the end of 2011.

Unfortunately, the Government in Spain changed at exactly that time.

The new Partido Popular administration reversed the policy of their Socialist predecessors.

They moved from cooperation with Gibraltar to outright confrontation.

That move was spearheaded by Jose Manuel Garcia Margallo.

He became the most anti-Gibraltar Foreign Minister since the days of General Franco.

Madrid abandoned the Cordoba Agreement.

Even though both the UK and Gibraltar did not.

And those actions had consequences for Europe as a whole,

when a number of aviation measures were blocked by Spain for the whole of the European Union.

The UK firmly defended the principle that European law on civil aviation applied to the airport.

And the matter was deadlocked.

But then in June 2016 the UK voted to leave the European Union.

This changed the dynamics of the airport question in an instant.

It became obvious to all the parties, including the European Commission, that the issue would go away once the United Kingdom exited the European Union and took Gibraltar along with it.

So it is worth recalling that before Brexit, Gibraltar airport was entitled to EU air connectivity as of right.

After Brexit, those rights were lost completely.

It was disappointing to say the least, that the European Commission, the guardian of the Treaties, failed to act and to uphold EU law in this area.

The EU institutions chose not to intervene.

The United Kingdom could only hold the deadlock.

Other Member States offered tea and sympathy.

And Spain was able to benefit from this all-round lack of interest.

 

THE AIRPORT - FUTURE

That was the past and present.

So what about the future?

Where does the airport fit in the treaty package?

As I said, Gibraltar now finds itself outside the EU and with no automatic rights.

That means that the principles we defended for decades no longer apply.

The airport debate now rests firmly in the context of a new relationship with the European Union.

This comes under the umbrella of the new treaty agreed between the UK and the EU.

You will know that the UK is the signatory because of our constitutional position.

But Gibraltar has been the negotiator.

UK has a direct military interest in the airport,

and both of us have defended every inch of our sovereignty throughout the process.

In practical terms, the result is straightforward: flights between Gibraltar and the European Union will be possible again, under a legal framework that protects Gibraltar’s sovereignty and preserves our relationship with the United Kingdom.

UK airlines will continue to fly between Gibraltar and the United Kingdom.

EU airlines will be able to fly between Gibraltar and the European Union.

Treaties of this type are governed by Committees.

In this field, a Specialised Committee on Aviation between the UK and the EU will be established.

This will have a supervisory role.

It will ensure that standards are met and that the treaty is complied with.

The mechanism for this will be inspection visits and information exchanges.

And these will only take place while there are flights to the European Union or in preparation for such flights.

Gibraltar has agreed to apply EU law in four areas through our own constitutional instruments.

This is what we used to do while in the EU.

The four areas are:

the rights of passengers with reduced mobility;

airport charges;

airport slots; and

ground handling.

A new 50/50 company between Gibraltar and Spain will be established in Ireland.

That Irish company will award the tender for the operating company to run the airport.

Given that it is 50/50, there can be no changes to the existing arrangement without our consent.

The ownership of the air terminal will remain with the Government.

The ownership of the runway and associated aprons and buildings will remain with the Ministry of Defence.

There will be no change of ownership.

It will be possible for passengers or others to litigate against the JV in Gibraltar or in the court of any state to which relevant international conventions apply.

That mirrors the position during our time of EU membership.

So the airport will benefit from a new relationship with the European Union which at the same time protects our relationship with the United Kingdom.

The best of both worlds.

The foundations have been laid for a new route network to the EU.

While this opportunity is now up to the airlines to take up, the possibilities are endless.

There is one paradox in all this.

While we were in the European Union, the airport was an area of controversy.

Now that we are outside the European Union, it is set to become an area of cooperation.

And in this contribution about Gibraltar and the EU, it is important to recognise that fact.

This progress has materialised in spite of Brexit.

 

THE LAND BORDER – PAST AND PRESENT

But this talk is about past, present and future.

So I will now make a few points in relation to the land border.

The frontier gates swung open in February 1985.

But that did not mean that the border operated as a normal crossing point between two parts of the EU.

Far from it.

For decades, the manner in which Spain operated the land border was highly questionable.

The passage of persons, vehicles and goods was often held to ransom by the state of political relations between Gibraltar and Spain at a given moment in time.

But again the EU institutions did not ask the questions.

And border issues were subjected for decades to the same apathy we experienced with the airport.

In fact, it was not until 2013 that the European Commission sent an inspection mission to Gibraltar.

This came in response to the lengthy delays instigated by Foreign Minister Margallo.

Those queues peaked at eight hours.

That intervention only came about after high level pressure from the UK.

Prime Minister Cameron interrupted his summer holiday and raised the matter with the then President of the Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso.

As a result, the European Commission sent three inspection visits to the border in 2013, 2014 and 2015.

It took a while, but the Commission eventually declared that the checks which created the lengthiest delays were "disproportionate".

The situation at the border improved as a result of that intervention.

But it was never perfect.

Transit through the border had been weaponised by General Franco in the 1960s.

It continued to be by his successors.

The frontier was used as a pressure-point;

sometimes by Ministers in Madrid;

sometimes by regional and local authorities;

sometimes through administrative obstruction; and

sometimes by individual officers with their own agenda.

And all this even when both Gibraltar and Spain were in the European Union.

The target was always the same: Gibraltar’s economy and people.

But EU law nonetheless provided a degree of protection.

That legal cover was lost when we left.

It should be obvious that Brexit therefore had the potential to create a very serious challenge here.

 

THE LAND BORDER – FUTURE

So when looking at the picture for the future of the border, it is essential to bear in mind the circumstances of the past.

The way in which it was abused.

The way in which it was used to target the economy of Gibraltar.

The way in which it was seen as a route, a failed route, to secure a surrender of sovereignty.

As a student of our history, I have always appreciated the value of learning from the past.

And the lesson from the past in relation to the border was crystal clear.

That coercive lever had to go.

This context is essential to an understanding of the future of the controls at the land border.

Because the border is not only a political boundary.

It is also the daily crossing point for thousands of people on both sides.

And the gateway through which the economy of Gibraltar connects with the surrounding region.

In this area, once again, our departure from the European Union has created a paradox.

This is that Gibraltar will enjoy greater border fluidity outside the European Union than we enjoyed when we were Members of it.

That will come about through the interaction between the EU Schengen Area and Gibraltar’s own immigration law.

Through the marrying of the EU Customs Union and Gibraltar’s own goods and customs legislation.

The arrangement is not theoretical.

It will remove routine immigration and customs checks at the land border while preserving the frontier itself.

Because that is where Spain ends and where Gibraltar starts.

It is relevant to emphasise too that our departure from the European Union has given rise to border control arrangements which are pretty much unique.

This is the system of dual controls which will be operated in a common immigration zone at Gibraltar airport.

First the Gibraltar control, as we have today.

Followed by the Schengen control operated by Spain on behalf of the EU.

And it is also relevant to stress that Gibraltarians and Gibraltar residents will enjoy a number of exclusive benefits.

They will have a right to return to Gibraltar.

They cannot be refused entry into Gibraltar.

They cannot be detained or arrested by the Schengen authorities.

They will be exempt from the new electronic European Entry-Exit System – known as EES.

They will be exempt from the new EU pre-travel authorisation scheme known as ETIAS.

There will be no immigration or customs controls at the border.

No immigration controls on flights to the Schengen area.

They will enjoy the de-facto non-application of the 90 day in 180 day rule.

So leaving the EU will bring Gibraltar closer to the EU.

And here we arrive at one of the great paradoxes of this story.

Brexit took Gibraltar out of Europe.

Yet the solution brings Gibraltar closer to Europe than we were before.

But Schengen here is a tool not a flag.

It is a practical arrangement

which means that there is no impact on Gibraltar’s British sovereignty.

And more than that, Gibraltarians and Gibraltar residents will enjoy the best of both worlds.

Access for persons into the UK and the EU.

Access to the UK market in services.

And access to the EU market in goods.

 

TERRITORIAL WATERS AND OTHER ISSUES

This talk today is about the relationship with Europe in the past, in the present and in the future.

A relationship which 96% of those voting supported in the 2016 referendum.

A relationship which has evolved through time and space.

And one which is set to develop and mature going forward.

The border and the airport were not the only two areas impacted by Spain’s accession to the European Community.

There were issues across the board.

For example,

the European Commission approved a proposal by Spain which included Gibraltar’s territorial waters as part of a Spanish marine protected area in 2007.

Gibraltar went to Court two times.

Again, both actions failed on technical grounds.

The appeal, was kicked out by a panel of three judges which included a Spanish judge.

A Spanish judge with a history when it came to Gibraltar.

In practice, the European Union became another arena in which that long-standing matter was played out.

This extended to other areas.

Madrid objected to competent authorities from Gibraltar.

And refused to recognise them or deal with them unless communication was through the United Kingdom.

Spain also made use of the EU State Aid mechanism to mount an assault on Gibraltar’s taxation regime.

And we often had to resort to Court in defence of those rights.

We even had to argue to exercise our right to vote in elections to the European Parliament.

Although that legal action was against the United Kingdom itself.

So Gibraltar’s position in the European Union became a whirlwind after Spanish membership, interspersed with occasional moments of calm.

And nothing came easy.

Nothing was handed down on a plate.

For decades Gibraltar had to defend itself against administrative, political and legal action.

The above is not an exhaustive list.

But it was one issue after another.

And this snapshot provides a flavour of what EU membership became after 1986.

Those disputes were not about technical compliance.

They were political contests conducted through legal or administrative means.

 

GIBRALTAR AND EUROPE – THE FUTURE

Yet despite all these difficulties,

the framework of the EU provided a legal and political structure where Gibraltar could make its voiced heard.

Yes. Spain had a veto and a seat, but so did the United Kingdom.

In 2004 Gibraltarians were able to vote in elections to the European Parliament for the first time.

This amplified the local voice.

Those MEPs were directly elected by the people of Gibraltar combined with the South West of England constituency.

The regional list elected seven and later six MEPs.

Gibraltar went on to win votes in the European Parliament.

This included a particularly important one on the rights of passengers with reduced mobility.

Some cases in Court were won as well.

On the question of regional selectivity in taxation matters.

And in 2006, the Cordoba agreements set out to place the relationship with Spain on a new footing.

This was a political agreement.

It was entirely voluntary.

It was not legally binding.

The parties entered into those agreements as a matter of policy because they thought it was a good thing to do.

But Cordoba did not survive a change of Government in Spain.

And the departure of the United Kingdom and Gibraltar from the European Union on 31 January 2021 changed the rules of the game.

A future relationship was no longer a voluntary policy option.

A treaty became a necessity as opposed to something which it would be nice to have.

Gibraltar needed to act.

And such action had to take account of the background which I have just described.

So the dynamics of our connection with Europe have now changed.

And they have transformed over time too.

We were outside the European Economic Community until 1973.

Then we were part of the EEC, the EC and the EU until 2021.

And now we have been out of the European club for some five years.

Importantly, as I said earlier, in 2016 Gibraltar voted for a relationship with the European Union.

That relationship was membership.

Membership is no longer possible because the United Kingdom has left.

While it is not membership, the new treaty represents the closest structural relationship available to Gibraltar outside the EU framework.

It is the closest to membership that is on offer.

And it will protect Gibraltar in a number of ways.

First, it will be legally binding.

Second, the treaty itself will include a dispute resolution mechanism of its own.

Third, the parties to the treaty are the United Kingdom and the European Union.

It is not a treaty between the UK and Spain.

In addition to all this, the termination clause provides an escape hatch in the event that it is ever required.

But the new treaty will regulate the immediate future.

What happens longer term?

What could the distant future bring?

 

REJOIN IN THE FUTURE

Brexit itself has demonstrated just how quickly the impossible can become a reality.

It is a reflection of how the relationship between Gibraltar and Europe has often rested on wider developments in the United Kingdom itself.

So what about a decision to rejoin?

Given the result of the 2016 referendum, UK political parties have been treading  on eggshells here.

Even the strongly pro-European Liberal Democrats described rejoining only as a “longer term objective” in their 2024 general election manifesto.

The UK Government too is itself performing a delicate balancing act, wary of losing Labour seats to Reform in strongly pro-Brexit constituencies.

The much publicised “reset” has so far been little more than an agreement to agree, with the finer detail still to be worked out.

Though only this week, the Chancellor Rachael Reeves has floated the possibility of a closer alignment for the UK with EU commercial rules.

It is clear that rejoining cannot be ruled out in the future.

And were that to occur, where would it leave Gibraltar?

The answer to that question is not found by gazing into a crystal ball.

Educated analysis would suggest that it would be unlikely for the UK to rejoin on the same terms it enjoyed before it departed.

That could mean no more opt-outs.

No more budget rebates.

And no more special treatment.

All this is speculation of course.

But there is some logic behind it.

The EU was not generous when the UK exited.

And much would depend on the level of generosity on offer at that point somewhere in the future.

Worse still, the EU might welcome the UK back - but not Gibraltar.

We have learnt from experience that decisions taken elsewhere can reshape our destiny overnight.

So what does that mean?

It means that the new UK-EU treaty will provide Gibraltar with a degree of legal certainty and continuity in the years ahead.

Because it establishes a framework that protects Gibraltar’s interests regardless of what future decisions may be taken in London.

 

RATIFICATION AND IMPLEMENTATION

This morning my aim was to cover 45 years of Gibraltar’s EU membership in less than 45 minutes.

And to look forward to what is to come.

It is not possible to do justice to the subject in the time available.

But one thing is clear.

That future is set out in a treaty which is now written.

It has been translated and it will be signed.

Then the spotlight will move to the ratification process of the two sides.

On the EU side,

treaty approval will need to come from the Council.

This is made up of the same Member States who authorised the European Commission to negotiate it in the first place.

And it will also require a vote in the European Parliament.

Earlier this month, the Gibraltar Parliament signalled the UK Parliament to commence the ratification process on the British side.

The UK will do so after Easter when the signed treaty will be laid for scrutiny during 21 days.

Signature and ratification will be followed by implementation.

I would divide that into three general workstreams.

The first is legal.

These are the changes to the laws of Gibraltar which will be required in order to give effect to a new treaty.

Those legislative amendments will cover a broad area of our existing legal framework.

The second workstream will be infrastructural.

This will include, for example, new construction equidistant into Gibraltar and Spain where the external border controls will be carried out.

There will be other physical works as well such as roads and buildings.

Some of that construction will be internal.

For instance, the underutilised Cordoba corridors inside the air terminal are being modified and will be put to good use.

This has already commenced.

A third workstream will be administrative.

The system will need to achieve a better understanding of the treaty and prepare to give practical effect to it.

I suppose the message is that the treaty work does not end with the conclusion of negotiations.

There was a negotiation.

Then a political agreement.

Then legal treaty text.

Then signature and translation.

Then ratification.

And finally an implementation process as well.

 

CONCLUSION

So I want to reflect briefly, in my closing comments, on how all this came about.

On how the United Kingdom came to exit the European Union and Gibraltar came to be landed in this predicament.

Let me say first, as someone who firmly believed in the European project that there were moments in this negotiation where I understood the sentiment of the Brexiteers.

I did not agree with them.

But I understood where they were coming from.

For it was obvious long before Brexit that there was already an alarming disconnect between the leadership of Europe and the people of Europe.

In June 1992, for example, the people of Denmark voted against the Maastricht Treaty and blocked its ratification.

This was put to a second vote in May 1993 where the treaty was carried after certain opt outs had been secured.

In June 2001 the people of Ireland voted against the Treaty of Nice.

There was some tinkering with the wording and they were made to vote again in October 2002 when the Treaty was then approved.

In June 2008 the Irish voted down the Treaty of Lisbon as well.

After certain guarantees, they were made to vote again in October 2009 where the amended treaty was approved.

But perhaps the most questionable cases came in 2005 where the French and the Dutch both rejected the so-called European Constitutional Treaty.

This time there was no second vote, and instead it was repackaged and presented again as the Treaty of Lisbon.

So there is an argument to be made that at key moments the leaders of Europe were taking the people of Europe in a direction where some did not want to go.

This is, in part, the approach which fanned the flames for the Brexiteers.

But we are where we are, and that is only a point for further debate and for reflection.

In this University setting, it is important to bear one important consideration in mind.

The relationship we are constructing will shape the environment in which our young people will live, work and build the next chapter of Gibraltar’s history.

So the path to secure that relationship with Europe has been a long journey.

A journey which was complex and difficult.

Because Gibraltar’s relationship with Europe has never been simple.

It has been shaped by geography, history, power and politics.

We have been outside Europe, inside it and now alongside it once again.

Gibraltar has navigated the storm to sail safely into its port of call.

The treaty before us is not perfect and it does not erase the past.

But it does learn from it.

It removes the weapons used against us.

It replaces volatility with law.

It brings certainty where there was none.

Gibraltar can plan, trade and live within a defined legal framework.

We have been driven here by necessity and arrived here by choice.

And so, I want to close with a reminder of what Winston Churchill is said to have once observed:

“If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea.”

Gibraltar has never had the luxury of that choice.

We have always lived between Europe and the open sea.

And we have learned, not merely to survive there, but to prosper as well.

Thank you.