In Brussels, Michel Barnier is seen as a skilled negotiator open to compromise, despite an exit on immigration

Michel Barnier’s appointment to Matignon has not gone unnoticed in Brussels. A former MEP, twice a commissioner and then a negotiator of the Brexit agreement, the new Prime Minister has a long European career behind him. What does it say about him?

Michel Barnier is remembered above all as a skilled negotiator, especially at the time of the Brexit agreement at the end of 2020. But also as a personality open to political compromises. Klaus Welle, from the German right, was Secretary General of the European Parliament when Michel Barnier was Commissioner and then Brexit negotiator. “He doesn’t put himself forward, he is quite modest in his behavior, he explains. He listens. Of course, he has his political convictions, but that doesn’t stop him from talking with other political families, whether on the right, the left or the far left.”

Still in the European Parliament but on the socialist side, Sylvie Guillaume nevertheless remembers a statement by Michel Barnier which had shocked Brussels, when he spoke of a moratorium of several years on immigration in Europe.

It was during the right-wing primary for the 2022 presidential election. “I was quite surprised because he had led this discussion of Brexit with a great assumed European dimension, remembers this MEPand there we had a bit of the impression of a race to the bottom with his right-wing competitors in the primary. It was really a match for type.”

Michel Barnier in any case retains the image of a convinced European. He was also a commissioner in Brussels for longer than a minister in Paris.