Brexit: May urges EU leaders to consider 'serious' UK plans

Theresa May has urged EU leaders to focus their minds on getting a Brexit deal in the next two months, saying negotiations will not be extended.
At a dinner in Salzburg, she told her 27 counterparts her priorities are maintaining economic ties and ensuring promises to Northern Ireland are kept.

There are suggestions the UK will put forward new ideas for regulatory checks to address the current Irish deadlock.

It comes as the PM insisted the EU must also rethink its stance on the border.

In her speech, Mrs May stressed her "serious" proposals for future co-operation between the UK and EU would ensure a "shared close relationship".

The informal gathering of EU leaders in the Austrian city was the first opportunity the prime minister has had to make the case for her Chequers blueprint to other leaders collectively.

In Mrs May's absence on Thursday, the 27 other EU leaders will discuss issues including the UK's future relationship with the EU and how to resolve the problems around the Irish border.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, two EU leaders said they hoped the UK would hold another referendum on Brexit, in the hope of reversing the 2016 result.

Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said most of his counterparts would like the "almost impossible" to happen.

Andrej Babis, the Czech Republic's prime minister, added he hoped the British people might change their minds.

Campaign group People's Vote is also calling for another referendum, arguing there should be a choice for voters between leaving with, or without, a deal or staying on current terms.

Negotiations over the terms of the UK's exit and future relations are at a critical stage, with about six months to go before the UK is scheduled to leave on 29 March 2019.