Spearheading Britain’s 90-strong team for Brexit talks in Brussels this week is a precocious man with a string of demanding day jobs. Olly Robbins is at the apex of Britain’s Brexit pyramid.
He is Theresa May’s principal Europe adviser and her "sherpa", an emissary who prepares summits for their head of government. He also runs the department for exiting the EU (Dexeu), building it from scratch over the past 12 months to a staff of nearly 500. Finally, he is the co-ordinator of the negotiations, spending more time in Brussels than David Davis, the UK’s Brexit secretary. "You can’t blame Olly," said one of his principal intermediaries in Brussels. "But it looks crazy to me." A leading former civil servant in London agreed. "I can think of no precedent where someone is double-hatted like this, working on the prime minister’s staff but also running a large government department. A sherpa can run a secretariat numbering a few dozen officials but not a department like Dexeu with nearly 500." All roads lead back to Robbins. One senior official who works with him described the negotiations as "the Olly show", while another of his colleagues joked that success would bring him t...
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