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The European Union’s chief Brexit negotiator was urged not to water down the bloc’s demand for unchanged access to the UK’s territorial waters after the post-Brexit transition period expires

in December. The Frenchman is understood to be ready to make concessions in an attempt to save talks over an EU-UK trade deal from collapsing. UK officials believe he is ready to climb down

from the bloc’s unrealistic position in order to broker a breakthrough compromise. European sources claim Mr Barnier is “under pressure” not to break cover until British negotiators first

concede ground to Brussels. During a private meeting with MEPs, the Brussels bureaucrat vowed not to deviate from the hardline guidelines handed to him by member states before the Brexit

talks were launched. He promised the group of Renew politicians, who are closely linked to French President Emmanuel Macron, that EU negotiators would not budge until their UK counterparts

dropped demands for a new scientific approach to determine post-Brexit access for European boats. British officials have published a detailed plan calling annual negotiations and to

calculate quota shares based on “zonal attachment”, where fish live, rather than historic data. From this the two sides would easily be able to establish the new arrangements but doing so

would reveal how much EU boats are set to lose out after Brexit. Mr Barnier has only tabled a vague wish list for a deal covering historic fishing rights and the socio-economic impact on

coastal communities. He has previously suggested the EU would have to move away from this demand in order to reach an agreement with Britain. Pierre Karleskind, chairman of the European

Parliament’s fisheries committee, said there is no need for the EU side to budge in the battle over access to its waters. He argued that Britain should swallow the bloc’s demands because of

its membership of the Common Fisheries Policy since the 1970s. French MEP Mr Karleskind, an ally of President Macron, said: “There is no reason why the EU would move unilaterally from its

relative stability position, which is the result of years of negotiation in which UK has been part of.” He accused the Government of “simply forgetting that the UK has been part of the

negotiation relative to the quota share system in the EU for the last 40 years”. MUST READ: EU CRISIS TALKS AS NO DEAL BREXIT COULD CRIPPLE IRELAND AND BELGIUM French trawlermen are set to

be hit hardest by any change to the quota system as the historic pattern allows them to catch 84 percent of the cod quota in the English Channel compared to the nine percent given to UK

boats. Last week Mr Barnier signalled for the first time that Brussels will have to drop its hardline demands.  He said: "On fisheries we have very strong positions on both sides. The

EU wants the status quo, the UK wants to change everything. "If we want an agreement we have to discuss somewhere between those two issues. We’re prepared to discuss what needs to be

discussed."