France on Thursday said it was ready to impose new checks on goods and passengers heading to Britain from next year whether or not there is a deal on the terms of London's exit from the EU single market and customs union.
After Britain and the EU acknowledged in late-night talks there were still large gaps between the two sides, France's Europe Minister Clement Beaune and Public Accounts Minister Olivier Dussopt checked on preparations at the Gare du Nord station in Paris where Eurostar trains arrive from London.
"We are ready," said Beaune, whose country is seen as a major voice in pressing the EU not to offer major concessions in the post-Brexit trade deal.
"We will obviously check until the last hour of the last day that our preparations are in place and that we are ready for this change which will occur, whatever happens, on January 1," he said.
"Whatever happens, on January 1 we will be in a different world, whether or not there is an agreement with the UK," he added.
'Acceleration in transfers'
The UK left the European Union on January 31 and at the end of this month will leave the bloc's single market and customs union, bringing to an end a half-century of ever-closer economic integration.
Negotiators from London and Brussels have been trying to agree a follow-on trade pact that would govern cross-Channel business after the transition period ends, but talks are deadlocked with just three weeks to go.
Dussopt said that 600 additional customs officers had been hired, including at Gare du Nord, to deal with the situation after January 1.
"Gare du Nord becomes an exit point from the European Union, an exit point from the internal market. Britain becomes a separate country," he explained.
He said in a change from the current practice, all passports will be stamped, that passports and not ID cards will now be needed to travel between France and Britain and that French customs officers will be aboard cross-Channel trains to carry out checks.
The agency that provides support for foreign companies thinking of bedding down in the French capital said Thursday that 5,000 new jobs have been created or will be created in the Paris area directly as a result of Brexit.
Choose Paris Region said that two-thirds of these jobs were in the finance sector, adding that people and companies were moving due to passport issues, logistics, customs duties and the desire to still benefit from European aid.
Arnaud de Bresson, the chief of Paris Europlace, which promotes Paris as a financial hub, said 10,000 jobs should be created in finance alone in Paris as a result of Brexit.
"We believe that we will have an acceleration in transfers from London" once Britain formally leaves the single market, he added.