Chris Mason
Political Correspondent

It is four years and six months to the day since the UK woke up to the EU referendum result and Brexit.

This morning, it wakes up to a deal, very nearly signed off, that will determine our relationship with our nearest neighbours from a week tomorrow and potentially for generations to come.

A re-wiring in how we are governed and how we trade that’s convulsed politics, driven two prime ministers from office and which took a pandemic to dislodge from being the daily, angry soundtrack of our national conversation.

The legal text accompanying the deal is expected to run to around 2,000 pages and Conservative Brexiteers have said they want to see it as soon as possible to scrutinise it in detail.

But with Mr Johnson’s big majority there is little doubt about it securing parliamentary approval.

The news conference announcing the deal was meant to be starting about now.

But after 1,645 days since the referendum, you won’t be that surprised it’s been delayed just a little more.

Image source, PA Media

It was well after midnight in Brussels last night when European Commission spokesman Eric Mamer advised "all Brexit-watchers" that work would continue through the night and they should get some sleep.

Then when the timing of a promised 08:00GMT press conference started to slip there was little surprise.

Brussels-based French journalist Anne Rovan quotes an EU source this morning saying the deal is stuck on the wording of the annexes. "If you've got shopping to do, this is the time to go and do it," according to her source. A deal should happen today, but every comma counts.

Is it all haggling over fish? Danish correspondent Ole Ryborg points out it would be nothing new. It was the same in the 1990s when Norway joined the European Economic Area, and with the accession talks on Spain and Portugal joining the EU too. "It's always the fish," he says.

We are all on tenterhooks here waiting for the detail of the post-Brexit trade deal between the UK and EU.

But before we get into the weeds of it, we already know things will be changing come 1 January 2021.

Let us take you through some of the most important things for people to think about in seven days time.

Read more here.

Katya Adler
Europe Editor

The fact is, believe it or not, they negotiated all the way through the night, and they haven't quite finished.

There are still very, very last minute talks ongoing.

Boris Johnson and Ursula von der Leyen have been in extremely close contact in the last days and hours - which was always expected, as when big political compromises have to be made to reach a deal, this has to come from the highest level.

The press conference time has been slipping and we are now hearing from the UK side it is expected around 10:00 GMT, but that is not quite yet a fact.

Even if and when this deal is announced as expected this morning, it is not just the European Parliament that wants to take a look - a copy goes to every single European member state for some light Christmas reading.

And after that each one of them has the potential to veto this deal, though it is thought unlikely they will.

But if they sign off on it, we can see this deal provisionally applied from 1 January.

Unlike what Theresa May once promised on friction free trade, we have to expect big changes when the transition period ends in seven days.

We don't need to go into the weeds of the deal to know it is out of the Customs Union and out of the Single Market - what was once known as a hard Brexit.

Soon we will start finding out what Brexit really means

Image source, Andrew Parsons

We know fishing - and how much access the EU should have to UK waters - has been one of the major obstacles to reaching a deal.

But what else has been holding up agreement? Well firstly, the EU's desire for 'level playing field' measures.

The EU is worried that once the UK has left the bloc's rules, it could cut regulations giving British businesses a competitive advantage over European ones.

That's why the EU wanted the UK to stick closely to its rules on workers' rights, environmental standard and state aid (subsidies given by government to business).

But the UK has argued it should be free to set its own controls.

The other sticking point concerns governance - or how the rules of a deal will be enforced in the future.

This includes what penalties one side could impose on the other if they break the rules of the deal - and who should arbitrate any disputes.

You can read more about this here.

Laura Kuenssberg
Political editor

The first thing that we expect to happen at an official level is a phone call, which I understand will be the fifth call in the past 24 hours between Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the EU chief Ursula von der Leyen.

That is expected to happen about now, but Brexit watchers will be stunned to know that the timings may slip a little bit.

It has been a long haul, but a trade deal done in record time.

Although the political debate will burst into life as soon as we see a glimpse on both sides of this, it is worth saying we expect there are about 2,000 pages of text.

The idea that everyone is going to get their heads round every single piece of detail and be able to find all the potential mini political explosions around it in the space of a few hours or by the time it's Christmas day is for the birds.

I don't think that the text will emerge immediately, but it will emerge before too long - and certainly before MPs have to vote on it, which we expect will happen on it on 30 December if all goes to plan.

Without sounding too grand about it, those pages - that dry detail - will set out the tramlines for an absolutely vital relationship that will shape what happens in this country for decades to come.

But what we will see in the next couple of days is the theory of it. The practice of the relationship will only be provided in the coming years.

Labour MP Hilary Benn, who chairs the Commons Brexit committee, said he thinks there is "no doubt" the UK Parliament will approve a deal, if it is recalled to vote on one next week.

“What any deal is going to do is to make the consequences of Brexit for business less bad than they would otherwise be," he told BBC Breakfast.

However, he said there would be "big changes" from 1 January regardless of whether there is an agreement and the debate over the UK's relationship with the EU will continue.

“I suspect this will not be the end of negotiations with the EU, there will be plenty of things to talk about over the months and the years ahead," he added.

Image source, Getty

MPs are likely to return (albeit virtually) to Westminster next week to vote on the trade deal.

"Parliament doesn’t have much option but to pass this thing," Jill Rutter of research group UK in a Changing in Europe says.

"Government is almost holding a gun to Parliament's head.

"If Parliament doesn’t pass this next week, then it is no deal on 31 December.

"I don’t think anybody wants to take responsibility for that."

The European Parliament will not have time to ratify a deal before 1 January, so any agreement is likely to be provisional.

Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) will vote on an agreement retrospectively at some point in the new year.

Gavin Lee
BBC Europe reporter

'Twas the night before a Brexit deal was agreed.

It seems the groundhog weeks of the same issues being fought over and discussed could be coming to an end.

Things changed about 24 hours ago. Every day, we get in touch with EU officials and ask what is going on, and the answer is always "could be now, could be later".

Suddenly it was "it is going to be tonight" and there was real confidence that they were so close.

They just had to go through species by species on fish and work out how close they could be, but the compromise was there.

In the next couple of hours we are expecting two press conferences from both sides of the water - one from Boris Johnson and one from Ursula von der Leyen.

This will be their view on how the deal has been agreed.

All of the EU councils and governments will also see this document and send it back if they agree provisionally.

So, fingers crossed we will have some news in the next hour or so.

We had been expecting a press conferences at around 08:00 GMT, but the timetable could be a bit fluid this morning.

This is from our political editor Laura Kuenssberg - "Brexit watchers - you'll be shocked to know the timings this morning may slip a bit."

Image source, Getty Images

It is believed one of the final obstacles being discussed by negotiators is quotas for particular types of fish.

That's no surprise as fishing has always been an emotional issue in the UK's relationship with the European Union.

Supporters of Brexit see it as a symbol of sovereignty that will now be regained. The UK says any new agreement on fisheries must be based on the understanding that "British fishing grounds are first and foremost for British boats".

But the EU wants access for its boats and says reaching a "fair deal" on fisheries is a pre-condition for a free trade agreement (with no tariffs or taxes on goods crossing borders).

So, while fishing is a tiny part of the economy on both sides of the Channel, it carries big political weight.

You can read more about why fishing is such a key issue in the talks here.

Laura Kuenssberg
Political editor

Take this with a bit of a pinch of salt, as the deal has not been confirmed yet, and no one apart from a tiny circle of officials and politicians on both sides have seen the full text of the agreement, which is said to be around 2,000 pages long.

But expect Boris Johnson to claim this morning that the agreement he’s sealed with the EU fulfils the promises he made in the Tory manifesto and the UK government will be in control of money, laws, borders and fisheries.

It’s understood the agreement does not have a role for the European Court of Justice and the two sides have agreed a system to sort out disputes that follows international law, rather than EU law.

The government is also confident that it secured last-minute protection for UK car plants too, over so-called rules of origin that determine where goods have been produced or manufactured, not just where they have been shipped from.

There were four calls between the prime minister and the EU chief yesterday, and another call is expected between the two of them soon this morning.

Negotiators were still haggling over the final details of the deal over fish stocks but it’s expected that the two sides have agreed to phase the new arrangements over five years, with the UK catching as much as two-thirds of the fish in UK waters by the end of the transition.

Image source, Reuters

After months of talks, UK cabinet ministers gathered for a late night conference call on Tuesday to discuss a Brexit deal with the EU.

The UK and EU negotiating teams talked through the night in Brussels.

It’s understood they discussed quotas for specific species of fish.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen were also in contact. It's understood they spoke four times yesterday, and will do so again shortly.

We're now poised for a press conference to follow some time this morning.

BBC Politics

Hello and thanks for joining us.

In the next few hours, UK and EU leaders are expected to announce that a deal has been reached that will govern their future relations after Brexit.

We’re here to take you through today’s developments, and bring you all the reaction as it happens.

And with analysis from our correspondents and the BBCReality Check team, we hope to guide you through what it all means.

Do stay with us.