May visits North but stays 80km from border
‘Do I understand impact for people?’
BRITISH Prime Minister Theresa May was at the centre of another Brexit furore yesterday when she visited the North to talk about Britain’s departure from the EU – but didn’t go near the border.
Instead, Theresa May went to a farm between Bangor and Belfast, in the unionist heartland of north Down, where support for Brexit is strong.
She later faced questions on why she had not gone to meet the border communities, who will be the most acutely affected by Brexit, despite visits from many EU leaders.
She said: ‘My diary over the next year hasn’t yet been set, but all I am saying is I understand. I think it’s not a question of just whether I actually go and stand on the border, it’s a question of, “do I understand the impact that has for people?”’
She said she was there to listen to farmers, and suggested that leaving the Common Agricultural Policy would be a big opportunity for agriculture.
‘Listening to representatives of the agri-food industry, hearing what they want to see coming out of Brexit, what are the opportunities for Northern Ireland in the future. That’s what I have been doing,’ she said.
The border has become one of the biggest obstacles in the Brexit negotiations, and Brussels has said it must be resolved before full trade talks can take place.
However, it emerged earlier this month that senior members of Theresa May’s Brexit team have not made a single visit to the Irish border since September 2016.
The Open Britain campaign revealed that Brexit Minister David Davis has made just one visit to the area since being put in charge, while Boris Johnson has never made the trip since becoming Foreign Secretary.
Mrs May was adamant there would be no customs stops. She said: ‘We are absolutely committed to ensuring there is no hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland to ensure that free flow.’ While visiting the Jackson family farm in Co. Down yesterday, the prime minister had lunch with representatives of the Ulster Farmers’ Union. She also walked around the farm, inspecting the family’s Friesian milking herd with the Jackson children.
Mrs May told the farmers that Brexit presented opportunities for them. ‘I think one of the things that will come out of Brexit is the opportunity for agriculture here, and across the UK, to really set our own way of doing things,’ she said, adding that on a recent visit to China she had learned of opportunities for British milk exporters. ‘There’s lot of opportunities to find ways of doing these things,’ she said.
Mrs May was conducting a whistle-stop tour of England, Scotland, Wales and the North, to mark a year until March 29, 2019, the day Britain leaves the EU.
She also called on Britons to come together to seize the opportunities, and said additional money would be available to spend on the health service and schools once they are no longer sending ‘vast sums’ to Brussels.
But in a BBC interview she steered clear of repeating Mr Johnson’s term ‘Brexit dividend’ and ducked a question of whether Brexit will be worth it. She told interviewer Laura Kuenssberg: ‘I think there are real opportunities for the United Kingdom.’