May seeking North measures ahead of vote on Brexit deal

THERESA May has promised to win further measures specific to Northern Ireland ahead of the crucial Commons vote on her Brexit deal this month.

The British prime minister said yesterday that she is still negotiating with the EU to secure specific, and as-yet-unnamed, measures for the North.

The promise is part of her drive to get the DUP to back her plan – a daunting and unlikely prospect.

She said that ‘we are still working on’ getting extra assurances from Brussels as part of her drive to secure support for the deal, but fell short of saying what more she could possibly offer the North to get DUP support.

It is likely she is seeking assurances from Brussels that her deal will not create a trade border, or barrier, between the North and the rest of the UK.

Leo Varadkar, and EU officials, have repeatedly said they will not renegotiate the deal and that Ms May must try to pass the agreement Challenges: Theresa May when it comes to a vote in the House of Commons on January 15. However, last week the Taoiseach appeared to soften his approach, although he said there would be no ‘substantial’ changes allowed to the agreement.

Mrs May warned Brexiteers they risk derailing the UK’s departure from the EU if they do not back her deal.

And she again rejected calls for a second referendum, saying it would be disrespectful to people who voted for Brexit in 2016.

As MPs prepare to return to Westminster with the Commons vote, the prime minister said no alternative plan was able to respect the 2016 referendum result, protect jobs and provide certainty to citizens and businesses.

She repeatedly sidestepped questions about whether she would keep putting the deal back to MPs if it gets rejected, instead saying: ‘If the deal is not voted on, this vote that is coming up, then actually we are going to be in uncharted territory.

‘I don’t think anybody can say exactly what will happen in terms of the reaction we will see in parliament.’

She accused the UK’s Labour Party of ‘playing politics’ and opposing any deal to create ‘the greatest chaos’ possible.

Labour MP Barry Gardiner, the shadow international trade secretary, has suggested his party could offer a referendum on a renegotiated Brexit deal. He told Sky News that Labour’s plan remained to push for a general election if Mrs May’s deal was rejected, and that ‘we would set out what we would seek to negotiate in Europe to try and deliver’.

Mr Gardiner said if they managed to renegotiate a better deal, ‘at that stage it makes sense to go to the country and to say, “Here we are, this is what we have managed to negotiate, this is the deal that we have managed to conclude because we don’t have the same red lines as Theresa May, we think it’s a better way forward”.’

But Mrs May said: ‘We have got people who are promoting a second referendum in order to stop Brexit, and we have got people who want to see their perfect Brexit. I would say: “Don’t let the search for the perfect become the enemy of the good, because the danger there is that we end up with no Brexit at all.”’

However, the Democratic Unionist Party – on whose ten MPs Mrs May depends for a majority – remains firmly opposed to the deal.

Deputy DUP leader Nigel Dodds said the British government must ‘stand firm’ and set out a ‘resolute red line’ to Brussels.

‘The coming days will show if this government is made of the right stuff,’ he said.

Opposition ‘are playing politics’