BATTLE TO FIX BREXIT
May holds crunch talks with Brussels in last-ditch bid to get EU to back down ahead of tomorrow’s historic vote in Commons
THERESA May held crisis talks with Brussels yesterday in a final bid to win concessions before tomorrow’s crunch vote on her Brexit deal.
The Prime Minister spoke to EU Council president Donald Tusk by phone amid intensifying demands for her to renegotiate the package. She is understood to have warned the chief Eurocrat that MPs will reject the deal overwhelmingly unless the EU provides a genuine guarantee that the UK will not be tied to
the bloc indefinitely through the “backstop” border mechanism.
The hotline to Brussels followed demands from a string of top Tories for the deal to be renegotiated.
Former cabinet ministers Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab and Esther McVey urged Mrs May to reopen the talks and “fix” Brexit.
Mr Johnson, seen as a key challenger for her job, offered to back Mrs May’s premiership if she dumped the backstop proposal.
He said her deal could be a “way forward” that would unite MPs if she could win the crucial change, saying: “You go forward with this deal but you take out the backstop. That’s what needs to happen.”
In a tweet last night, Mr Tusk indicated Mrs May had talked of the high stakes in tomorrow’s vote. “It will be an important week for the fate of Brexit,” he said.
Downing Street said the call was a “routine” discussion about preparations for the summit of EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday.
Mrs May is expected to have to tell the gathering that Parliament will not accept the deal, with more than 100 Tories openly committed to voting against the Government.
Tory whips called dozens of potential rebels yesterday, pleading with them not to risk the future of Mrs May’s premiership by opposing her deal. One Tory MP claimed whips were privately asking backbenchers if she should resign if the motion was defeated.
Brink
Mrs May was also braced for further frontbench resignations as tomorrow’s vote looms.
Ministry of Defence aide Will Quince quit on Saturday and at least one more frontbencher was said to be on the brink of resigning.
Mr Johnson used a BBC interview to set out his demands for backing the Prime Minister.
The leading Leave campaigner signalled he could back Mrs May’s deal if the backstop was scrapped.
Suggesting there was a “way forward”, he told the Andrew Marr show: “There is a programme that would unite the House and it’s very, very simple. You go forward with this deal but you take out the backstop. That’s what needs to happen.
“I think she needs to recognise that there is overwhelming hostility to this backstop arrangement on all sides of the House and that is the thing that needs to be changed.
“But there is support for much else that she has negotiated and the stuff on citizens, the looking after the 3.2 million here in this country, looking after UK citizens abroad, all that is very sensible.”
Mr Johnson added: “I do think that we can have a fantastic future if we do
Brexit right, I passionately and sincerely believe that.”
He also likened the backstop mechanism, which seeks to prevent a hard border between
Ireland and Northern Ireland, to a “lobster pot” trap that the UK could enter, but not escape.
He said: “It is not right for our country. The EU runs our trade policy, they set laws for us, a huge chunk of our law comes from Brussels, and we need to get out of it. It’s colony status for the UK.” But an ally of Mrs May was scathing about the former foreign secretary’s intervention,
saying: “Arguing we can dump the backstop is like arguing that black is white. Without a backstop, there is no deal.
“Boris is trying to appear statesman like, but this is all part of his game.”
Former Brexit secretary Dominic Raab, who quit over the deal, insisted yesterday the possibility of putting a time limit on the backstop had been discussed early in the Brussels negotiations.
“You could see this backstop issue coming down the line. It was obvious. It wasn’t a shock or a surprise,” he said. “Now I’m not suggesting
it’s easy to go back. You lose moments in negotiations and you can’t just claw them back.
“What I am suggesting is that there is probably more flexibility than is being suggested and actually we should have taken a robust line back then and we certainly should be taking one now.”
Tory ex-work and pensions secretary Esther McVey said Mrs May must “immediately” go to the EU and “get a better deal” if she loses tomorrow’s vote, adding: “If she doesn’t, it is going to be very difficult for her.”
Reports that tomorrow’s vote
could be scrapped amid the scale of opposition were rejected by Downing Street and ministers yesterday.
Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay said: “The vote is going ahead. That’s because it is a good deal, it’s the only deal and it’s important we don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
But Justice minister Rory Stewart cast doubt on the vote yesterday. He said it was “overwhelmingly likely” that the vote would take place but admitted: “Nothing is beyond any doubt at the moment.”