Daily Mail

EU migrants will not get preferenti­al access to the UK after Brexit, hints May

Leader’s speech labelled bizarre as he enrages the Brexiteers

- By Ian Drury Home Affairs Editor

THERESA May has given her biggest hint yet that European citizens will not have preferenti­al access to the UK after Brexit.

The Prime Minister has instead signalled that she prefers a ‘global’ system – which would treat EU and nonEU migrants the same.

Her comments come despite speculatio­n that she may choose to give migrants from the bloc better access in order to smooth negotiatio­ns with Brussels.

Pressed on the issue in an interview aired last night, Mrs May suggested there would not be two ‘sets of rules’.

‘The message from the British people is very simple,’ she told the BBC’s Panorama programme. ‘It was they don’t want a situation where they could see people coming from the European Union having... those automatic rights in terms of coming to the United Kingdom, and a set of rules for people from outside the European Union.

‘What we will be doing is putting forward a set of rules for people from the European Union and people from outside.’

Mrs May also warned MPs they will have a choice between her proposed deal with Brussels – or no deal at all.

She said that if Parliament did not ratify the Chequers plan, ‘I think that the alternativ­e to that will be having no deal.’

The Prime Minister made her remarks as the Migration Advisory Committee prepares to publish its assessment of the impact EU nationals have on the economy.

The independen­t panel was commission­ed by the Government to help ministers devise a new immigratio­n system for after Britain leaves the EU in March. A study commission­ed by the panel, which is published today, found that European migrants living in the UK contribute £2,300 more to the public purse each year than the average adult. There were around 2.3million EU migrants working in the UK in 2017.

During her interview, Mrs May also gave one of her most positive forecasts yet for Britain’s future after Brexit, saying: ‘I believe that our best days are ahead of us.’ Meanwhile, No 10 yesterday slapped down Boris Johnson after he warned that Britain was heading for a ‘spectacula­r political car crash’ if the Government sticks to Mrs May’s Brexit blueprint.

The former foreign secretary said unless she dropped her Chequers plan, which would see the UK remain closely aligned to Brussels on goods and regulation, Britain was ‘heading full throttle for the ditch with a total write- off of Brexit’. But the Prime Minister’s spokesman suggested Mr Johnson was simply engaged in political manoeuvrin­g.

Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg also warned Mrs May not to hold a Commons showdown on the Chequers plan, saying it would be ‘foolish’ to put the plan to a vote as it had ‘very little support’.

The proposals are likely to be discussed at a Cabinet meeting next week. Chancellor Philip Hammond and Business Secretary Greg Clark are set to resist tight EU migration restrictio­ns, but Environmen­t Secretary Michael Gove is said to want to level the playing field for Commonweal­th migrants.

Ministers have also been encouraged by signs the EU may be starting to accept that curbs to free movement could be needed.

VINCE Cable infuriated Brexiteers last night after it emerged he is planning to compare Brexit to an ‘erotic spasm’ in his conference speech today.

The Liberal Democrat leader will also describe leaving the EU as a ‘dream behind closed doors’ for Brexit ‘fundamenta­lists’.

Last night Brexiteers poured scorn on the speech, saying his remarks were ‘bizarre’ and an insult to democracy.

In his conference speech, Sir Vince is expected to say: ‘For the “True Believers” – the fundamenta­lists – the costs of Brexit have always been irrelevant.

‘Years of economic pain justified by the erotic spasm of leaving the European Union. Economic pain felt, of course, not by them, but by those least able to afford it.

‘And the latest piece of nastiness from Jacob Rees-Mogg – calling into question the right of Europeans to stay in Britain and of Britons to stay in Europe: creating unnecessar­y worry and insecurity for millions.’

He will add: ‘The public don’t mind what these people dream about behind closed doors – so long as their dreams don’t become nightmares for the rest of us.’

He will also say that people ‘felt sorry’ for Theresa May and call on her to show leadership and support a second referendum.

But Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said: ‘Given the bizarre analogies used by Vince Cable, I hope he never accuses another politician of courting controvers­y to get a headline.

‘His remarks are a huge insult to the 17.4million people who voted to Leave the EU and those of us in Parliament who cherish and respect democracy.’

Mr Rees-Mogg said: ‘Is this the only way the Lib Dems can get anyone to pay the slightest attention to their otherwise dull conference?

‘Sir Vince is a thoroughly decent man so it is all rather sad that his leadership has descended to a cheap sound bite.’

Yesterday former deputy prime minister Sir Nick Clegg told the conference that David Cameron was a good coalition prime minister but a bad Conservati­ve one.

Sir Nick said that after ‘getting rid’ of the Lib Dems in 2015, Mr Cameron’s brief period of rule with a Tory majority was an ‘absolute disaster’. He also contradict­ed deputy Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson’s speech to the Lib Dem conference calling on the party to ‘own its failures’ during the coalition years.

He added that the party should stop ‘raking over the coals’ and accept the coalition was positive. Sir Nick said he was ‘proud’ of his record in government. He said: ‘You can’t go around constantly licking your wounds. You’ve got to broadly say whether you’re happy with the decisions you made and I emphatical­ly am.’

‘There is this narrative hung round the Lib Dem party’s neck …that we sold our soul, merrily went along with a savage, ideologica­l approach to austerity which deliberate­ly penalised the poor. It is simply not true.’ He also said he could not be the British equivalent of French President Emmanuel Macron, who formed a centrist alternativ­e to the main political parties with his En Marche movement.

‘I’d love to think some sort of British Macron would come charging over the horizon and save us all from Brexit,’ he said. ‘But the secret to these breakthrou­gh characters is precisely that they arrive relatively unencumber­ed by baggage. New characters will emerge to lead that political renewal.’

Anti-Brexit campaigner Gina Miller gave the conference’s keynote speech – but said she was not party political and had no desire to lead the Lib Dems.

 ??  ?? Suggestion­s: Theresa May during the interview last night
Suggestion­s: Theresa May during the interview last night

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