May urges UK to ‘come together’
BRITAIN will be a ‘different’ country after Brexit, Theresa May has said.
As she conducted a whistle-stop tour of the four nations of the United Kingdom to mark a year until Brexit day, the PM called on Britons to ‘come together’ to seize the ‘great opportunities’ she expects as a result of EU withdrawal.
Mrs May said additional money will be available to spend on priorities like the NHS and schools once Britain is no longer sending ‘vast sums’ annually to Brussels.
Butshe steered clear of repeating Boris Johnson’s term ‘Brexit dividend’ and twice ducked the question of whether she believes Brexit will be ‘worth it.’
“I think there are real opportunities for the United Kingdom,” she said. “I think it’s a bright future out there. And yes, I think Brexit is going to deliver a country that will be different, but I think there are real opportunities for us as an independent nation for the future.”
Speaking earlier in the day, Mrs May said she was ‘looking forward’ to Brexit day on March 29 2019. “Yes, I am looking forward to it because it presents great opportunities for the United Kingdom,” she said.
The Prime Minister kicked off her tour with a visit to a textile company in Ayr, before attending a mother and toddler group in Newcastle and taking lunch with farmers near Belfast.
She went to Barry in south Wales for a round-table discussion with businesses, before completing her tour in west London with a group of Polish citizens who have made the UK their home. Mrs May’s all-day plane trip comes amid polling suggesting the UK remains deeply divided over Brexit, but has little appetite for a second referendum on the issue.
Labour’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell accused the Government of being in ‘chaos’ over Brexit, following a series of defeats in the House of Lords on its flagship EU Withdrawal Bill.
Mr McDonnell played down suggestions from Emily Thornberry that Labour would ‘probably’ support the deal obtained by Mrs May in a Commons vote this autumn, saying that the shadow foreign secretary was being ‘sarcastic.’
Former prime minister Tony Blair urged Mrs May to offer a free vote in the Commons on the final Brexit deal, saying that if she did not, Labour and Tory MPs should vote with their conscience and rebel.