Leaked plan to sell Brexit deal to Britain

May accused of shutting out Cabinet as Eurosceptics fear agreement in secret

Gordon Rayner

Steven Swinford

THERESA MAY was last night accused of secretly lining up a Brexit deal behind the backs of her Cabinet after a leaked memo revealed detailed plans for selling the agreement to the public.

A three-week strategy leading up to a parliamentary vote includes daily “themed” announcements, a major speech by the Prime Minister and a televised interview with David Dimbleby.

The document, which was seen by the BBC and appears to have been written in the past week, proposes a vote on the deal on Nov 27, adding to suspicions from ministers that Mrs May, desperate for a deal before Christmas, was rushing into an agreement with Brussels.

It came after a Cabinet meeting at which senior ministers warned Mrs May not to be panicked into signing a deal that would give Brussels the power to keep Britain in an EU customs union.

The Cabinet was told the Brexit negotiations had moved a “major step” forward and Brussels was willing to discuss ways of ending the impasse over the Irish border. But Sajid Javid, the Home Secretary, and Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, were among those who urged caution over any solution that would prevent Britain from unilaterally ending any “backstop” arrangement over Northern Ireland.

Brexiteers said the leaked memo added to suspicions that Mrs May had already agreed a deal and that an ongoing row over the Irish border had been “fabricated” for appearances’ sake.

A government spokesman claimed the document, which appeared to have been drawn up by an official in the Brexit department, “doesn’t represent the Government’s thinking”.

The memo assumed a proposed deal would be put to the Cabinet and that Dominic Raab, the Brexit Secretary, would announce “a moment of decisive progress” tomorrow.

Mrs May would then claim the Government had “delivered on the referendum” in a speech at the CBI on Nov 19, the same day Mr Raab would announce the proposed deal to Parliament.

World leaders, including Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister, would be lined up to tweet support for the deal, followed by a week of themed media events, including a visit by Mrs May to Northern Ireland on Nov 24, the day the DUP holds its conference in Belfast.

The memo says Parliament’s “meaningful vote” on the deal would be held on Nov 27, with MPS told in capital letters: “Historic moment, put your own interests aside, put the country’s interests first and back this deal.”

Steve Baker, a former Brexit minister, said: “It looks like exactly the kind of back-of-the-envelope post-exit plan to sell a rubbish deal I would have expected. For months we have expected an orchestrated campaign following a fabricated row over the backstop. It’s like you almost can’t be too cynical. That’s not where our politics should be.”

Jacob Rees-mogg, the Eurosceptic Tory MP, said: “It sounds like a very Blairite approach to media and opinion management. The electorate, MPS and commentators will not be as easily

hoodwinked as they were when the Blair spin doctors were at their peak.

“There are rumours a deal has been done without keeping the Cabinet properly informed… the Chequers proposals undermined trust. If there is an attempt to soften up and hoodwink people there will be no trust left.”

The memo seems to have been overoptimistic in its expected timing for a deal as Downing Street said yesterday there were still “significant” obstacles.

But some ministers believe Mrs May could call another Cabinet meeting as early as Friday to put a proposed deal to them. Leo Varadkar, the Irish Taoiseach, said yesterday he was “open to creative solutions” to avoid a hard border in Ireland in the event of no deal. But ministers fear Mrs May could “capitulate” by giving the EU an effective veto over Britain ending the backstop.

A government spokesman said: “The misspelling and childish language in this document should be enough to make clear it doesn’t represent government thinking. You would expect it to have plans for all situations – to be clear, this isn’t one of them.”