Corbyn accused of cowardice over Brexit

The government battled to salvage plans for a “customs partnership” with the EU yesterday after Theresa May was forced to retreat by Brexiteers in her own cabinet.

In a coordinated push to defend “as frictionless as possible” trade after Brexit, businesses and Tory backbenchers spoke up to defend the government’s plans from Brexiteers led by Jacob Rees-mogg.

It comes as the next round of Brexit talks were scheduled for the week of May 21, with little sign that Brussels has changed its stance since calling the government’s plans “magical thinking” last year.

The Prime Minister was forced to ask officials for revised proposals on postbrexit customs after she failed to get support from her “war cabinet” for a complex arrangement that would see the UK collect duties on goods in transit to the EU in order to keep trade flowing freely and maintain an open border in Ireland.

In a bid to calm fears among her cabinet and Mr Reesmogg’s European Reform Group of Tory backbenchers, Mrs May said she had an “absolute determination to make a success of Brexit, by leaving the single market and customs union” in an article for the Sun on Sunday.

But the government also went on the offensive, sending Business Secretary Greg Clark onto the BBC’S Andrew Marr show to argue that, without a customs partnership,