Brexiteer MPs must make their case

It is increasingly becoming clear that the only way the EU will accept the Chequers deal is if it is diluted or drastically changed. No Brexiteer worthy of the name could accept that. Chequers as Theresa May designed it already gives away far too much to Brussels: it swallows too many single market rules and concedes too much in other areas. Some Tory MPs, and especially Eurosceptic Cabinet members, reluctantly signed off on Chequers on the understanding that this was it – they would go thus far and no further. In which case, what will they do if and when Chequers compromises Brexit even more?

It would be unacceptable, to use one example, to commit the UK to signing up to Europe’s social and environmental regulations – existing and future – which looks like the direction of travel. Everybody wants a clean environment, but there’s more than one way of achieving this. The top-down EU approach often imposes many burdens while yielding minor benefits. There are other models that we may wish to pursue and a sensible energy policy would not hit households with ever-rising costs or ban lightbulbs that actually work. The whole point of leaving the EU is to allow Britain to govern itself in this and other ways. It is apparent that the EU is terrified of us following more economically rational policies that give Britain an edge when it comes to attracting capital and talent.

Therefore the EU’s main objective in these negotiations is to reduce our ability to compete, preferably to leave Britain in the status of a vassal – hampered by the same costly and inefficient rules as everyone else on the Continent but having no say in writing them. That is completely intolerable – whether one campaigned for Leave or not – and the Brexiteers in the Cabinet have to think hard about what they intend to do about it. Mrs May has told the Conservative Party that Chequers is the only option for them, and yet she has invited Brussels to offer its alternatives and meet her halfway.

How can Brexit-backing MPs possibly put up with this? If they object, they must speak up – and this applies particularly to those Brexiteers who are still in the Cabinet.