What the commentators said

The one clear fact that stands out from the “latest wave of Brexit froth”, said Dan Roberts in The Guardian, is that the Government “is still more preoccupied negotiating with itself than with the EU”. Why else would Downing Street feel the need publicly to knock down “well-sourced” reports about its proposed divorce payment? Ministers have been desperate not to name an exact figure for fear of enraging backbench rebels, said Tom Goodenough in The Spectator. Jacob Rees-mogg this week dismissed the reported bill out of hand. “There is no logic to this figure,” he wrote on Twitter. “Legally we owe nothing.” The Tory leadership has also been doing its best to “duck and fudge” the Irish border question, said Martin Vander Weyer in the same paper. They’ve completely failed to address “the problem that two countries not in a customs union must obviously have a customs boundary between them”. “Vague talk” of number plate recognition and CCTV is not good enough.

In private, even some of the “most fervent Brexiteers” admit that the process of extricating ourselves from the EU is not quite going to plan, said Sebastian Payne in the FT, but voters “do not seem to care”. In a recent Yougov survey, 61% of Leave voters said they thought “significant damage” to the economy was a price worth paying for Brexit. Be that as it may, the PM has an opportunity in her speech next month to put an end to some of the Brexit uncertainty and “silly Cabinet bickering”. It’s clear that a “hard” Brexit is the only result that will deliver voters’ professed desire for greater control of borders, trade and lawmaking. But by confirming that she will seek a transition period of at least two years, the PM can at least set out plans for “a hard Brexit with a soft landing”. That would help businesses plan ahead. She should also openly broach the issue of the UK’S exit payment, even at the risk of annoying rebels, and map out the shape of the “deep and special partnership” she has promised with the EU. “It is time for her to give Britain the leadership it desperately needs.”