Ministers round on firms’ ‘threats’ over Brexit deal
Senior Cabinet ministers have rounded on Airbus and other firms after they questioned the Government’s handling of Brexit negotiations.
Jeremy Hunt accused them of making “completely inappropriate” threats, warning that undermining Theresa May could lead to a disastrous “fudge”.
Liam Fox warned that taking “no deal” off the table during Brussels negotiations would weaken the UK’s bargaining position.
Their comments came after Airbus, which employs thousands of workers at its assembly plant in north Wales, Siemens and BMW all raised concerns about the direction of travel in negotiations and urged the Government to provide greater clarity.
Health and Social Care Secretary Mr Hunt said the country needed to ignore “siren voices”, telling the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show: “I thought it was completely inappropriate for businesses to be making these kinds of threats, for one very simple reason.
“We are at an absolutely critical moment in the Brexit discussions and what that means is that we need to get behind Theresa May to deliver the best possible Brexit – a clean Brexit.
“What businesses want... is clarity and certainty and the more that we undermine Theresa May the more likely we are to end up with a fudge, which would be an absolute disaster for everyone.”
Welsh Conservative leader in the Welsh Assembly, Andrew RT Davies, supported Mr Hunt’s position.
Mr Davies told BBC’s Sunday Politics Wales programme: “I would suggest the comments I made on Friday were similar to what Jeremy Hunt said on Andrew Marr today. This is a time for working with the UK government to have a united position.”
However, Mr Davies’ remarks appeared to spark an internal row within his own party, when Conservative Aberconwy MP Guto Bebb demanded Mr Davies withdraw his statement, calling it “inflammatory”, according to the BBC.
Airbus, which employs 14,000 people in Britain, had threatened to quit the UK in the event of a no-deal Brexit and demanded that any transition period, if a deal is struck, be longer than that currently proposed, which ends in 2020.
The company, which employs 6,000 people at its wing assembly plant in Broughton, said it would “reconsider its investments in the UK, and its longterm footprint in the country” if Britain crashed out of the single market and customs union without a transition agreement. The company published a risk assessment on its website, outlining what it says are the urgent risks arising from the UK exiting the European Union without a withdrawal agreement.
The Airbus announcement had already been described as “extremely worrying” by the Welsh Government over the weekend.
A spokesperson said: “We have repeatedly warned that the UK cannot take the huge economic risk of cutting ourselves adrift from the Single Market and Customs Union. Particularly in the case of manufacturing sectors, which in Wales are so important in providing high-paid, high-skilled jobs.”
First Minister Carwyn Jones described the news as a culmination of what businesses have been saying in private for some time – that they are losing faith in the notion of a sensible outcome. He said the situation was now critical and companies were making plans based on the worst case scenario.
Dr Fox, the International Trade Secretary, told Sky News’ Sophy Ridge On Sunday that the businesses should also be raising their concerns to figures in Brussels.
He said: “If we actually say we’ll accept any deal you give us rather than walk away, that weakens our negotiating position.
“And people who are making these comments need to understand that they may be actually putting the UK at a disadvantage by making these cases.
“We’ve got to be free in the negotiation to say if we don’t get the deal we want, there won’t be any agreement.”
Dr Fox added that extending Article 50, which governs when the UK leaves the EU, would not be politically acceptable.