Give Boris more power says top Tory
THERESA MAY’S government will “sooner or later” have to concede that the UK must remain in a customs union, Scotland’s First Minister said.
Nicola Sturgeon made clear in her view this was the “only credible and sustainable” option for the UK after Brexit, but added that the Prime Minister was only listening to “mad Brexiteers”.
While some Tory politicians, such as Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, want the UK to pull out of both the customs union and the single market, Ms Sturgeon insisted maintaining these relationships would be in the country’s best interests. She spoke out after a meeting with the European Union’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier in Brussels.
Ms Sturgeon said afterwards: “I was very clear with Michel Barnier this morning that I wanted to see not just Scotland but the UK as a whole remaining within the single market, that’s the position the Scottish Government has taken all along.” On the issue of a customs union, she said: “Staying in the customs union is in Scotland’s interest, but it is not just in Scotland’s interest.
“In my very, very strong view it is in the interest of the whole of the UK to stay in the customs union, it (the UK Government) would be cutting off their nose to spite their face if they turned their back on that .”
The SNP leader argued that a customs union was important to prevent the return to a hard border in Northern Ireland but added that without similar arrangements for Scotland it could be left at a “competitive disadvantage”.
She also sought to allay fears over an independent Scotland using the pound without a formal currency union, insisting such an arrangement would not be akin to Panama. BORIS JOHNSON has been “hobbled” as Foreign Secretary because the role is not powerful enough, according to a prominent Tory MP.
Chairman of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, Tom Tugendhat, is using a speech today to call for a “revolution” at the heart of government.
Such a shake-up would see the Foreign Secretary gain strategic control over diplomacy, intelligence, defence, development aid, international trade and leaving the EU.
Mr Tugendhat will tell the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies: “Successive foreign secretaries – including the current one – have been hobbled. They’ve had the title, but they haven’t had the power.”
He added that the Foreign Office “has lost control of key aspects of overseas influence” like trade and development. Mr Tugendhat will say the great office of state has been forced into a tug-of-war with the Cabinet Office over anything that involved national security and the EU. He will add:“We need to make the Foreign Office the strategic engine of our foreign policy again.”