May’s ministers want to delay March 29 exit
LONDON: Three ministers in UK Prime Minister Theresa May’s cabinet have broken ranks to say Brexit should be delayed if an agreement that wins Parliamentary support is not possible before March 29, the day Britain is due to leave the European Union.
Business secretary Greg Clark, justice secretary David Gauke and works and pensions secretary Amber Rudd wrote in a joint article they would join opposition ranks to push for an extension of Article 50 of the Lisbon treaty that deals with exits from the EU. So far, May has insisted that Brexit will happen on March 29, with or without an agreement. There is much alarm over leaving the EU without an agreement due to its debilitating impact on the UK’S economy and other aspects of everyday life. The ministers’ intervention prompted calls for their resignations.
In Brussels, there was little progress between May and EU leaders on the contentious issue of ‘backstop’ for Ireland-northern Ireland border. May’s Brexit Plan B will be put to vote in Parliament on Wednesday. She is due to hold more talks with the EU.
The three ministers wrote in The Daily Mail, “If there is no breakthrough in the coming week, the balance of opinion in Parliament is clear - that it would be better to seek to extend article 50 and delay our date of departure rather than crash out of the European Union on 29 March.
“It is time that many of our Conservative parliamentary colleagues in the ERG (the pro-hard Brexit European Research Group) recognised that Parliament will stop a disastrous no-deal Brexit on 29 March. If that happens, they will have no one to blame but themselves for delaying Brexit.”
Andrew Bridges, a pro-brexit Conservative MP, was among those seeking the ministers’ resignation, “What they are actually saying is that they are rejecting collective responsibility of being in government, they are rejecting government policy In that case, they should do the honourable thing and resign from the government immediately.”
There are reports that senior figures in the government want May to resign after March 29 so that another PM can take the Brexit negotiations forward.