May takes Brexit deal to cabinet as MPs revolt
Cabinet and all Conservative MPs should stand up, be counted and say no to this capitulation.
LONDON: British Prime Minister Theresa May will seek her cabinet’s approval Wednesday for a long- awaited divorce deal with the EU but hardline Brexiteer MPs warned they will seek to block it in parliament.
After months of talks, May’s office announced late Tuesday that negotiators had finally struck a draft agreement on the terms of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union next March.
The pound surged following the news, which came just as Brussels stepped up preparations for a potentially catastrophic ‘no deal’ exit.
But diplomats and officials warned the technical agreement, which runs to hundreds of pages, still needs political approval.
Ambassadors from the other 27 EU member states will meet later in Brussels, Ireland’s Prime Minister Leo Varadkar will hold a cabinet meeting and May’s ministers convene at 1400 GMT.
If the British cabinet approves the text, London is hoping for a special summit of EU leaders later this month to seal the deal.
David Davis, Former Brexit minister
But May has faced constant criticism from her Conservative MPs over her approach, and the deal had barely been announced when they took to the airwaves to denounce it, with many on the lookout for high- profile resignations.
Former foreign secretary Boris Johnson, who quit the cabinet over Brexit in July, said the deal would leave Britain a ‘vassal state’ and urged his former colleagues to “chuck it out”.
Former Brexit minister David Davis, who quit at the same time, said: “Cabinet and all Conservative MPs should stand up, be counted and say no to this capitulation.”
Most ominously for May, the Northern Irish party which props up her government threatened to break their alliance over reports of a special arrangement for the British province.
“This is not the right Brexit,” Jeffrey Donaldson of the Democratic Unionist Party ( DUP) told BBC Radio’s Today programme yesterday.
“It fundamentally undermines the constitutional and economic integrity of the UK — the UK will be faced with the choice in the future, it wants to get out of this binding agreement, it will have to leave Northern Ireland behind.”
All eyes were on whether eurosceptic ministers including Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab may join the chorus of disapproval and resign.
“We are clearly not out of the woods yet,” the London-based Capital Economics research group said in a note to clients.
British and EU negotiators had stepped up their talks ahead of a deadline yesterday to get a deal in time to call the special summit for later this month.
Failure would delay the final settlement until a formal Brussels summit in mid-December, leaving little time for May to get the deal and associated legislation through parliament.
The talks were stuck for months on how to avoid border checks between British Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland, if and until London strikes a new trade deal with Brussels. — AFP