Raab and Davis now backing EU deal ‘without poison pills’

TORY Brexiteers last night started circulating their alternative proposals for a divorce from the EU as fears of a nodeal departure grow.

Their ideas were published in a document entitled A Better Deal, as MPs scramble to take over the reins of the withdrawal agreement from the Prime Minister.

Many elements of Theresa May’s package are included but the plans remove what the authors refer to as “poison pills” which prevented her securing cross-party support for her own deal. It has the backing of former Brexit secretaries Dominic Raab and David Davis who both quit over Mrs May’s proposed deal.

Supporters of the new approach said that Parliament had effectively rejected Mrs May’s deal by making it impossible for her to get it through the Commons.

Launching the paper, Mr Raab said: “These are modest and reasonable changes that could help salvage the proposed deal with the EU.

“The UK needs a unilateral exit mechanism from the backstop, but we can give the Irish government assurances that we would put in place specific measures to guarantee no return to a hard border.

“This proposal can help deliver this and allay fears that the UK would be stuck indefinitely in an undemocratic regime of laws we have no control over and can’t exit.”

The document was drawn up by former adviser to Liam Fox Shanker Singham, customs expert Hans Maessen and lawyer Robert MacLean.

It proposes that the UK would not stay in a customs union with the EU if there was a no-deal Brexit.

Instead there would be a new Irish backstop where advanced customs measures would be put in place to avoid the need for a hard border.

This would allow Britain to regain control over tariffs and regulations and negotiate trade agreements with other countries. Plans also include keeping some inherited EU regulations regarding the environment, animal standards and competition rules to ensure free-flowing trade.