May rules out a second referendum on Europe
vOTERS will not get a say on the terms of Britain’s exit from the European Union, Downing Street said yesterday.
Theresa May will gather her Cabinet at Chequers today to hammer out a negotiating strategy for Brexit ahead of months of talks with fellow EU leaders.
But the Prime Minister moved swiftly yesterday to rule out any mechanism that could result in Britain remaining in the EU.
A spokesman for Mrs May said there would not be a second referendum, and ruled out holding a General Election on the Brexit deal.
No 10 also indicated that MPs are unlikely to get a vote on the decision to trigger the formal exit process – making it impossible for pro-EU MPs to block it.
Former foreign secretary William Hague yesterday urged Mrs May to rule out a ‘dangerous’ second referendum in order to reduce uncertainty for business.
Lord Hague, who campaigned to stay in the EU, said politicians and civil servants had a duty to respect the outcome of the referendum and stop looking for ways to thwart the will of the voters.
He added: ‘I voted Remain in June, as I thought staying in the EU was best for the country. But the second best course, in my view, is to leave the EU with clarity, certainty and purpose.
‘To embark on leaving with doubt, lack of confidence, and with attempts to undermine the decision that has been made would be the worst of all worlds.’
‘Respect the will of the people’
A Downing Street spokesman said: ‘The Prime Minister is absolutely clear that the will of the people must be respected and must be implemented.
‘She is also clear that there should be no attempts for us to remain inside the EU, no attempts to rejoin through a backdoor mechanism and no second referendum.
‘There is no legal obligation to consult parliament on Article 50 [the formal process for leaving the EU] since the decision to leave the EU has been taken by the British people. But it’s important to remember that parliament voted to support the referendum in the first place by a margin of six to one.’
He added: ‘The PM is very clear there will be no second referendum and she is clear there won’t be a General Election either [before 2020].’
Labour leadership contender Owen Smith has vowed to try to block Brexit unless Mrs May agrees to hold a second referendum. He said Labour would ‘fight tooth and nail to keep us in the EU’, despite the fact millions of the party’s traditional supporters voted for Brexit.
But Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said yesterday that he was confident that the UK could get a good deal from Brexit negotiations. German chancellor Angela Merkel was taking a rational approach that could see trade links remain strong for the benefit of both sides.
And Professor Stiglitz criticised European Commission president Jean-Claude Junker for saying, before the referendum, that ‘deserters’ would be punished. ‘If that view is dominant, Europe will fall apart,’ he said. ‘He was saying that the benefits of the EU are so low that the only way to keep peo- ple in the EU is to threaten them if they leave.’
Cabinet ministers have been asked to present plans to today’s meeting on how their departments will meet the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities presented by Brexit. The Cabinet meeting – the first since parliament broke for the summer – will also discuss Mrs May’s plans for a new industrial strategy.