Last-ditch renegotiation with the EU is delusional, Hammond warns rebel Tories

REJECTING the Prime Minister’s Brexit agreement in the hope of securing better terms from Brussels is simply a delusion, Philip Hammond has told Eurosceptics, as he warned no deal would be “too awful to contemplate”.

The Chancellor yesterday increased the pressure on Tory rebels to back Mrs May’s Withdrawal Agreement, dismissing suggestions that an 11th-hour alternative could be struck with the EU.

Opening the third day of debate on the deal, he confronted rebel backbenchers, urging them to be honest with themselves, saying no deal or no Brexit were the only other options. He said: “I have observed this process at close quarters for two-and-a-half years and I’m absolutely clear about one thing – this is the best deal to exit the EU that is available or that is going to be available. The idea that there’s an option of renegotiating at the 11th hour is simply a delusion. We need to be honest with ourselves – the alternatives are no deal or no Brexit. Either will leave us a fractured society and a divided nation.”

He said Labour’s six Brexit tests yielded no magic deal and the only way of securing the same benefits as EU membership was to remain in the bloc. “Last time I checked, that is not Labour policy,” he said. “A customs union alone would not maintain supply chains nor remove regulatory checks and non-tariff barriers, nor deliver frictionless borders. Labour’s policy fails its own test.

“The time for having your cake and eating it has passed. It is now time for tough choices and practical solutions.”

But Mr Hammond was challenged in the Commons by David Davis, who accused the Treasury of making “disgraceful polemical projections” over the economic fallout of no deal. Though leaving without an agreement would be a hiccup, the former Brexit Secretary said, the advantages of trading on WTO terms would outweigh the negatives. Mr Davis also disputed the warnings of shortages of medicine and gridlock at Dover, saying that up to 40 per cent of trade could be diverted elsewhere.