Brexit ‘will help shield UK from eurozone financial woes’

REGAINING full independence from the EU at the end of this year will help to reduce the impact of a eurozone financial crisis on the UK, senior Brexiteers have said.

Speaking as they launched a new, cross-party think tank, Owen Paterson, the former Tory cabinet minister, and John Longworth, the ex-Brexit Party MEP, claimed that Britain would be in a stronger position to recover from a slump if the Brexit transition period ends on schedule, at the end of December.

Mr Paterson and Mr Longworth, the former director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, are launching the Centre for Brexit Policy, along with Graham Stringer, the former Labour

‘The countries which emerge the strongest will be those which can manage their own laws and affairs’

MP, and Sammy Wilson, the DUP’s Treasury spokesman in Westminster.

Stating that the coronavirus pandemic would “cause multiple pits of bad debt to deepen in southern Europe”, Mr Longworth said: “It is not in our interest to see a precipitous collapse.

“We must however put as much distance between us and the Eurozone as possible – it would not be wise to be in the same room with an explosion.”

Mr Paterson, the former environment secretary, who will chair the new body, claimed: “The period of recovery could be long, but the countries which emerge the strongest will be those which can manage their own laws and affairs to suit their own circumstances.”

Meanwhile, the European Commission has pressed ahead with a demand for the UK to commit to remaining signed up to the European Convention on Human Rights and keeping the Human Rights Act in place, after the country becomes fully independent from the bloc.