Theresa May has signalled there will be no transitional deal to prevent a “cliff-edge” Brexit unless the UK settles its final trading relationship with the EU next year, prompting warnings that businesses will start leaving the country before then. The prime minister surprised MPs when she told them in a Commons debate that there could be no “implementation period” unless the UK had settled its “future partnership” with the EU, which is unlikely to happen until next summer at the earliest and may fail to be agreed at all. Her remarks alarmed MPs fighting against a hard Brexit. Business groups have been intensively lobbying for the government to agree the terms of transition with the EU by Christmas, before companies make their financial plans for 2018. Labour warned that the delay in agreeing a transitional period was “a recipe for job losses, businesses disinvesting and an economic downturn”, while the backbench Tory MP Nicky Morgan called for more clarity for businesses. The prime minister was responding to a question asked by Iain Duncan Smith, a former party leader and a leading Tory Eurosceptic, to confirm that there could not be agreement on an implementation period until there was a final deal that could be worked towards. She replied: “I thank my right honourable friend because he is absolutely right. The point of the implementation period is to put in place the practical changes necessary to move to the future partnership and, in order to have that, you need to know what that...
No Brexit transition period without final EU trade deal, Theresa May tells MPs
Posted on: October 24, 2017
Posted on: October 24, 2017