Brexit: Preparations

Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, may I take the Minister back to the answer he gave to the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, on the Liberal Democrat Benches? I do not disagree that nobody has a monopoly on the use of slogans, but is it his belief that if we leave on 31 October, with or without a deal, Brexit will be done? That is not a view widely held anywhere else, no matter what side of the argument anybody might be on. Does he agree that, whether we like it or not, the process of detaching the United Kingdom from the European Union will be complicated, long, drawn out and not, as he said earlier in respect of negotiating trade deals, relatively straightforward? Nothing about this process has been relatively, or even a bit, straightforward. Does he therefore not agree that it is really not in the interest of sensible debate here today or in future to continue to say that we need to get Brexit done? We do, but it will not be done on 31 October.

[Lord Callanan]

I thank the noble Baroness for her question. I suppose we are getting into the semantics of what “done” means here. It will be done in the terms that we will have left the European Union, but if she accepts that concession, I will be happy to agree with her that of course discussions will need to take place and agreements will have to be made across a range of areas. I have many times said across this Dispatch Box that discussions will take place before we leave and, I hope, discussions will take place after we leave. We have to have agreements with the European Union in a range of areas. I have never resiled from that. We will need to agree a number of different policy areas with the EU.