Anna Soubry
Main Page: Anna Soubry (The Independent Group for Change - Broxtowe)Department Debates - View all Anna Soubry's debates with the Cabinet Office
(5 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Michael Gove
My right hon. Friend was kind enough to say that I was courteous; I also thank him for the courtesy and thoughtfulness with which he addresses every issue in this House. He is right: it is important for all of us in public life, whether we are appearing here at the Dispatch Box or working for Government Ministers or Opposition figures, to use language that shows our respect for differing points of view, even as we hold robustly to our own.
Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (IGC)
This is Brexit reality: £8 billion of taxpayers’ money—the equivalent of 400 brand spanking new state-of-the-art schools—being spent on something that people did not vote for and were not promised. We have just heard about the cost to business—£15 billion—and that is before we have sorted out the tariffs. The leave campaign, of which the right hon. Gentleman was a proud leader, promised that we would not leave the European Union until we had secured a good deal. We were told that it was going to be so easy that it would take somewhere in the matter of a few days. Three and a half years on, the reason why we have not left the EU is that the simple truth is that whichever way we do it, it will harm our economy and cut jobs and the future prosperity of our constituents. He talks about the 17 million people who swallowed many of the falsehoods and fake promises that were made by him and others, forgetting the 29 million who did not vote for us to leave the EU. Is not the only way out of this crisis now to put this matter back to the British people by way of a confirmatory referendum—at last, a people’s vote?