Leaving the European Union

Anne Main Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Wera Hobhouse]

I do not agree. In the 2017 general election, many other elements played their part. For the people, it was not clear what leaving the European Union would mean or what the Brexit deal on the table would be, and we knew nothing about the backstop. We now know what that all looks like.

I truly trust in people and I believe that when I put things in front of them, with the honest options on the table—outside the heat of the media and the competition of political parties—they will make good decisions. That is why, by the way, I am very much in favour of citizens’ assemblies. If we get to the point of extending article 50—I believe that we must because we are simply running out of time—we should precede that with several citizens’ assemblies where we put the options to focus groups and where people can discuss them honestly.

I have said time and again that I believe that people will make very good decisions. I trust in them and, if they confirm their former opinions—whether that is a no-deal Brexit or the Prime Minister’s Brexit—and there is a majority of more than 50% for a specific Brexit deal, I will accept it. That is a final say. We have always said that the people must have the final say and that we must give it to them.

[Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)]

I note that the hon. Lady said that the people should be asked whether they want a no-deal Brexit or the Prime Minister’s Brexit. She was very clear. I have heard other Liberal Democrats add another option. Has she left off her list a staying put option? Can she clarify? I hear both versions and I am absolutely not certain about what the Liberal Democrats are asking for. There could be an argument for asking about the two versions of Brexit, but there certainly is not one for putting the issue back to the people as a three-way referendum.

[Wera Hobhouse]

To clarify: absolutely. The ballot paper has to have the option to remain, because in the previous referendum, 48% voted for that. When I consult my mailbox, and when we consider polling, a majority—

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[Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)]

I am pleased to be called to speak in this debate, Mr Hanson, because sometimes those in the main Chamber are so crowded that it is difficult to get in. This is wonderful—I am told we have hours, which is great—because we can really explore the options.

The important thing for me is to look at the petition. I listened with interest to the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), who spoke with great passion. The Liberal Democrats contested my seat hotly at the last election, making it a Brexit election, but to be fair, they have a fixed view: they do not want to leave the European Union. However, as the hon. Lady said, they offered a referendum and—this is on my wall as a poster—Sir Nick Clegg featured in a leaflet saying, “Only the Liberal Democrats offer you a true referendum, in or out.” I thought, “Fair enough, that’s a fair question.” Now, and this was confirmed by the hon. Lady—I wanted to check—the “in or out” talked about in that leaflet is not the referendum that the Liberal Democrats want to offer; the new referendum, if that were to be considered, would be a three-way choice, which would split the vote considerably.

[Wera Hobhouse]

A democracy is a place where things move and are dynamic. The hon. Lady is not being helpful if she keeps harking back to what was said in the past. We are where we are, and we are in a very difficult situation. Is it not important to look at the present, instead of always harking back to the past?

[Mrs Main]

I completely agree, but we have to learn from the past, which forms part of our future trajectory. All I am saying is that the in-out referendum that the House promised the British people is the only way to go. The three-way referendum now supported by the hon. Lady’s party and others would ask people to choose between what she would describe as a hard Brexit—a no-deal Brexit, perhaps—the Prime Minister’s Brexit, and staying in. That could not be countenanced as democratic.

As I understand it, the EU would have no truck—I do not blame it—with us wanting to kick the whole thing into the long grass during a long drawn-out process. My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) said that the British public would never forgive us; certainly they would never forgive us for trying to twist the arm of the EU, and saying, “Please can we extend article 50, so that we can offer a three-way referendum?”.

[Sandy Martin (Ipswich) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady says that the British people would never forgive us for asking them again, but would they ever forgive us for a serious economic collapse as a result of a no-deal Brexit?

[Mrs Main]

That is interesting. The other day in the main Chamber, I tried to intervene on the Leader of the Opposition many, many times. I wanted to know whether the policy of the Labour party is to offer another referendum. The economic collapse, I believe, is a much-hyped fear factor.

The British public had 40 years of trying out the European project, which is certainly not the Common Market that my late parents voted for. That was a vote for one thing. After 40 years of ever closer political integration, the British public were asked if they wanted to re-endorse that membership, or if they would like to say, “We’d like to leave.”

It is not as though we have not discussed the possibility of leaving, or our unhappiness with having treaties foisted on us. The British public have a lot of experience—the history that the hon. Member for Bath does not want to draw on—of looking at how they were treated, how they were talked to, and how they were being sucked into closer integration, which they were not happy with. As my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully), who opened the debate, said, that is what many people were unhappy with. The British public knew that they did not like it, so they decided that they wanted to leave and be an independent, self-governing and sovereign nation again. That is the argument that was made.

I campaigned to leave, and I made it very clear to my constituents that I was for leaving—I did not hide that, or take the easy option—although most of them voted to remain. I made it clear that I believed in leave, but that I was only one vote. Those members of the British public who were of voting age that first time around, however, had seen the direction of travel, which was towards ever closer integration, and they did not want to go there, so they decided get off that bus.

I do not like to talk of winning or losing, but the only way to describe a referendum is in those terms. The leave campaign won because there was more heart in the campaign to get back our sovereignty than there was in saying, “We know the EU’s not perfect, that it should change, that lots of you have had grumbles and complaints over the years, and that we keep trying to change things and it never gives us much—but I am sure it will at some point in the future.” That did not cut it.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady makes the important point that people knew what deal we already had, but I take her back to the wording of the petition:

“the British people MUST be given the Brexit they voted for”.

Can she tell me what the Brexit that they voted for was?

[Mrs Main]

It was made very clear and, for my sins, I watched so much of the debate—

[Wera Hobhouse]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Mrs Main]

The convention is to answer an intervention before giving way again, and I would like to do that. I am sorry.

It was made clear that there would be no second asks—I remember hearing that several times during the campaign—and that if we left, we would take back control of our borders and so make our own immigration policies. I am quite relaxed about numbers, although some people are not, but leaving would mean a level playing field on immigration policy. Also, it was clear that we would deliver on the vote of the British people; Parliament would not tinker and water it down. The referendum was about bringing back a level of control to Parliament—eventually, not right this second—from the European Union. We have got caught up in the argument that that means going back to parliamentarians having control over the people, but the people voted to bring back control from Brussels to Parliament; it was very clear, and they expect us to deliver on that.

[Lilian Greenwood]

The hon. Lady’s answer to my intervention was not what I hoped for. Do not all of us in the House of Commons have different versions of what an acceptable Brexit deal would look like? Some advocate a close relationship with the single market and a customs union; some support the deal that the Prime Minister made; and many in her party say that that is not the Brexit that they voted for. Surely the British public are just as split, if not more so, than parliamentarians here in the Palace of Westminster. If we are to have the trust of the public, we have to present them with a deal and check whether that is the Brexit that they feel that they voted for.

[Mrs Main]

To me—unless someone would like to iterate a different view—it seems that the official opinion of the majority of Labour Members is that they support the view of the Liberal Democrats. They want what they describe as a people’s vote; some would call it a remoaner’s ask. There seems to be a growing chorus of, “It’s in the ‘too difficult’ box, so let’s put it back to the public.” If that happened, I would be the first to call for the best of three, particularly if the wording was not exactly the same as last time, and did not ask, “Do you wish to leave or stay?”. If the wording was different or three options were offered, I would say, “You’re not asking the same question.” To get to the nub of what the petition is about, the public are beginning to be fearful about whether we will honour and do what we said we would do.

I was at Prayers this morning—I am pleased that we have Prayers, because it concentrates the mind for a few moments—and one of the things that we are asked to do in Prayers is not be concerned with the desire to please. In this place, we can try desperately to please everyone, but the reality is that we cannot. We can, however, come to a settled opinion and try to do our best. The difficulty is that Members of Parliament overwhelmingly voted to remain, and are trying to deliver something that they do not really believe in. We cannot get away from the fact that that is a tension. But we have to deliver what we said we would deliver, and not just try to please, which would be the easy option.

[Wera Hobhouse]

The hon. Lady is generous in giving way. She will be pleased to know that I agree with her, and I go to Prayers, too. Irrespective of religion, I very much believe that it is important to discuss things honestly, accept our differences and come to a conclusion together. If we are delegates, we are just delivering what the people have said, but if we are not delegates, we are representatives. Is it not for us to make a decision according to our conscience and to what we believe is best for our country? That is exactly what we are all grappling with, including the Liberal Democrats. It does not help to denounce one another all the time and to call some people remoaners.

[David Hanson (in the Chair)]

Order. Interventions must be short.

[Mrs Main]

The hon. Lady has made her speech and interventions; if she does not mind, I will leave it there and we will have to agree to differ.

My concern is that we may end up looking weak because we cannot get behind a deal by the Prime Minister. My hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam said that he could settle for the withdrawal agreement. When I went to see the Prime Minister before Christmas, I said, “I truly believe you are trying to do your very best on this.” Whatever anyone from any political party thinks, the Prime Minister has a very difficult job. Her tenacity is astonishing. I said, “At the moment, whether people believe in leave or remain, we have the absolute right to walk out the door, shut it behind us and say, ‘We will not put up with any more interference in our legislation from a group of countries.’ We can choose, but we will not be obliged.” We have the absolute right to do that, but I said we were like a load of nervous sheep in a pen.

I cannot hover around the idea of a backstop that 27 other countries may hold the key to. We are trying to get back sovereignty; we must not dilute that sovereignty by giving 27 other countries the whip hand over us. They have their own agendas. Each country would have a veto. It may well be that Gibraltar, or our fishing, comes up on the agenda. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam: I do not think the EU will want to keep us in the backstop, but I fear what they will exact to let us out.

[Mrs Murray]

My hon. Friend has been extremely generous in giving way. Does she agree that the myth that people did not know what they were voting for must be dispelled? Prime Minister David Cameron spent more than two years trying to negotiate a better deal for the UK by going around and speaking to the European Commission and all the other member states. He got a deal and put it in a leaflet that was delivered to every single home in the UK. We know that the majority of people—17.4 million—voted to reject that.

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[Mrs Main]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. At the time, I was very worried about whether there was some undue influence, whether we should have purdah and other things that were taxing our brains at that point. The European Union was advocated for by the leader of the Government at the time; a lot of big names tried to make the case for it, and a lot of money was associated with that. Even so, the British public had 40 years of knowing what they had, and they did not like it. People want to call them stupid or deluded—those are some of the things thrown at my constituents who voted to leave—but they were prepared to take the opportunity to leave.

There was a split decision, but did anyone ever think it would be more decisive than it was? It struck me how many people participated in the referendum—it was overwhelming. When I was out knocking on doors, people told me they had not voted for many a year, but they were going to vote. The referendum galvanised and engaged people in a way that we often struggle to. If we do not get on with this, the public will ask, “What is the point of taking part in any votes whatever? We got ourselves out the door for that special occasion; we were motivated.”

I do not know what motivated some people; they may have had different motivations, but they still wanted to leave the club. That is why they got out the door that morning in vast numbers and went to vote. This petition reflects a frustration; people think that we are cloth-eared in here and did not wake up to the sheer number of people who decided they had to vote to leave. This was a topic that had engaged them, if nothing else, for decades. No party, leaflets or knocking at their door had got them out, but this did. The former Prime Minister would not like to hear that some people did not bother to read his leaflet, but some people felt they had enough personal experience to make up their mind; the leaflet was not going to change that. They were glad of the opportunity of the vote.

I do not believe the European Union will want a “kick the can down the road” delay to article 50. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam: if it were for a few weeks, that might well be tolerated, so long as it was just to dot the i’s and cross the t’s. In that respect, I disagree with the petition, but I have sympathy for where it is going.

I could not vote for the withdrawal agreement, and 240 people felt the same way. When I went to see the Prime Minister after the big defeat, I said, “Will I want to pay £39 billion? No; it will stick in my craw, but it is a one-off. Do I want the European Court of Justice to have jurisdiction over us during the implementation period? No, but I can stand it. Can I lock us into a backstop? No.” I have gone through the debates, arguments and thought processes; that has to be fixed.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam: Brussels said that it will not tell us what we want to hear, but I believe and hope that it will listen, now that things have been distilled down. I do not wish to be the teenager trashing the flat, as someone said; I wish us to have a good relationship. I do not want us to be rancorous. I hope the people who have signed this petition will accept that we have not ignored the fact that 17.4 million people, many of whom said they had not voted for a very long time, got out the door that day because this was the one thing they wanted delivered. It is up to us to deliver it.

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[Patrick Grady]

I absolutely take that point. Of course, if we want to keep going back into history, the European Coal and Steel Community was founded in response to the second world war to link European economies, and peace has prevailed on this continent for longer than at any other time in the past several centuries largely as a result of closer European integration. The hon. Lady says the Common Market back then was very different from the European Union today, but rejoining the Common Market—or Common Market 2.0, which some Members are discussing—is not what the House is currently being asked to vote for. If anything, we are being asked to move further away from that.

Let us look again at what people voted for. They were told by the now former Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), that there would

“continue to be free trade, and access to the single market.”

The current Environment Secretary said we would be

“redefining the single market, not walking away from it.”

The current International Trade Secretary said in 2016:

“The free trade agreement that we will have to do with the European Union should be one of the easiest in human history.”

All that is collapsing in front of our eyes. Shortly, the business in the main Chamber will move on to a statement about Nissan in Sunderland and the consequences of our plunging off the cliff with a no-deal Brexit on 29 March.

[Mrs Main]

Does the hon. Gentleman not wonder why Nissan has chosen to relocate not to Spain, where it has factories, but to Japan?

[Patrick Grady]

Well, that is where its parent company is and where it currently has factories it can easily locate to. The point is that it is not choosing to stay here in the United Kingdom precisely because of all the uncertainty.

[Mrs Main]

I have to correct the hon. Gentleman. I think anyone from Nissan would say it is staying in the United Kingdom, and I am sure people in the constituencies concerned would not like to hear that he is closing it down.

[Patrick Grady]

I take that point. Nevertheless, jobs are at risk and there is massive uncertainty, and it is in large part to do with the cliff edge that we face because of Brexit.

From the SNP’s point of view, three things should happen, two of which are related. One of the effects of extending article 50 would be to rule out a no-deal Brexit. As I said, 29 March was just picked and written on a bit of paper. Frankly, that is true of all the Brexit negotiations. All this comes down to people in a room being willing to talk to one another. It is not rocket science. It is not changing the fundamental laws of physics. It is about there being political will among the negotiating parties to speak to each other and reach an agreement.

Of course, we are still in the European Union. We will continue to be members until such time as something called Brexit does or does not take effect. The easiest option—the simplest, safest and best option—is to continue on those terms. As the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) said, by definition, the best possible relationship with the European Union is membership; otherwise, nobody would want to be a member. Everybody would want the better deal. Everybody would want those terms and conditions. The point of leaving has to be that somehow we will have more benefits because of our relationships with the rest of the world, but there is absolutely no evidence of that. All the trade treaties we were told we would have simply are not in place.

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[Patrick Grady]

I was going to make that exact point in my peroration. Members can probably guess what that will be.

The problem is that this deal is not good enough. It has already been rejected by Parliament, and the Prime Minister has had to accept that it needs to be renegotiated so that we have these magical alternative arrangements. That in itself demonstrates that if the House—if parliamentarians, whether we are delegates or representatives—cannot agree on the shape and form of Brexit, then it has to be put back to the people, either in a people’s vote or in a general election. I assure the House that the Scottish National Party fears neither of those.

[Mrs Main]

I was encouraged to hear the hon. Gentleman talk about the deal. If there were amendments to the deal, could he support it?

[Patrick Grady]

No, because we support remaining in the European Union. That brings me to my final point, which is about the treatment of Scotland in all of the debate. As I said to the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), 78% of my constituents voted to remain, which was one of the highest proportions in the United Kingdom. I want to listen to and understand the people who voted to leave, but I am not afraid or ashamed to stand up for the vast majority of my constituents. Some 35 residents of Glasgow North signed this petition—it is interesting to look at its geographical spread.

The day after the 2016 referendum, the First Minister of Scotland said that we had to respect the results of both the 2014 independence referendum and the 2016 UK-wide referendum on the European Union. The Scottish Government have consistently put forward alternatives, compromises and ways forward that could respect the result of the Brexit referendum across the United Kingdom. I meant to say at the start that the SNP voted against having the Brexit referendum, as we did not think it was necessary. We are not in the position of the Liberal Democrats, who now want to revisit an answer that they did not like.

The Scottish Government have not been listened to at all. For example, we proposed ways of retaining single market or customs union membership for Scotland—and potentially for Northern Ireland and parts of the United Kingdom that had voted to remain—and none of that was paid attention to. The promises made to people in Scotland, both in 2014 and 2016, have been broken. The major promise in 2014 was that voting no to independence guaranteed that Scotland remained a member of the European Union, which has proven to be false.

In these circumstances, the people of Scotland will come to the conclusion that it is not the European Union that is failing, but the Union of the United Kingdom; they will choose their own course, whether through a referendum or at a general election, and choose to take back control for themselves. As alluded to by the hon. Member for Bath, independent countries nowadays are defined by their interdependence; a country is known to be independent precisely because it is a member of the United Nations, because it has chosen to pool sovereignty through the European Union or because it has chosen to join any number of international organisations. That is the positive trend that the world should be aiming for, but instead Brexit represents a retrograde step.

[Mrs Main]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Patrick Grady]

I was coming to a conclusion, but if the hon. Lady is very keen I will give way.

[Mrs Main]

The hon. Gentleman talks about having a second referendum and potentially asking Scotland to go into the European Union again, stay in or whatever, so would he want a wall?

[Patrick Grady]

No. I am sorry, a wall?

[Mrs Main]

Would he want a wall for the hard border, or does he think other mechanisms could be brought about where a wall does not need to be built?

[Patrick Grady]

I think that would be completely unnecessary. Clearly, there are going to have to be arrangements made for the border with Northern Ireland. If it is possible to do that in Northern Ireland, then it ought to be possible to do when Scottish independence comes. The best solution would be to revisit the whole issue through a people’s vote and ultimately give the people of the United Kingdom the option to remain in the European Union.

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[Paul Blomfield]

There would be 10% less money for public services, 10% fewer jobs, and we would be 10% less wealthy than we would otherwise be. The Treasury was right to share that with the British people.

As to a no-deal Brexit as a negotiating lever, it has value only if those on the other side of the negotiations believe that it is meant seriously. No one thinks that a no-deal Brexit is in the British interest, and no one believes it will influence the outcome of the negotiations.

[Mrs Main]

The hon. Gentleman is being very generous in giving way—and his tone is very emollient. I want to reassure him. I was terrified when the Chancellor said each household would be £3,000 a year worse off if we voted to leave, but the economy has done very well. Just have a little faith: that is what I am really trying to say. Such predictions are often way out of kilter.

[Paul Blomfield]

It is always fascinating to hear Conservative Members rubbishing their own party’s Chancellors and former Chancellors. The economy may not have lived up to the former Chancellor’s worst expectations, but the pound has crashed and we have moved from being one of the fastest growing economies to one that is growing less quickly. There has been a negative impact already but, as the hon. Lady will recognise, we have not left the European Union yet.

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[Chris Heaton-Harris]

That is remarkably clear for a Liberal Democrat. The hon. Lady mentioned that of those writing to her, the biggest group are people arguing for no deal. That is no surprise, when they have seen the political class argue as we have done. What those on the outside see is people trying to stop Brexit, and that is why they get frustrated.

[Mrs Main]

On a point of clarification regarding the answer the Minister had from the hon. Member for Bath, can he remember any group that campaigned saying, “And when we’ve got the answer, we’ll make sure we come back again and double-check”? I do not think anyone thought we could unpick all this without doing some form of negotiation. Did anyone make the case that we would double-check and then go back to the EU again?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

To the best of my knowledge, I did not hear anybody mentioning that in the campaign, or in the debates in Parliament that led to the referendum being granted. I can honestly say that I never heard that until possibly the day after the referendum result. I was going to come on to my hon. Friend’s contribution; as there are now two Chairmen in the room, I should make the point that they both need to go back to Mr Speaker and ensure that my hon. Friend gets higher priority on the speakers’ list, because more people need to hear what she has to say on this subject. She made a huge amount of sense, and I think she underestimates her value to this place and this debate. She said that she campaigned to leave, and that she was but one vote, but she was joined by 17,410,741 others, of which I was one, and that is a decent-sized number.

[Mr Philip Hollobone in the Chair]

I completely take my hon. Friend’s point, and that is why I get slightly anxious in some of these debates to ensure that we are not seen to be cloth-eared here. We have a referendum result that we are delivering on. I agreed with pretty much every word that she said, including about my contribution to whatever debate there was around the deal. I absolutely voted for the deal the first time around. With my personal experience of the European Union, I trust it to deliver on matters that it signs up to, so I was happy to go into the Aye Lobby. However, I can guarantee her that the Government will not ignore the fact that 17.4 million people voted in the way they did.

It is always a pleasure to listen to the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), who, as the Scottish National party’s Chief Whip, is now too silent. It was a pleasure to deal with him when I was a Government Whip. He is always courteous, polite and completely on the money. He will never go back on his word, and that is true in this case, too. He wears his heart on his sleeve in these matters, and he articulated very well that he is a passionate pro-European. I guess I should ask him to forgive me for being exactly the same, but coming from the reverse position.

I would love to quote parts of the hon. Gentleman’s speech back to him—perhaps I can do so over a beer some time—including the bits about how staying within a Union gives people a chance to shape its future and all that sort of stuff. However, we will leave that for another day.

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[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I will carefully repeat what I just said: we—the Government—remain clear that our policy is not to revoke article 50, extend it, delay or hold a second referendum on exit. Perhaps it will help the debate if I re-outline the now very familiar reasons why the Government have taken this position. I remind hon. Members of the immense progress we have made towards delivering the exit that we, as a Government and as a Parliament, were entrusted to deliver.

First, let me deal with the overarching question of revoking article 50. As I have made clear, the Government’s policy remains that we should not and will not revoke our article 50 notice to withdraw from the European Union. To revoke article 50 would betray not only the vote of the British people in 2016, but the mandates on which the majority of us were elected at the last general election. I emphasise again to hon. Members the strength of the mandate and the clarity of the instruction given to us by the 2016 referendum, which illustrates why we must respect the result and why the Government’s policy is not to revoke article 50.

In the summer of 2016, millions of people came out to have their say, trusting that their vote would count and that, after years of feeling ignored by politicians, their voices would be heard. The referendum enjoyed a higher turnout than any previous referendum, with 17.4 million people voting to leave the European Union. That is the highest number of votes cast for anything in UK electoral history, and the biggest democratic mandate for a course of action ever directed at any UK Government. As I have reminded the shadow Minister and the House, the passion with which people voted was quite extraordinary. Those of us who toured polling stations on the day will remember pencilgate: people refused to put their cross in the box using a pencil, for fear that the Government would rub it out. The battles over trying to get a pen into a polling station to vote with were quite extraordinary.

[Mrs Main]

I went round various areas campaigning to leave, and I talked to people who said that one reason why they were voting was because the referendum was a nationwide vote. Some said they did not usually bother voting because there was no way to change the Member of Parliament, so there was no point, but at the referendum, their vote was counted nationwide.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I heard that many a time. [Interruption.] No, it is not a call for proportional representation. Members should be careful what they wish for. I was elected under proportional representation for the first time in 1999. While it was a lovely system for getting me elected to the European Parliament, it is not a good system for voters who want democratic choices to be delivered.

Parliament overwhelmingly confirmed the referendum result by voting with clear and convincing majorities in both Houses for the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Act 2017. Parliament, informed by the will of its electorate, voted to trigger article 50 and leave the European Union. Further still, in the 2017 general election, more than 80% of voters voted for parties committed to respecting the result of the referendum. Not only Government Members but Opposition Members were elected on manifestos committing to respecting the decision of the people.

We made promises and commitments to the people we represent from when we held the referendum to when we as a Parliament voted to begin the process of implementing its result. The British people must be able to trust in their Government to both effect their will and deliver the best outcome for them. As the Prime Minister said:

“This is about more than the decision to leave the EU; it is about whether the public can trust their politicians to put in place the decision they took.”

To do otherwise would undermine the decision of the British people and disrespect the powerful democratic values of this country and of this Government. We therefore cannot and must not frustrate the will of the people by revoking article 50.

Despite that, I understand that there are those who advocate revoking, extending or otherwise delaying our article 50 notice. Parliament is clear that it does not wish to deliver no deal; it expressed that last week in the House. The obvious conclusion is that we must secure a deal to deliver the exit for which people voted. The only alternative, as the Prime Minister has laid out, is revoking article 50. That is not Government policy and it would, as she said, disrespect the biggest vote in our democratic history. The Prime Minister has also been clear that other delays, such as through extending article 50, would not resolve the issue of the deal with which we leave the European Union. Moreover, as she reminded the House this week, the 29 March 2019 exit date is the one that Parliament itself voted for when it voted to trigger article 50. The Government are clear on their notice to withdraw under article 50 as instructed by the British people.

I reiterate to hon. Members that this Government are committed to delivering on the result of the referendum. It remains our policy not to revoke article 50 and not to frustrate the outcome of the 2016 referendum, which I trust will please the petitioners. Instead, we continue to work to overcome the challenges and seize the opportunities to deliver on the result of the vote by the British people in the summer of 2016 to leave the European Union.