Colin Clark
Main Page: Colin Clark (Conservative - Gordon)Department Debates - View all Colin Clark's debates with the Cabinet Office
(5 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberThey think our nerve will eventually fail, that the Prime Minister will come to the summit next week and, in the event of the deal having been voted down, ask for some cosmetic changes, and I expect they will think about granting some cosmetic language that is intended to be helpful but which does not change the legal position.
In Brussels, they are confident that some time before next March, the Government will come back to the House and that the deal will go through somehow or other—by hook or by crook—because, as everybody keeps saying, there is allegedly no alternative. The Norway option will be seen for what it is—an even worse solution than what is currently proposed—and the notion of extending article 50, thereby delaying the date of Brexit, will be greeted, I think, with fury by the electorate, as would any attempt to amend the terms of exit so as to plunge us back into the customs union. That would be rumbled by the electorate as well.
Is my right hon. Friend not concerned that, in trying to win 7-0, he might lose 4-3?
No, although I understand exactly my hon. Friend’s analogy. I have heard it said by defenders of the Government that we may be 1-0 down at the end of the first half of the negotiations, but that we will win 2-0—I mean 2-1—by the end.