EU: Withdrawal and Future Relationship (Motions)

Dominic Grieve Excerpts

Wednesday 27th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

I am going to make some progress as I am very conscious of the time strictures.

Conservative Members of this House should support this motion because it is making good on the promise that their Prime Minister—she was still Prime Minister the last time I looked—made to the Commons earlier this week when she said that

“unless this House agrees to it, no deal will not happen”.—[Official Report, 25 March 2019; Vol. 657, c. 25.]

Labour MPs should support it because it fits with their manifesto. They said in their manifesto:

“Labour recognises that leaving the EU with ‘no deal’ is the worst possible deal for Britain and that it would do damage to our economy and trade. We will reject ‘no deal’ as a viable option”.

This motion is the only means today for Labour to fulfil that manifesto promise, and I know that the Labour party has repeatedly asked the Government to rule out no deal so I entreat them to support this motion today as the means of doing that.

[Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

rose—

[Joanna Cherry]

I give way to the right hon. and learned Gentleman, who is a co-sponsor of the amendment.

[Mr Grieve]

I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady. Does she agree that the point about this motion is that it is there in extremis? It is not there to summarily revoke article 50, but only to do it in the event of circumstances where there is no alternative and no ability to get an extension that might deliver a referendum, for example, or some other conclusion.

[Joanna Cherry]

That is exactly so, and I am very grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for spelling that out so clearly and for lending his support to this motion.

Fellow Members can support this motion even if they are supporting other motions tonight. It should be acceptable to supporters of the current draft withdrawal agreement—for some reason that is not on the Order Paper today, but we might see it later in the week. If an hon. Member wished to support the Prime Minister’s deal, they could also support my motion because it is a failsafe. If an hon. Member wished to support Norway-plus, they could also support my motion because it is a failsafe. And, very importantly, those of us who wish to support a people’s vote can also support this because it is a failsafe. Also, it does not even preclude a general election, because the way the motion is worded makes it kick in on the penultimate day before exit day, which is of course a moving target at the moment; so it leaves the door open to a general election, which I know some of us would quite like to see, particularly the SNP in Scotland as we are riding so high in the opinion polls. But today is about cross-party working and democracy, because the decision that we are taking is of generational importance for the United Kingdom and it ought to be the representatives of the people of the United Kingdom in this House who decide between revocation and no deal, not the Prime Minister of a minority Government.