Progress on EU Negotiations

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I do not agree with the first part of the right hon. Gentleman’s question. I believe that actually, as an independent state outside the European Union, the United Kingdom will continue to play a very key role in a number of multilateral organisations around the world, such as the United Nations and NATO. More than that, we have already started to extend our partnership to countries around the world where we have not had the same extent of partnership as a member of the European Union and to look forward to us outside the European Union. I think the right hon. Gentleman has probably asked me the question about the economics previously. Outside the European Union, I believe it is important for us not only to have a good trade relationship with the European Union—that is what this deal delivers—but to be able to develop those trade relationships around the rest of the world.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Will the Prime Minister help those of us who want to try to help her in this vote? She knows that what we are worried about is that we will be trapped for years in a customs union. She tells us that this backstop is temporary, so can she give me this commitment? Given that the Vienna convention makes it absolutely clear that a sovereign state can abrogate any part of a treaty with an international body when it likes and that this Parliament cannot bind its successors, if by the end of this Parliament—or the due date of the end of this Parliament—or by 1 January 2022, we are still trapped in these arrangements, will she assure me that she will abrogate those treaties and we will become an independent nation again?

[The Prime Minister]

The premise of my hon. Friend’s question is that we would be in the backstop by 1 January 2022. I repeat to my hon. Friend and to others, first, that it is our intention and the intention of the European Union to work to ensure that the backstop need never be brought into place. There are many references throughout the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration that make clear the temporary nature of the backstop, should it be exercised. But of course, as I said earlier, even if an interim arrangement were necessary, it would be the case that alternative arrangements—the extension of the IP—could be in place instead of the backstop.

My hon. Friend asked me about the due date for the end of this Parliament—the general election in 2022. What I am very clear about is that it is my firm intention that we will be firmly in our future relationship with the European Union by the time of the next general election, such that we are able to look the British people in the eye and say, “You gave us an instruction to leave the European Union, and we have delivered.”