EU Exit: Negotiations and the Joint Committee

Elliot Colburn Excerpts

Monday 19th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her points. In my statement, I made the point—I hope that she will forgive me for making it again—that we made significant progress today in the Joint Committee, thanks to the constructive approach taken by Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič. We are lucky that he and his team are so committed to making sure that the protocol works. I remind her that the protocol is there to give effect to the Belfast agreement, which is about agreement across communities, rather than a culture of grievance.

[Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend may not have known it before December 2019, but Carshalton and Wallington residents voted to leave the European Union and are keen to see us get on and return to being an independent, free-trading global nation. Although we hope that the EU will return constructively to the table, will he confirm that, irrespective of whether a deal is struck, we will continue to go out into the world to seek free trade agreements, such as the one we recently secured with Japan?

[Michael Gove]

Absolutely. A cloud lifted from Carshalton and Wallington in December last year, and we were able to see at last that the people of that constituency who voted for Brexit had a representative who believed in them.