Business of the House

Lord Tugendhat Excerpts

Thursday 4th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Ridley]

We are here because there is a difference between a remainer Parliament and a leaver majority in the country. That is why we are here; that is the problem we are trying to resolve. My argument is that this Bill does not resolve it because it denies them the clearest form of Brexit, which all the polls suggest an awful lot of people want.

[Lord Tugendhat (Con)]

Does my noble friend agree that a large number of people who voted remain in the referendum, including myself, have frequently said that they accept the result of the referendum and support the Prime Minister’s deal, and have sought to facilitate our departure? The reason the Prime Minister’s deal has failed is that his friends—the extreme Brexiteers —have put a block on it.

[Viscount Ridley]

I do not agree. What has happened is that we were presented with a deal last summer that the British public, much of the House of Commons and even many remainers did not like. There has been a huge amount of opposition to that deal, and it should have been abundantly clear to the Government that it would not fly.

I said that I wanted to talk about—