United Kingdom’s Withdrawal from the European Union

Stephen Doughty Excerpts

Friday 29th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Attorney General]

Precisely: we are where we are. I intend not to review how and why we have arrived at this point, but to explain the motion that the Government have placed before the House.

On 21 March, the Council agreed a decision that if the withdrawal agreement is approved, we have a legal right as a country to an extension to 22 May 2019. If this withdrawal agreement is not approved, that extension will expire on 11 April. That means that any other extension that this House might desire to be agreed by the Union would be at its discretion, subject to the veto of 27 leaders. Therefore, by this evening, if the 11 o’clock deadline expires and the agreement has not been approved, that legal right will expire with it.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Attorney General give way?

[The Attorney General]

I will in a moment, but not now.

This is, therefore, the last opportunity to take advantage of our legal right. The Government have taken the view that it would have been wrong to allow that time and date to expire without giving this House the opportunity to consider whether it should avail itself of the legal right or whether it should move into a position where any further extension will be at the discretion of the 27 leaders.

[Stephen Doughty]

Will the Attorney General give way on that point?

[The Attorney General]

I am not taking interventions at the moment; I will in due course. [Interruption.] I do not intend to take long. I want to set out clearly the choice before the House today.

The minimum necessary in order to secure this right, which is ours as a matter of law, is that the withdrawal agreement is approved. All negotiated exits from the European Union will require this withdrawal agreement to have been approved. The Union has made it abundantly clear, and the decision—

[Stephen Doughty]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker.

[Mr Speaker]

I hope this is a genuine point of order.

[Stephen Doughty]

The Attorney General refused to accept my intervention, Mr Speaker. I believe that he may be inadvertently misleading us. He spoke very importantly about the date, the significance of today and the importance of the deadline this evening. However, I know that the Government approached those of us working on the indicative votes process asking us whether we would reschedule our indicative votes business for today. If that is the case, why is there this significance? Surely the Attorney General is misleading us about the significance of holding the vote today.

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but that does not require adjudication by the Chair. The Attorney General will have heard the point of order and it is open to him to respond to it or not, as he thinks fit.