UK Plans for Leaving the EU

Tulip Siddiq Excerpts

Monday 9th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I am very clear that there will be no second referendum. The British people were given their opportunity to choose, they chose to come out of the European Union and that is what this Government will deliver.

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

My constituent Jessica Simor, QC, from Matrix Chambers has done important work on the legal status of revoking article 50, and she is of the opinion that it can be revoked. The Supreme Court case that the Prime Minister referred to rules that the Government cannot trigger article 50 without an authorising Act of Parliament. Article 50 provides for the notification not of withdrawal but of an intention to withdraw, and the Prime Minister will be aware that in law an “intention” is not a binding agreement. So I ask her once again: will she publish the legal advice she has received, which is important for the wider public to see?

[The Prime Minister]

I say to all those Opposition Members who have stood up today and asked about the legal position on revoking article 50 that the position is very clear. The British people voted in a referendum to leave the European Union.