Britain is turbo-charging no-deal Brexit preparations: foreign minister

FAN Editor
Newly appointed Britain's Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is seen outside Downing Street in London
Newly appointed Britain’s Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab is seen outside Downing Street in London, Britain July 25, 2019. REUTERS/Hannah McKay

July 29, 2019

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain is turbo-charging its no-deal Brexit preparations and will be ready to leave the European Union with or without a deal on Oct. 31, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said on Monday.

Raab, an avowed Brexiteer, said the “undemocratic” Irish backstop had to go from the Withdrawal Agreement.

“We want a good deal with EU partners and friends but that must involve the abolition of the undemocratic backstop,” Raab told the BBC. “What the prime minister has instructed and the cabinet has accepted is a turbo-charging of those preparations.”

Ministers said on Sunday the government assumed the EU will not renegotiate the Brexit deal that it agreed with former prime minister Theresa May but which is opposed by her successor Boris Johnson, and was ramping up preparations to leave the bloc on Oct. 31 without an agreement.

Conservative lawmaker Oliver Letwin, who is opposed to leaving the EU without a transition agreement, told BBC radio that lawmakers would seek to stop a no-deal Brexit but that it was not clear whether parliament could prevent such a scenario.

“I am accepting that we may well not be able to (stop a no-deal Brexit),” he said.

“Nobody can tell whether we will be able to get a majority in parliament for some way of doing something other than having a no-deal exit at the last minute, if it turns out that this government hasn’t got a deal,” Letwin said.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by William Schomberg)

Free America Network Articles

Leave a Reply

Next Post

Barclays, JPMorgan, others face UK class action over currency-rigging

A worker cleans a Barclays logo outside a bank branch in the financial district of London, Britain July 8, 2019. REUTERS/Simon Dawson July 29, 2019 By Kirstin Ridley and Iain Withers LONDON (Reuters) – Barclays <BARC.L>, JPMorgan <JPM.N>, RBS <RBS.L>, UBS <UBSG.L> and Citigroup <C.N>, are being sued by investors […]