Progress on EU Negotiations

Boris Johnson Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

We have of course put forward proposals that would enable frictionless trade to be achieved outside the customs union and outside the single market. That is not something that is accepted by everyone in the European Union—I fully accept that—but we have in the future negotiations the ability to continue to work for our objective of achieving that frictionless trade. The right hon. Gentleman talks about concern about uncertainty into the future; I have to say to him that the thing that would create most uncertainty in the future is a failure to take and agree a deal that is going to be good for the UK, that delivers on the vote of the people in the referendum, and that does so while protecting people’s jobs and security.

[Boris Johnson (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con)]

May I regretfully point out to my right hon. Friend that of course nothing in this political declaration changes the hard reality of the withdrawal agreement, which gives the EU a continuing veto over the unilateral power of the entire United Kingdom to do free trade deals or to take back control of our laws? May I therefore respectfully suggest that we can accept the generalities and the self-contradictions contained in this political declaration, but we should junk forthwith the backstop upon which the future economic partnership is to be based, according to this political declaration, and which makes a complete nonsense of Brexit?

[The Prime Minister]

I am sure that my right hon. Friend will recall the discussions we had earlier in the year when we were agreeing the temporary customs arrangement as our proposal for the basis on which we would ensure that we guaranteed the commitment for the people of Northern Ireland, and, indeed, obviously elements of that have been reflected in what we see in the withdrawal agreement. There are various arrangements that we can put in place, as I have said to others who have questioned me so far in this statement in relation to the backstop. I say to my right hon. Friend that the future relationship that we have set out in the political declaration ends free movement, ends sending vast sums of money to the European Union every year, and ends the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice here in the United Kingdom, and it enables us to hold an independent trade policy and to negotiate trade deals around the whole of the world. I know that my right hon. Friend has in the past expressed his desire to have all those elements available to the United Kingdom, and that is what this deal delivers.