EU Exit Negotiations

Lord Field of Birkenhead Excerpts

Thursday 15th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Let me first thank my right hon. Friend for focusing people’s sights on people outside the Chamber, because they are the ones we must consider when we are looking at our decisions in relation to this deal when it comes forward.

A number of quotes have come from industry about the deal. It has been said, for example, that

“it delivers a clear path ahead that business so desperately needs” .

The Federation of Small Businesses has said that it

“brings with it some certainty that our small businesses have craved.”

Businesses out there have been looking for the certainty that a deal will bring. They have also been concerned that we focus on that free trade area and on that frictionless trade across borders, which is, of course, exactly what the Government have done.

[Frank Field (Birkenhead) (Ind)]

Can the Prime Minister guarantee to the House that at the end of March we will continue to have frictionless supply chains, and that at the end of this process we will be in control of our borders, we will have brought back all the judicial powers that we have surrendered, and we will be free from the European Court’s jurisdictions?

[The Prime Minister]

I can say to the right hon. Gentleman that the future relationship we are negotiating with the European Union absolutely delivers on the points that he made about no jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, and taking back control of our borders so that free movement is ended. We have also based the concept of the free trade area on the need for that frictionless trade in goods, to ensure that the people whose jobs depend on those supply chains do not see those jobs go, and that not only are we able to retain those jobs, but, with the other trade agreements that we are able to bring forward once we are outside the European Union, we can enhance the economy and create more jobs in this country.