Exiting the European Union

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

My hon. Friend the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee is right, and this is fundamental to one of the points I was making in my earlier remarks. There are very strong security, foreign affairs, foreign policy and environmental relationships, and a whole series of other relationships, that will continue to apply long after we have left the EU, to the benefit of both the EU and the UK.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

I warmly welcome the Secretary of State to his new position and I know that millions of Labour voters and supporters across the country who voted to leave will be pleased that there is someone in this position who genuinely wants to get out of the EU. Will he confirm that there is a real difference between wanting to be members of the single market and wanting to have access to the single market, and that some of the remainers should learn that?

[Mr Davis]

The hon. Lady is right, and of course access to the single market is not really up for grabs; it is there for everybody and, frankly, there are many countries outside the EU that do a better job of exporting to the single market than we do, even without a trade arrangement. So of course we want to have access to the single market and we do not need to be a member of it to do that. Indeed being a member of it is what has caused some of the problems of sovereignty that drove this referendum.