Brexit News for Sunday 22 October

Brexit News for Sunday 22 October
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Voters spurn fresh referendum and back no deal over alternatives

The poll suggests concerns have not translated into large numbers of people changing their minds over how they voted. In fact, there is support for leaving the EU with no deal. More voters opted for that outcome (37%) than the alternatives of entering a transition period where we remain in the EU single market until we can negotiate a satisfactory deal (25%), or abandoning Brexit altogether (23%). There is little appetite for a second referendum that would give a choice between the deal on offer and remaining in the EU. Most voters (53%) said that they did not want a second referendum, compared with 35% who did. Even a quarter of Remainers opted against another vote. Meanwhile, it appears pledging one would enrage those who voted Leave, with 82% against another national poll. – Observer

David Davis to have dinner with French foreign minister in bid to jump-start EU withdrawal talks

David Davis will travel to Paris on Monday for Brexit talks days after French President Emmanuel Macron suggested Britain would need to up its divorce payment offer to unlock trade negotiations. The Brexit Secretary will have dinner with French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian in the UK’s latest attempt to jump-start withdrawal talks with the European Union. – Independent

Labour to work with Tory rebels in bid to get Commons vote on final Brexit deal

Labour will join forces with Tory rebels in an attempt to force Theresa May into giving MPs a veto on the final Brexit deal, Sir Keir Starmer has said. The shadow Brexit secretary demanded six changes to the “paused” repeal bill, formally known as the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, including Parliament being given final approval of the exit agreement. Sir Keir said the Government has unexpectedly withheld the legislation from the House of Commons for two weeks running because it fears defeat on at least 13 amendments at the hands of Tory rebels. – BT

No way now to stop Brexit, Tory grandee Ken Clarke says

Conservative former chancellor Ken Clarke has said he believes there is now no way to prevent the UK leaving the EU. The staunch Remainer said there was “little doubt” that Brexit would take place and argued a second referendum on any deal would be “folly”. Mr Clarke told an audience at the Scottish Parliament’s Festival of Politics that a “no deal” scenario with the UK crashing out of the EU was “very unlikely”. – Evening Telegraph

Brexit must mean end to live animal exports, say MPs

The “cruel trade” of shipping live cattle and sheep abroad for slaughter should be banned on the day Britain leaves the European Union, Conservative MPs will say this week. Theresa Villiers, a former cabinet minister, is to call on ministers to end the practice as soon as Britain is no longer bound by EU rules preventing a ban. Ten Conservative MPs, among them Graham Brady, the chairman of the influential 1922 committee of backbenchers, declared their support for a bill drawn up by Ms Villiers that will be debated on Wednesday. – Sunday Telegraph (£)

BBC invited a third more pro-EU than Eurosceptic speakers to appear during election campaign, report claims

The BBC invited a third more pro-EU speakers than anti-EU speakers to appear during the election campaign, a report has revealed.  A survey of its news coverage during the period between May 3 and June 7 found that of 375 contributors, 189 were pro-EU or expressed negative opinions about Brexit, while just 140 were positive. – Sunday Telegraph

John Redwood MP: Simple negotiating

I am glad the government is going full ahead with showing how the WTO option can work for the UK, and will do what it takes to make sure we trade and do business after March 2019 if there is no deal. That is a sensible contingency plan, as well as a good negotiating strategy. It is quite clear from the different tone of remarks coming from Mrs Merkel, the Commission and elsewhere within the EU that they are very worried at just how popular the WTO model is with many UK voters. Brexit voters understand that this model delivers us full control over all our money from March 2019 with no additional payments, full control over all our laws including the laws transferred from the EU with the end of all ECJ jurisdiction, and full national control of our borders from day one out of the EU. That is what we wanted from Brexit. That is what “taking back control” was all about. – John Redwood for John Redwood’s Diary

Tim Newark: EU’s treatment of Cameron told us what to expect

Her reasonable request to go back with a deal she could defend to the British people echoes David Cameron’s plea for concessions he could sell to the nation to head off the need for a referendum on membership. In February 2016, the spectacle of Mr Cameron turning up at Brussels with his begging bowl asking for changes to our terms of EU membership was bad enough – and did no favours for his Remain campaign. – Tim Newark for the Sunday Express

Bernard Jenkin: We should walk away from talks if we don’t have a Brexit deal by March

Theresa May is being urged to walk away from Brexit talks in March next year unless the major parts of a trade and transition deal have been struck. Brussels must accelerate its “painfully slow” approach to talks otherwise the PM will have no choice but to quit the negotiations, said a leading Brexiteer. The stark warning to Downing Street about the tipping-point moment in five months comes from senior Tory Bernard Jenkin. His intervention came as leaders of the EU’s other 27 countries agreed to start internal talks on trade and transition in time for negotiations with Britain from December. – Bernard Jenkin for the Sun on Sunday

Dominic Raab: Diplomacy is needed in Brexit negotiations, not Corbyn’s silly games

For the Brexit doom-mongers, the result from the latest Brussels talks will be a disappointment — with progress on key issues and a shift in tone and attitude from our EU partners. EU negotiators were told to prepare for talks on the future partnership deal — covering trade and security cooperation — to start in less than two months’ time. We must continue the serious diplomacy, striving for the best “win-win” deal for both sides. Also, the only responsible thing for the UK government to do is prepare for all possible outcomes from negotiations, including the failure to reach a deal. – Dominic Raab for the Sun on Sunday

Tony Parsons: After cosy chats with EU buddies, we must ask whose side Corbyn is really on

As Jeremy Corbyn cheerfully licked the loafers of all his new chums in Brussels, the question was reasonably asked – exactly whose side is the Labour leader on? It is not yours. It is not mine. It is certainly not Britain’s. Corbyn, had private meetings with Antonio Tajani, the ­European Parliament President who dismissed Britain’s offer of £20billion as “pea­nuts”, and chief EU negotiator Michel Barnier, who is more interested in administering a punishment beating to Britain than in hammering out any deal. – Tony Parsons for the Sun on Sunday

James Forsyth: Deal or no deal, let’s make Brexit a new deal

It is no coincidence that Theresa May got just enough at the EU Council – and no more. For one of the EU’s key aims in these talks is to get as much money as possible out of the UK without collapsing the talks. As one Cabinet minister puts it, what “they need from us is cash”. So, the EU says “sufficient progress” hasn’t been achieved to move on to negotiating the trade deal. This increases the time ­pressure on the UK; there’s now only 18 months until we leave the EU. The EU believes this will pressure May into offering more money. But at the same time, the EU gives enough — a commitment to start preparing for trade talks — to ensure May stays at the negotiating table. – James Forsyth for the Sun on Sunday

Janet Daley: The EU finally seems to have realised that this is not a play fight any more

Is this hell? We appear to be locked in some horrible recurrent dream in which the same people say the same things again and again in varying tones of voice, but always with the same deadly intransigence. The “negotiations” over our exit from what was supposed to be a fraternal, cooperative, mutually beneficial association is now a hostage crisis in which the ransom cannot even be agreed, let alone met. – Janet Daley for the Sunday Telegraph (£)

Sunday Telegraph: Authoritarian EU is facing deep divisions

One of the biggest delusions among militant Remainers is that the EU is so enlightened, so morally superior to Britain that once the prospect of leaving it becomes more concrete, the British people will want to jump back in. Yet everything that has happened in Europe since the referendum has vindicated the vote for Brexit. The EU leadership has come out for an ever-closer union: Emmanuel Macron talks of a continental army and single asylum agency; Jean-Claude Juncker wants budgetary and tax integration. At the same time – and this is no coincidence – Europe has witnessed a number of national and regional revolts that reject the designs and values of the EU elite. – Sunday Telegraph view

Brexit in brief

  • Brexit must offer Leave voters the dignity they voted for – Lisa Nandy for the FT (£)
  • EU knows we are not leaving without a deal – Richard & Judy for the Sunday Express
  • It’s the hand-to-hand combat this side of the Channel that’s stalling Brexit – Adam Boulton for the Sunday Times (£)
  • How blockchain technology can set us free from this Brexit time warp – Haakon Overli for the Sunday Telegraph (£)
  • The tale of Europe’s 20th century is uplifting, but it is not our tale – Daniel Hannan for the Sunday Telegraph (£)
  • Britain must make the EU think about what ‘no deal’ would mean – Sunday Telegraph (£)
  • Calm down, Britain is getting out just in time – Sunday Times (£)
  • EU parliament exposed as ‘hotbed of sex harassment’ – Sunday Times (£)
  • Non-euro states should take part in euro reform talks – EU’s Tusk – Reuters