Labour renews pressure for parliamentary Brexit vote with 170 questions… Labour’s 170 questions – one for each day before the end of March, the government’s self-imposed deadline for triggering formal exit talks – come from the new shadow Brexit secretary, Sir Keir Starmer, and shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry…Although the precise number of questions is a little gimmicky, they address some issues which business leaders also want answered – for example, whether the government has decided the UK should leave the single market and if so, if it would still abide by its regulations. – BBC Thornberry and Starmer’s letter to David Davis demanding answers over Brexit – LabourList Labour’s 170 questions for the Tories on Brexit – LabourList …as the Government makes surprise ‘climbdown’ on Brexit scrutiny In a move described by Opposition sources as a “huge climbdown”, the Government tried to persuade several Tory MPs to refuse to back Labour’s Opposition Day motion, which called for Parliament to be able to scrutinise a plan before Article 50 is triggered…. On Tuesday evening the Government offered an amendment in the name of the PM to accept extra scrutiny as long as it “does not undermine the negotiating position of the Government”. – Sky News Mrs May’s amendment, tabled on Tuesday night, adds to Labour’s motion “and believes that the process should be undertaken in such a way that respects the decision of the people of the UK when they voted to leave the EU on 23 June and does not undermine the negotiating position of the Government as negotiations are entered into which will take place after Article 50 has been triggered”. – ITV News May rules out allowing MPs Brexit vote – Daily Express Ken Clarke calls for parliamentary vote on PM’s ‘hard Brexit’ – Daily Express Daily Mail: Damn the unpatriotic Bremoaners and their plot to subvert the will of the British people From the moment the referendum result became clear, Remain have been sore losers: incredulous that the British people could be so disrespectful as to reject their wisdom, and increasingly furious that the economy — far from collapsing, as predicted by Mr Osborne — is flourishing. – Daily Mail editorial Time to silence EU exit whingers – Daily Express Scorn is poured on yesterday’s Times story on Treasury Brexit calculations… By the Times’s own admission, the leaked document, prepared for parliamentary committee discussions, is “controversial”. The calculations were copied from a paper produced by the Treasury in April as part of a campaign on the economic consequences of Brexit – a campaign later derided as “propaganda” and branded “Project Fear”. The £66bn is also a “worst-case figure”, based on a scenario that includes no accord with Europe and no replacement deals with other global countries. – The Week …as David Davis accuses Treasury officials of trying to ‘undermine’ Brexit negotiations David Davis has accused Treasury officials of trying to “undermine” Brexit negotiations as part of a “desperate strategy” to keep Britain in the Single Market… Mr Davis is understood to be furious at the use of the figures, which he believes risk undermining Britain’s negotiating strategy. “He thinks it is pulling the rug from beneath us,” a friend told The Daily Telegraph. – Daily Telegraph Hard Brexiters vs the Treasury: the Cabinet battle that will decide Britain’s economic future – James Kirkup in the Daily Telegraph Theresa May’s spokesman says figures in leaked government papers are not new – The Guardian Jacob Rees-Mogg launches ferocious attack on the Treasury after leaked report – City A.M. Leak of gloomy Brexit forecast pushes pound to 31-year low – The Times (£) Leaving EU customs union will cost UK £25bn a year, said newly appointed government adviser The British economy will be hit by a “permanent cost” of more than £25bn a year if it decides to withdraw from the EU customs union, a new government adviser on Brexit has said. Raoul Ruparel, who has been hired by David Davis to provide expertise on the process of leaving the EU, said he believed there was no question of the UK staying in Europe’s free-trade bloc… “What [Open Europe] found is that, in the long run (up to 2030), there will be a permanent cost to leaving the customs union,” the analysis said. “This cost is around 1% to 1.2% GDP.” – The Guardian MPs criticise ‘ridiculously large’ Brexit select committee Under a plan to be unveiled on Wednesday, 21 MPs from every party in the House of Commons except Ukip and the Greens, will sit on the new Brexit select committee. The committee will be almost double the size of almost every other Commons select committee after a deal struck between Conservative and Labour whips. But some senior MPs have claimed that the committee has been made deliberately large so that it is less effective at scrutinising the government’s strategy and less able to reach a consensus. – The Guardian Spend the aid budget on a new royal yacht Britannia, Tory MPs tell Government Cash should be diverted from the annual “rich as Croesus” aid budget and spent on a £120 million successor to the royal yacht Britannia, former defence ministers have told the Government. The news came as the Government invited plans for a privately funded successor to the royal yacht to help drive British exports after the UK leaves the European Union. – Daily Telegraph Government has ‘no plans’ for royal yacht for Brexit trade talks – BBC Boris Johnson gagged by No 10 from backing new Royal Yacht at Tory conference – The Sun Brexit makes China keener to strike a trade deal with Britain “Britain is now China’s major trading partner and investment destination in Europe – the Brexit referendum has certainly not dampened the enthusiasm of Chinese businesses about investing in this country,” [Ambassador] Liu told HSBC’s China and renminbi forum. – Daily Telegraph Flights from UK to China set to double in new deal – Daily Express Osborne warns against non-EU post-Brexit trade deals – Daily Express The SNP tries to clarify its post-Brexit strategy Within the Scottish National Party, there are fault lines when it comes to independence — and Brexit has laid them bare. Sturgeon and her Brexit minister, Michael Russell, have made it clear they want to retain Scotland’s place in the EU. But others see opportunities in the U.K.’s vote to leave the European Union. – Politico Brexit is “opportunity”, say Scottish fishermen – The Scotsman Ruth Davidson mustn’t shy away from the fight she faces with Theresa May and the Brexiteers – Alan Cochrane in the Daily Telegraph Stephen Phillips MP: We voted for Brexit to keep parliament sovereign – we won’t be gagged The government says, of course, that it can’t give a running commentary on its negotiations with the EU and the governments of its member states. Nobody is asking for that. We are asking for MPs to have the right to have a say in directing a government with no mandate as to the form that Brexit should take. That’s it….therefore, I will vote with the opposition to try to wrest back control over the form our future relations with the EU should take from a government that has no mandate at all to decide that question on its own. – Stephen Phillips MP in the Guardian Did we reclaim sovereignty from Brussels only to ignore Parliament? That really is the way to dictatorship – Philip Johnston in the Daily Telegraph Owen Jones: We need to stop calling it hard Brexit. This is chaotic Brexit The framing of Brexit is so critical. Opponents of the Tories’ approach to Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union call it a “hard Brexit”. This is a mistake. At best, it is abstract. It can simply mean reassuring many of those who voted to leave that Brexit really does mean Brexit, rather than “the Tories’ deal will slash your living standards”…That’s why opponents of the Tories’ position should settle on a “chaotic Brexit” – Owen Jones in The Guardian Stefan Stern: A Remoaner’s lament Britain voted Leave, but did not specify what kind of Brexit it wanted. The ballot paper did not allow for specifics. So our sovereign parliament must have a say on what shape Brexit takes. That’s what the vote was partly about, wasn’t it – parliamentary sovereignty? We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the EU in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a UK level with a UK state exercising a new dominance from Westminster, as Mrs Thatcher almost said. – Stefan Stern for Reaction Peter Marshall: Why Article 50 bars any attempted punishment of Britain for Brexit Unhappily, there is much in the attitude already adopted in some EU quarters which world opinion would regard as falling short of the ideal. A prime cause of concern is the conviction, seemingly held among Brussels diehards, that the UK must not be seem to gain from its departure, lest “contagion” spread among other EU member states. Beggar-my-neighbour tactics are no proper basis for building a framework for anyone’s future relationship with the EU, or with anyone else. We must all – repeat all – play a Positive-Sum Game, not a Zero-Sum Game. – Peter Marshall for ConservativeHome Graham Brady MP: Brexit will set our justice system free The European Arrest Warrant operates as an extradition arrangement between EU member states. Introduced in 2004 and intended to speed up extradition proceedings, any national judicial authority within the EU can issue a warrant to extradite a suspect on the basis of the mutual recognition of criminal justice systems within the EU. Yet therein lies its major flaw. This one-size-fits-all approach equates British and German judicial standards with those of countries such as Romania and Bulgaria – recently named by the RAND Europe research institute as the most corrupt in the EU. – Graham Brady MP for CapX Katy Balls: The three Europhiles take on the three Brexiteers It was a case of the ghosts of governments past as George Osborne, Michael Heseltine and Vince Cable were hauled before the Commons Business Committee to discuss the UK’s industrial strategy. What followed was a bit of a love-in as Heseltine commended Osborne for his time in the Cabinet – praising Cameron’s government for working on industrial strategy ‘on a bigger scale than any previous government’. – Katy Balls for the Spectator’s Coffee House Blog Brexit comment in brief The back-door court attempt to overturn Brexit is laughably undemocratic – Michael Toner for International Business Times Why Britain will rise as the pound falls – Austin Mitchell in the Yorkshire Post My advice to the EU? Ask why we slung our hook – Bernard Ingham in the Yorkshire Post Brexit News in Brief UK court challenge risks delaying Brexit – EurActiv Regardless of Brexit, sterling was screaming out for a devaluation – Nils Pratley for the Guardian Flash crash of the pound shows the FX market is too liquid – The Times (£) Fujitsu denies Brexit decision to blame for 1,800 UK job cuts – The Times (£) Ireland to set up ‘rainy day fund’ as buffer against Brexit shock – The Guardian UK ‘may still have to pay into EU even after Brexit’ – BBC Iain Duncan Smith clashes with Ed Miliband over the single market – Daily Express British advertising budgets to grow in 2016 despite Brexit – Reuters Spanish wine and meat sales to feel the pinch of Brexit – EurActiv