News / Politics

Brexit deal likely to be rejected by MPs over EU trade deal: David Davis

Wednesday, 25 April 2018 4:28 PM [ Last Update: Wednesday, 25 April 2018 4:41 PM ]

Britain's Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union David Davis arrives in Downing Street, London, April 24, 2018. (Photo by AFP)

Britain's Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, has said that British MPs are likely to reject the deal unless an agreement on future trade with the EU has also been secured.

David Davis said on Wednesday that British Prime Minister Theresa May will have the “hardest time” convincing the House of Commons to sign up to the £39 billion-plus “divorce bill” if only few details of the long-term trade deal are discussed.

“It has to be substantive from a British parliament point of view,” Davis told MPs on the Brexit committee. “The hardest time I will have in October is people saying, ‘what have we got for this?.’”

He pointed out that the House of Commons will also be “voting for a bill of £39 billion”, adding, “It will want to know what it is getting in exchange.

Davis also insisted that there would not be a repeat of a scandal involving black Caribbean immigrants known as the Windrush scandal, with the children of EU citizens living in Britain, when they are required to apply to stay in the UK.

“At the risk of being mildly self-righteous, I’ll point you to my own speeches early on in this process, where I said our treatment of the European citizens in the UK would be a moral issue, it was a moral imperative and that is how we will treat it,” he said

Thousands of workers from the Caribbean region near Central America were invited to Britain to compensate for labor shortages between 1948 and 1971, but some of their descendants have been caught up in a tightening of immigration rules. In some cases they have been denied health services, prevented from working or even threatened with deportation.

May has admitted that there are “hard facts” Britain should be ready to face about the economic consequences of leaving the EU. She has spelled out Britain's challenges in Brexit, declaring the country would "face up to some hard facts." She has said the UK would leave the EU’s single market and customs union after Brexit in March 2019, noting the country may suffer new trade barriers as a result of her move.

In Britain’s 2016 referendum, 52 percent, or 17.4 million people, voted to leave the EU while 48 percent, or 16 million, voted to stay.

May insists Britain will leave the EU as planned and there will be no rerun of the Brexit referendum.

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