Sir Keir Starmer – Labour backs ‘a customs union’ arrangement
The Shadow Brexit Secretary told Andrew Marr this morning that Labour has come out in favour of the UK reaching an agreement to remain in ‘a customs union’ with the EU. The outcome would see the UK retain tariff free access to EU markets, but still apply the EU’s external tariffs to goods from the rest of the world. The announcement comes after a prolonged period of confusion and contradiction over Labour’s exact policy on this issue. Starmer said that the ‘unanimous’ decision had been arrived at after ‘many weeks of discussion’:
AM: Can I ask what the Labour position is on a customs union?
KS: We’ve long championed being in a customs union with the EU and the benefits of that. Obviously, it’s the only way realistically to get tariff free access. It’s really important for our manufacturing base, and nobody can answer the question of how you keep your commitment to no ‘hard border’ in Northern Ireland without a customs union…
AM: So this is laying to rest the last shreds of any doubt. What kind of customs union do you want?
KS: The customs arrangements at the moment are hardwired into the membership treaty, so I think everybody now recognises there is going to have to be a new treaty. It will do the work of the customs union. So it’s ‘a customs union’. There’s going to have to be a new agreement. But will it do the work of the current customs union? Yes, that’s the intention.
Asked by Marr how the UK could negotiate trade deals from within a customs union with the EU, Starmer replied ‘We all want to do bold new trade agreements, but we would be better off doing that with the EU.’ Referring to the possibility that Labour could back amendments drafted by Conservative rebels attempting to keep the UK in the customs union, Starmer said ‘We haven’t made a final decision on that, but they are so close to our amendments… whether it’s our amendments or cross-bench amendments, crunch time is now coming for the Prime Minister because the majority of Parliament does not back her approach’.
Liam Fox – Jeremy Corbyn ‘was a useful idiot to the Soviet Union’
The International Trade Secretary has waded into the Jeremy Corbyn spy row by declaring the Leader of the Opposition and his fellow travellers to have been ‘the Soviet Union’s useful idiots’ during the 1980s. Other Conservative MPs have come under fire for their remarks concerning the allegations that surfaced last week, with the party’s Vice Chair Ben Bradley forced to apologise for his claim that Corbyn ‘sold secrets to Communist spies’, and Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson has attracted ire from some quarters for saying that Corbyn had ‘betrayed’ his country. Andrew Marr asked Fox if he agreed with Williamson:
AM: Did Corbyn betray his country?
LF: I think that the Labour left during the Cold War were extremely unhelpful to this country. We believed that we should see off communism. We believed that we should see off the tyranny…
AM: That’s not quite what I’m asking you. Did he betray his country?
LF: I don’t think I would use the word betray… but I certainly think that the Labour left were the Soviet Union’s useful idiots during that period.
AM: …Should Gavin Williamson apologise to Jeremy Corbyn for saying that he has betrayed this country?
LF: I think in the broadest sense he was undermining the security of our country by siding with the Soviet Union in that argument, I think that was very damaging to the country. Luckily it was our side of the argument, not Jeremy Corbyn’s, that won the day.
On Donald Tusk’s assertion that the UK’s negotiating position was ‘pure illusion’, Fox replied ‘Well we’ll wait and see where the negotiations take us because remember if you’re looking at what’s in our interests you also have to look at what’s in the EU’s interest’. On the likely Tory rebellion, Fox stressed ‘I hope that they will have an open mind and listen to what the Prime Minister says because I think that what the Prime Minister will set out will deal with a lot of the reservations that they have had’.
Nigel Dodds – Two weeks left to set Northern Ireland’s budget
The DUP’s Westminster Leader Nigel Dodds has called for action to be taken from the Westminster government in order to set Northern Ireland’s budget in the absence of a functioning executive at Stormont. Dodds told Robert Peston that the current situation was ‘unacceptable’ and that action needed to be taken within a fortnight:
‘It’s intolerable to have a situation where everyone in Northern Ireland is affected by the lack of ministers.’ @NigelDoddsDUP says a budget needs to be agreed in the next fortnight. #Peston pic.twitter.com/JxDDxGBxO7
— Peston (@itvpeston) February 25, 2018
ND: Northern Ireland has been without ministers for 13 months…Clearly you couldn’t survive 13 days in Whitehall without ministers in charge and that wouldn’t be tolerated… It’s put the civil servants in a very, very difficult positions and an unacceptable position. That needs to come to an end. There needs to be a budget within the next fortnight, and there needs to be decisions taken in order to spend that money, not least the rollout of the money that was secured by the Democratic Unionist Party for all of Northern Ireland.
RP: And constitutionally, who can take those decisions on how that money is spent?
ND: The budget can be set here at Westminster and clearly Parliament can authorise ministers to take whatever decisions are necessary for the good governance of the province.
RP: Is that what should happen?
ND: That’s clearly what should happen and I confidently expect that it will happen.
When Peston asked if the DUP were holding the government to ransom, Dodds countered that ‘Advocating that there should be some ministerial decision making and budget set is a common sense position everybody should want to adopt.’ Instead, Dodds even suggested that the 7 Sinn Fein MPs should take up their seats in the Westminster Parliament, arguing that ‘they might find that they would have more influence than they currently have’.
Iain Duncan Smith – The UK will be ‘endlessly outvoted’ in a customs union with the EU
The former Work and Pensions Secretary has given his response to the idea that the UK should remain in a customs union arrangement as advocated by Labour and Conservative backbenchers such as Dominic Grieve and Anna Soubry. Sarah Smith asked the one-time Conservative leader why neither he nor the government would support the Conservative rebels’ proposal to stay in the customs union:
Iain Duncan Smith argues that by agreeing to be in 'a' customs union, Britain will "not" be free to trade with other countries and will have to listen to the EU "and we would almost certainly be outvoted endlessly" #bbcsp pic.twitter.com/7rRJ1T07cm
— BBC Daily Politics and Sunday Politics (@daily_politics) February 25, 2018
SS: This controversial amendment that Anna Soubry and others have put down – is there really that much space between you and [their] objectives?
IDS: …It depends on what the detail is, but the reality is, the government set its heart, quite rightly, on having a proper free trade arrangement. Now of course, you can describe a free trade arrangement in all sorts of different ways, but a free trade arrangement is about us having a clear ability to sell our goods into the European Union, and them to sell to us without any artificial tariff barriers between the two of us and that will require… customs arrangements. The big difference though, between having a customs union, and being outside with a free trade arrangement, is that we are then free to make trade arrangements with America, Australia, India, wherever we want to – where 90% of the growth is in the global economy in the next few years – we’ll be free to do that. If we’re in a customs union, you agree not to do that, and therefore we’d have to listen to what the European Union says, and we would almost certainly be outvoted endlessly. So this is about where does the power lie to make those agreements?
On the prospect of Conservative rebels joining forces with the Labour party to defeat the government, Duncan smith warned that Conservative backbenchers should ‘just be very careful on this one because you are being invited into a Labour Party tactical game which will actually end up in real damage to the United Kingdom’.
Michael Wolff – Tony Blair is ‘a complete liar’
And finally, the author of ‘Fire and Fury’, the controversial book chronicling President Donald Trump’s first year in the White House, has labeled the former Prime Minister Tony Blair a ‘complete liar’ for saying that he did not ‘suck up’ to the President’s nephew Jared Kushner in order to secure a prestigious role working on the peace process in the Middle East. Wolff insisted to Andrew Marr that his version of events was the correct one:
AM: Tony Blair was absolutely outraged about what you said about him trying to get a job as part of the Middle East Quartet.
MW: I sat in the White House on the couch listening – I wasn’t supposed to overhear this, but they were standing right there – with Tony Blair and Jared Kushner standing, not 15 feet in front of me, with Tony Blair – let me choose my words carefully – sucking up to Jared Kushner.
AM: He says and I quote ‘This story is a completely fabrication, literally form beginning to end. I have never had such conversation in the White House, outside the White House with Jared Kushner, or anybody else’. So he’s lying, you’re saying?
MW: Then I have to say Tony Blair is a complete liar… In this instance, absolutely.
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