The big Brexit crunch meeting at Chequers isn’t until Friday but already Tory civil war is breaking out into the open. The divisions in the Conservative party on Brexit had previously been confined to a couple of spats on Twitter. Not any longer if today’s Daily Politics bust-up between Ed Vaizey and Owen Paterson is anything to go on. While Tory MPs who appear alongside each other on TV can usually be relied on to back each up, it seems that when it comes to Brexit, these rules don’t apply:
Paterson: “You cannot dismiss the election and neither can the Labour party. Theresa May, forget the seats, she got the second largest number of votes since John Major. There was a vote strongly to endorse the referendum result” Vaizey: “50 per cent of this country voted to stay in the European Union, so we can all look at election results…it is a complete bit of sophistry. What are you going to tell people when it costs them their jobs, this Hard Brexit?” Paterson: “…If we don’t deliver what was voted for in the referendum and the general election, there will be massive disillusion. Senior economists see an 8 per cent reduction in cost of living, a £2,300 bonus to every family in this country. It is complete rubbish all this Project Fear.”
It’s only Tuesday, and the knives already appear to be coming out: Mr. S is holding his breath for more to come…
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