NICOLA Sturgeon has urged the UK Government to “end the sorry mess” over Brexit and call a second EU referendum to enable the process of leaving the EU to be halted.
The First Minister said Theresa May appears to have “given up” attempts to make a case for her “bad deal” on Brexit and warned it would not pass through the Commons.
Speaking at First Minister’s Questions, she said: “My position and view is very clear and I made this view clear to the Prime Minister yesterday in London.
“The Government should at this stage request an extension of Article 50. An extension would have to be agreed by the EU27, but it should do that to allow time for a second EU referendum and if the result of that referendum, as I hope it would be, is Remain – not just in Scotland but across the UK – then Article 50 can be revoked.
“We know from the recent ECJ court judgment that it is possible for the UK to retain membership on current terms, contrary to the false choice that’s been offered by the Prime Minster.
“She seems to me to have given up trying to make any positive case for her bad deal and instead, extraordinarily for a government leader, is threatening to impose the disaster of a no-deal outcome on people she is supposed to serve.
“I would call on the UK Government to start acting in the interests of the people it serves, ask for that extension, allow people to look at this again and, if people change their minds, to revoke Article 50 and end this sorry mess once and for all.”
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LibDem leader Willie Rennie exclaimed “hallelujah” at the SNP supporting a second EU referendum, or People’s Vote as it is known, on the Brexit deal, and asked how the Labour leadership could be convinced to support it too.
“The Prime Minister is indulging in a form of psychological no-deal warfare in a desperate gamble to revive her dead deal,” he said.
Commenting on a People’s Vote, Sturgeon replied: “I think momentum is building.”
Meanwhile, judges at Scotland’s highest civil court yesterday rubber-stamped a European Court of Justice (ECJ) decision allowing the UK to unilaterally revoke its withdrawal from the EU.
The Luxembourg court ruled last week that the UK can go back on its decision to trigger Article 50, which started the Brexit process, without the agreement of the other 27 EU member states. The ECJ found that if this does happen it must be decided following “democratic process”, and would mean the UK remains in the EU as a member state.
It referred the case back to the Court of Session in Edinburgh where a hearing before three judges took place yesterday, in which it approved the decision.
Scotland’s most senior judge Lord Carloway, the Lord President, said: “This court will grant a declarator which mirrors the decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union.”
The case was brought by a group of Scottish politicians, SNP MP Joanna Cherry and MEP Alyn Smith, Labour MEPs Catherine Stihler and David Martin, and Green MSPs Andy Wightman and Ross Greer, together with lawyer Jolyon Maugham QC, director of the Good Law Project. It was originally heard in the Court of Session and two attempts by the UK Government to appeal against the referral to the European court were rejected.
In a statement following its ruling on December 10, the ECJ said: “The full court has ruled that, when a member state has notified the European Council of its intention to withdraw from the European Union, as the UK has done, that member state is free to revoke unilaterally that notification. That possibility exists for as long as a withdrawal agreement concluded between the EU and that member state has not entered into force or, if no such agreement has been concluded, for as long as the two-year period from the date of the notification of the intention to withdraw from the EU, and any possible extension, has not expired.”
It added: “The revocation must be decided following a democratic process in accordance with national constitutional requirements.”
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The UK Government has stressed it has no plans to revoke Article 50. It has been ordered to pay £105,000 in legal fees after losing its case.
Speaking outside the court, Greer said the team of politicians had “opened up another avenue in the Brexit process”.
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