DOMINIC Raab has told the SNP Westminster leader that the UK Government has “no intention” of extending its Brexit transition period deadline because of the coronavirus crisis.
Standing in for Boris Johnson at PMQs today, Raab was asked about the plan to leave the EU officially at the end of the year.
Ian Blackford expressed concern that ministers are “threatening to isolate our economy” at the end of the December after the UK goes through economic turmoil as the result of the virus crisis.
'Why is the government threatening to isolate our economy at the end of the year during the biggest economic crisis of our time.'
— ITV News (@itvnews) April 29, 2020
Ian Blackford says we are just two months away from the deadline of approving a deadline to Brexit negotiations https://t.co/b77DpE18B2 pic.twitter.com/h7rj7sOxzP
He said: “Michel Barnier has been clear, the UK is refusing to engage seriously on a number of fundamental issues. The Government is shamefully gambling our economic future with a No-Deal Brexit in the middle of a health emergency.”
'Why is the Government threatening to isolate our economy at the end of the year during the biggest economic crisis of our time?”
Raab said the UK Government did not plan to extend the Brexit transition period any further than is already enshrined in law.
He replied: “I’m not sure I’d be quite taking the word of Michel Barnier for the state of progress in the negotiations quite as readily and as uncritically as the honourable gentleman has. But let’s be very clear about it, our position is unchanged, the transition period ends on December 31, that is enshrined in law there’s no intention of changing that.
“And actually what we should do now given the uncertainty and the problems and the challenges coronavirus has highlighted for us but also for our European friends, and I’ve worked extremely closely with our German French and all of our other European partners, is focus on removing any additional uncertainty, doing a deal by the end of the year and allowing both the UK and the European Union and all of its member states to bounce back as we come through the coronavirus.”
READ MORE: Ian Blackford urges Boris Johnson to back Brexit talks extension
Blackford, the MP for Ross, Skye and Lochaber, has been a vocal critic of the UK Government’s intention to leave the EU as planned in the middle of an unprecedented global crisis.
Writing to the Prime Minister earlier this week, Blackford called for an end to the “foolish and irresponsibility” of attempting to negotiate an entirely new relationship with the EU at this time.
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