After her Brexit plan was rejected at last week’s EU summit in Salzburg, Prime Minister Theresa May has been facing renewed pressure from Cabinet ministers and prominent backbenchers to give up on her Chequers blueprint and seek a looser free trade deal with Brussels.
Axar.az informs citing Sputnik.
Brexiteers are pushing for a clean split from the European Union, a move some Cabinet ministers fear could precipitate the country’s breakup and effectively place a border between Britain and Northern Ireland putting the latter “in the departure lounge from the UK,” The Guardian wrote.
Some also fear that the move could reignite the debate about Scotland’s place in the UK and further unravel the union.
“Nobody voted Brexit to break up the UK,” one minister said. “Those advocating [the free trade deal] approach need to face up to the consequences for the union,” another said.
Since EU leader turned Theresa May’s Chequers deal during their summit in Salzburg last week, has been building once again among some prominent Tories behind the idea of securing a free trade deal, similar to that given to Canada.
The impasse has led senior Tories to compare the situation it to the 1956 Suez crisis that destroyed Anthony Eden’s premiership with a major Tory donor warning that “this will accelerate business concern even further. This ends up with us suffering a series of quite cataclysmic events."
“It is like the Suez crisis. You just don’t know what the unintended consequences will be. The next three weeks could change everything. The Suez crisis went on for months and this is up there with some of the great turning points in British political history,” he said.
Some Tory aides are worried about the lack of support for May’s Brexit roadmap and fear that another snap election may be needed before the end of the year.
On Wednesday and Thursday, EU heads of state and government gathered for an informal meeting in the Austrian city of Salzburg.
During the talks, May presented her Brexit plan to other EU leaders who characterized it as unworkable.
With the Brexit deadline now less than 200 days away, the two sides are yet to reach a divorce deal with officials increasingly expecting an informal October deadline to slip into November.