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Henry Smith

Crawley MP asks Prime Minister to confirm if she will rule out a delay of Brexit

In Prime Ministers Questions yesterday, Henry Smith MP took a stand and asked Theresa May to clarify the governments position.

Published

2 years ago

on

Taking a dig at the recent overheard conversation within a bar from a the PM’s chief negotiator, Crawley MP Henry Smith yesterday in PMQ’s asked the PM to confirm her position over and planned request for a delay on Brexit.

Mr Smith said:

“Not withstanding Brussels bar room chatter, will the Prime Minister rule out a delay of Brexit beyond March 29th?”

He then went on to also ask:

“Will she also rule out a future customs union arrangement which would prevent us doing those global trade deals which the Bank of England governor says is a potential golden age of trade?”

It was a very direct series of questions considering how explosive the ‘overheard’ comments had been across the media.

The Prime Minister responded saying:

“The governments been very clear that we want to have that independent trade policy.

I’m grateful that he asked me that question rather than relying on what someone said to someone else as overheard by someone else in a bar.

It’s very clear, the governments position is the same, we triggered article 50, in-fact this house voted to trigger Article 50, that had a 2 year timeline, that ends on the 29th March, we want to end with a deal and that’s what we are working for.”

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Henry Smith

Henry Smith MP: Brexit and a vaccine

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2 weeks ago

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7th January 2021

By

In his article this week, Crawley MP Henry Smith talks about Brexit and the new Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.

As the UK entered the New Year it did so having finally delivered what Crawley and the country voted for in the Brexit referendum almost half a decade previously.

Last week I voted for the European Union (Future Relationship) Act which allows the British Government to implement and ratify the agreements secured between the UK and the EU.

With no role for the European Court of Justice and no requirements for the UK to continue to follow EU law, and no more payments of billions of pounds to Brussels, we fulfil one of the key aims of Brexit, which is to secure this country’s political and economic independence. This means, of course, that our laws are determined by elected politicians in the United Kingdom who are accountable to the British people.

Britain’s commitment to maintaining high labour, environment and climate standards now ensure we do not give the EU any say over our rules.

In areas such as the living wage, entitlements to sick pay, parental leave and annual leave, UK policy already goes further than EU requirements.

The Future Relationship Act represents the largest free trade agreement in history, not only allowing the UK full access to the EU but also the ability to strike trade deals globally, following recent agreements already signed with countries including Japan, Canada and Turkey.

Looking ahead to 2021; it is welcome that the start of the year has seen the roll-out of the UK-developed University of Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccination.

On Monday the NHS began administering over half a million doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, with 100 million doses secured in total. This is part of a national vaccination programme alongside the Pfizer/BioNTech jab, which has already seen more people inoculated in the UK than the rest of Europe put together. Indeed Great Britain was first globally by several weeks in delivering COVID-19 vaccines to its citizens.

The Government’s plan to roll out vaccinations as swiftly as possible is well underway, with 1,000 vaccination sites up and running by the end of the week.

With this further welcome news on the vaccine we can see an end to the blight of Covid in sight. These are still challenging times but global Britain will deliver in 2021.

Henry Smith MP
Crawley Constituency

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