Days before the second anniversary of the EU Referendum, Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Europe, Mark Isherwood AM, has urged politicians opposed to the United Kingdom leaving the EU to respect the wishes of Welsh and British voters and stop trying to undermine the Brexit process.
Speaking in this afternoon’s Assembly Debate, ‘The Second Anniversary of the EU Referendum’, Mr Isherwood said:
“In a joint Statement after the people of Wales and the UK voted to leave the EU on the 23rd June 2016, the Presidents of the European Commission, European Council and European Parliament said “we now expect the United Kingdom Government to give effect to this decision of the British people as soon as possible … we hope to have the UK as a close partner of the EU also in the future."
“Contrary to offensive claims repeatedly made here that the people did not know what they were voting for, the well-publicised arguments for Brexit at the time were all about taking back control of our money, borders, laws and trade.
“The Prime Minister has made it clear since that instead of hard Brexit, she seeks the greatest possible access to the EU through a new, comprehensive, bold and ambitious free trade agreement.
“In contrast, this Welsh Government motion asks us to support the approach endorsed by Welsh Labour and Plaid Cymru, which would deliver none of these things, and a Brexit in name only.
“Further, as I said here last month, the think tank ‘Open Europe’, told the (Assembly) External Affairs Committee in Brussels “it would be strange if the UK was in the Customs Union. The EU would negotiate trade agreements with third parties without the UK at the table” – and “If the UK is in the Single Market, it would have to accept all the rules without being able to vote on them”.
“Whilst claiming to respect the Referendum result, both the Labour Welsh Government and Plaid Cymru have spent the last two years preaching doom and gloom whilst promoting approaches that would undermine it.”
“They claimed that the agreement secured by the UK Government last December enabling both sides to move on to the next phase of Brexit talks would never happen, that the Brexit transition period secured by the UK Government would never be agreed – before then taking credit for it – and that a way forward allowing this Assembly to give legislative consent to the UK Withdrawal Bill would never be secured. Each time they were wrong – and yet they are now doing it again as they seek to undermine current negotiations on the UK’s future relationship with the EU, by giving away all our negotiating cards at the outset and incentivising the EU side to drive a hard bargain.
“Our amendment 1 therefore “recognises that the UK Government is delivering on the decision made in the EU referendum to leave the EU and that its position in negotiations with the EU should not be undermined”.
He added: “Labour’s position would mean continuing to follow a swathe of EU rules with absolutely no say in them.
“This breaks Labour’s Brexit promises and does not respect the referendum result. Seventy per cent of Labour constituencies voted Leave and they want to see the result of the referendum honoured.
“People outside Parliaments across the UK are getting a little tired of parliamentary games. They want to know when they’re going to get Brexit, when it will be delivered and when it will be done.”