PM says UK will not keep ‘bits of EU membership’ despite threat of second independence referendum

Theresa May has given her clearest signal yet that Britain will leave the single market when it leaves the European Union, despite a renewed vow from Nicola Sturgeon that a so-called hard Brexit would force a second independence referendum.

The prime minister said in her first interview of 2017 that she was not interested in keeping “bits of membership of the EU” and indicated that regaining control of immigration policy in the Brexit negotiations – a demand incompatible with single market membership – would be a priority.

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She was speaking only an hour after Scotland’s first minister used a separate interview to say that she was not bluffing about holding a second independence referendum in the event of Scotland being taken out of the single market, adding she was not prepared to see “Scotland driven off a hard Brexit cliff edge”.

May’s comments came as the case for a hard Brexit was strengthened by the publication of a report from the rightwing thinktank Civitas that argued that even if Britain failed to get a trade deal with the EU and had to operate under World Trade Organisation terms, it would not lose out.

British exporters would face having tariffs worth £5bn imposed on their goods, Civitas said. But it said the government would raise £13bn from tariffs on imports which could fund an industrial strategy that would boost the manufacturing sector.

The prime minister’s renewed insistence that taking control of immigration policy will be non-negotiable suggests that the repeated calls from Scotland, the business community and pro-European MPs for staying in the single market are falling on deaf ears.

Breaking with precedent to give her new year interview to Sky’s new talkshow, Sophy Ridge on Sunday, instead of to the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, May rejected the claim from Sir Ivan Rogers – who resigned as Britain’s ambassador to the EU last week – that the government’s thinking on Brexit was muddled. “Our thinking on this isn’t muddled at all,” she said.

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“Often people talk in terms as if somehow we are leaving the EU but we still want to kind of keep bits of membership of the EU. We are leaving. We are coming out. We are not going to be a member of the EU any longer,” she said. “We will be able to have control of our borders, control of our laws.”

EU leaders have repeatedly said that if Britain refuses to accept the free movement of EU workers, it will no longer be able to enjoy membership of the single market and the tariff-free trade that entails. But May hinted that she thought EU countries might still be willing to allow the UK tariff-free access to the single market because it would be in their interests.

“Anybody who looks at this question of free movement and trade as a sort of zero sum game is approaching it in the wrong way,” she said.

“I’m ambitious for what we can get for the UK in terms of our relationship with the European Union because I also think that’s going to be good for the European Union.”



Sturgeon is so determined to keep Scotland in the single market, even if the rest of the UK leaves, that she published a detailed plan before Christmas setting out how this might be achieved. On the Andrew Marr show she said the UK government would be “making a very big mistake if they think I’m in any way bluffing” about holding a second independence vote just as the UK quit the EU.

“I’m not going to sit back while Scotland is driven off a hard Brexit cliff edge with all the implications for jobs and the type of country we are that that would have,” she added.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Nicola Sturgeon told the Andrew Marr show she was ‘not bluffing’ about holding a second vote on Scottish independence. Photograph: BBC

She said her plan would allow May to honour her promise to English voters to quit the EU while allowing Scotland to keep the closer ties it voted for in the June referendum. It would mirror the deal being discussed to ensure open borders between the UK and Ireland post-Brexit, she added.



Sturgeon also hinted that she envisaged staging a snap independence vote within the two year deadline set by the EU once the UK triggers article 50 in March. But she refused to set out a clear timetable or deadline on a decision to stage a new vote.



With Scotland’s economy now far weaker than before the 2014 independence referendum, Sturgeon’s opponents believe she is using the threat of a second vote to press for far greater powers for the Scottish parliament as well as to placate her supporters.



Sturgeon indicated on the Andrew Marr show that the SNP’s core message during a referendum would be the divisive prospect of Scotland’s fate being determined by rightwing Tories ruling from London for the next 20 years.



“If we’re in a position where we’ve a UK prime minister saying no compromise, Scotland just has to shut up and like it or lump it, then the question for Scotland – and it’s a much more fundamental question than just the EU or Brexit – is are we happy with that?

“Are we happy to have no voice in the UK, do we simply have to accept the direction of travel that an increasingly rightwing UK government wants to impose upon us?”