Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond walks on to the stage before delivering his keynote address at the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham, Britain, October 1, 2018. REUTERS/Toby Melville

BIRMINGHAM, England (Reuters) - British finance minister Philip Hammond said on Monday the government would prove the European Union was wrong to dismiss Britain’s plans for Brexit as unworkable.

“Mr Tusk says it won’t work,” Hammond said, referring to Donald Tusk, the head of the European Council, which groups the bloc’s national leaders.

“But that’s what people said about the light bulb in 1878. Our job is to prove him wrong,” Hammond said in a speech to his Conservative Party’s annual conference.