Select Committee
Parliament

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Conservative MP Sir Bill Cash asks Philip Hammond whether he agrees Westminster would have "sovereign control" to diverge from EU legislation in the area of financial services after Brexit.

He also asks how the UK government would react if the EU passes laws that would "adversely" affect the UK financial services industry during the proposed transition period.

He mentions, by way of example, continued efforts from some states to bring in an financial transactions tax.

The Chancellor replies that "clearly" Parliament will be arbiter of "all decisions" about the UK's future relationship with the EU.

However, he says this might be achieved through a "framework" rather than making a "parliamentary decision" in every case.

He adds that the "relatively slow pace" of EU lawmaking "works in our favour".

He adds that it is "quite unlikely" that new laws will actually come into force during the transition that the UK has not been able to "shape" during its membership.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour MP Stella Creasy notes that her fellow London MP, Iain Duncan Smith, said earlier that "cake is meant to be eaten and cherries are meant to be picked".

Continuing with the confectionery metaphors, the Labour MP tells the House: "However sweet it seems, fudge is no way to run the country."

House of Lords
Parliament

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Government spokesman Lord Keen of Elie resists the need for an amendment that would require ministers to report on ways in which the rights afforded by EU family law continue to exist in domestic law.

He argues that all the UK can do is pursue "reasonable alignment as the basis for reciprocity", pointing out that the government can try to encourage reciprocity but it can't legislate for it.

When it comes to those affected by offences under family law, he assures peers "nobody's going to turn their back on them" and this area is "critically important".

House of Lords
Parliament

Conservative Lord Farmer is the first peer to speak against the amendment seeking reports on how rights arising from EU family law will be protected, arguing that "perfectly adequate and satisfactory" protection is provided by the Hague convention.

He says it would amount to "continued membership of EU family law", which is not being sought in any other area and could lead to calls for other areas of EU law to apply to the UK.

He calls the amendment "presumptuous" and "arbitrary".

House of Lords
Parliament

Image source, HoL

Meanwhile, in the House of Lords, peers are getting stuck into day four of the committee-stage debate on the EU Withdrawal Bill.

The former president of the Family Division of the High Court of Justice and crossbencher Baroness Butler-Sloss says she's "dismayed by the inadequacy" of how the bills deals with family law.

She gives the example of domestic violence injunctions made in the UK which won't apply in EU countries.

She goes on to say she can understand people's wish to be rid of EU law where it is substantive but that EU family law is procedural, and it is "profoundly unjust" to leave UK citizens without recourse to that procedure.

House of Commons
Parliament

Tory MP Peter Bone says the UK is leaving the "dreadful European Union superstate" and reckons Theresa May is the first Conservative prime minister who has managed to "unite these benches on Europe".

Theresa May says she is "pleased that these benches are united".

There are some noises of scepticism emanating from some other benches.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour backbencher Peter Kyle asks whether the prime minister will publish "the legal text of her negotiating stance" following the EU's legal draft last week.

Theresa May says the EU document is "not a legal text on their negotiations" but on the withdrawal agreement.

The UK government has set out its proposals and "we now wait for the response", she adds.

House of Commons
Parliament

A Conservative MP George Freeman says the prime minister confirmed in her speech last Friday that there "will be no hard Brexit, only hard choices".

House of Commons
Parliament

"This time last year she promised that we would have the same benefits in terms of access to free trade," says Labour MP Chris Leslie of the prime minister.

"Does she regret that?" he asks.

The PM says the UK will "be achieving the benefits" of trade with the EU, "sometimes in different ways".

Select Committee
Parliament

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Over on the committee corridor, Brexit ruminations continue as Chancellor Philip Hammond appears before MPs on the European Scrutiny Committee.

The session is expected to cover the Brexit divorce bill, the transitional period and the future of financial services trade after the UK has left the EU.

Earlier in the Commons debate this afternoon, Theresa May said the Chancellor would be setting out more detail on plans for financial services "later this week".

The committee will also be taking evidence from Mark Bowman, a official who leads the Treasury's relationship with EU bodies.

House of Commons
Parliament

A Conservative Bernard Jenkin says the prime minister's speech last Friday was "a calm speech that has been widely welcomed".

He adds: "We owe it to her to get behind her."

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour's Kate Hoey urges the prime minister to read a "very good report" from an EU committee about the Irish border., external

Ms Hoey says the issue can be solved by "innovative technology and so on".

Theresa May says she is aware of the report and will encourage her officials to read it.

House of Commons
Parliament

DUP MP Emma Little-Pengelly says the prime minister has been right to oppose what she sees as "disgraceful EU attempts to interfere" in the UK.

She calls for no additional barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.

Theresa May agrees and also says she looks forward to talks with the EU and Republic of Ireland on the future of the Irish border.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour backbencher Pat McFadden says the prime minister's speech represented a "public burial" of claims by Brexit Secretary David Davis that the UK could secure the exact same benefits that it enjoyed while in the EU.

He asks what the economic cost of leaving is, when the public will be told and who will pay it.

"Life is going to be different in the future," replies Theresa May, "because we'll have a different relationship with the European Union".

She says the government is working on getting the best possible trade deal with the EU and other countries around the world, to build a Britain that is "fit for the future".

House of Commons
Parliament

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Conservative Eurosceptic backbencher Jacob Rees-Mogg asks the prime minister whether she now expects a better response from the EU after the "generous offer" of the plan in her speech.

He accuses the European Commission of "aggression" and a "high-handed" attitude for having suggested in the draft of a withdrawal agreement that Northern Ireland could follow EU rules as a backstop option to prevent a hard border.

Such a situation would endanger the Conservatives' pact with the DUP and thus the future of the government, he adds.

In response, Theresa May says it was "absolutely right" for the government to have already said that such a proposal is "completely unacceptable".

House of Commons
Parliament

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable asks the prime minister what her "red lines" are in trade talks with President Trump, calling him "the economic nationalist and warmonger in the White House".

He asks if protecting the NHS will be one of the red lines.

The NHS will remain as it is today and "is not for sale", Theresa May insists.

House of Commons
Parliament

European Scrutiny Committee chair Sir Bill Cash asks whether the "continuous unprincipled reversals" of Labour's policy on Brexit "betrays" their voters and the country.

Theresa May agrees with him, and says that if Labour was to keep the UK in the single market and customs union, they would be going against what people had voted for.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour chair of the Home Affairs Committee, Yvette Cooper says Theresa May has proposed that, in Ireland, 80 per cent of businesses will be exempt from any border checks.

She goes on to tell Mrs May that there are "links between smuggler groups and paramilitary organisations" and asks why she is pursuing a customs union policy which has a "risk of increasing the smuggling and security threats".

House of Commons
Parliament

Tory MP Anna Soubry says the PM has been "frank about the complexity and economic consequences".

Ms Soubry adds that the process and the future relationship will incur "considerable administrative costs" and asks that MPs and voters are kept informed about these costs.

The PM says the chancellor has already announced that contingency money is being "set aside", adding that the government set up the Brexit department and the Department of International Trade.