“So we do not seek membership of the single market”.
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Acknowledging some of the rhetoric presented during the referendum campaign on controlling immigration from the European Union, she added: “I know that you can not control immigration overall when there is free movement to Britain from Europe”.
May will say she wants Britain to be a “magnet for worldwide talent”, and a “great, global trading nation” that reaches beyond Europe to build relationships with other countries around the world. May said she wants the “the greatest possible access to [the single market] through a new, comprehensive, bold and ambitious Free Trade Agreement”. “We’ll continue to take decisions in an orderly manner, but I’m not prepared to allow Scotland’s interests to be steamrollered”. “Not partial membership of the European Union, associate membership of the European Union, or anything that leaves us half-in, half-out”.
He added: “I think we have to have a deal that ensures we have access to the market – we have British jobs dependent on that market – that’s what we’ll be pushing for”. “It is not the means that matter, but the ends”.
Theresa May is to give further details of her plans for Brexit in a speech in which she will declare she doesn’t want the United Kingdom left “half-in, half-out” of the European Union.
“No deal at all will be better than a bad deal”, stated May in her first definitive announcement about the conditions to be sought in the upcoming negotiations between London and Brussels.
The pound, which had fallen in advance of the speech, later recovered.
In an attempt to symbolise the UK’s outward-facing aspirations, May spoke before an audience of British civil servants and global diplomats at London’s Lancaster House, a Georgian mansion that has hosted worldwide summits. Britain would still leave within two years unless all 27 European Union member states agreed to extend the deadline.
The problems encountered with drawing up the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership between the European Union and the United States suggest this process could be slow and cumbersome.
“Ireland’s key priorities remain: economy and trade, common travel area, Northern Ireland (peace process) and the future of Europe”.
The main points of what she had to say appeared on the front pages today since Downing Street leaked the outline to political correspondents yesterday.
“Should it become apparent that you can get full access to the single market even if you can choose certain things then we risk that every country cherry-picks”, said German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a Monday night speech to business leaders. “I believe others will leave”.
Under EU rules Britain can not sign trade deals with third party states until it is formally outside the bloc, a position that does not change despite voting to leave.
The markets reacted positively to her long-awaited speech detailing her 12 priorities for the forthcoming Brexit talks, with the pound rising by nearly three per cent against the dollar.
But she warned European Union leaders that she would walk away from talks rather than sign up to a “punitive” divorce agreement as the price of Britain’s departure from the bloc.
With Theresa May opting to give her speech in the grand settings of Lancaster House rather than the Commons, it fell on David Davis to face anxious MPs in the House.
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“The message from the public before and during the referendum campaign was clear”, she said.
