Author Archives: johnredwood

It is open to backbenchers and members of the public to be as critical of Mrs May’s plan as we like and to propose an alternative. Those MPs who decide to stay in the Cabinet have to defend Mrs May’s position, which is her deal is the only proposal worth considering. This early move in […]

Ministers fanned out yesterday to spread gloom and doom around the country about what will happen if we just leave next March. It was a poor version of Project Fear, without even any novelty to amuse connoisseurs of this most popular political genre. We were told that the ports will jammed by our own Customs […]

Almost two and a half years have now passed since the people spoke in the referendum. It was the largest democratic vote in our history. The people voted in very large numbers to take back control of our laws, our money and our borders, and to reclaim the lost sovereignty of the United Kingdom electorate. […]

I was not present at the meeting I read about between the ERG and the Chief Whip as I was speaking on the advantages of leaving when the meeting was said to have taken place. It is quite clear there is no UK Parliamentary fix that the government could offer to make the Agreement acceptable. […]

This is how my pamphlet begins roughly like this: Let us make 29 March 2019 our Independence day. We should be proud of our democratic past and confident about our democratic future. Restoring the right to govern ourselves is not a threat but a promise. It is not a problem but a whole host of […]

Parliament was told on Monday that the Speaker will accept votes on up to six amendments to the government’s motion to approve its EU Withdrawal Agreement. The official Opposition has already tabled an amendment that declines to approve the Agreement and asks for customs union and single market membership. This is very likely to be […]

Leaving without an Agreement looks more likely given the bad response of most MPs to the proposed Withdrawal Agreement and delayed exit. So let’s make the most of the money, the freedoms and the opportunities leaving brings. More than half the voters expect things to get better when we leave, and so they can. That […]

It is normally right for the government to withhold its legal advice from freedom of information requests or Parliamentary questions. Where the government is pursuing a court action to collect more tax or prosecute some criminal or to justify its actions, it should keep its own legal advice to itself to give it the best […]