Tag: legal risk

Reaction to May deal ahead of vote Has anything changed in the Brexit deal? In his advice, Mr Cox said the extra assurances won by Mrs May in 11th hour talks with the EU "reduce the risk that the United Kingdom could be indefinitely and involuntarily detained" in the backstop if talks on the two sides future relationship broke down due to "bad faith" by the EU. And he said "the legal risk remains unchanged" that if no such agreement can be reached due to "intractable differences", the UK would have "no internationally lawful means" of leaving the backstop without EU agreement. In a statement to the Commons, Mr Cox later said: "Were such a situation to occur, let me make it clear, the legal risk as I set it out in my letter of November 13 remains unchanged." And ERG chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg said: "The unilateral declaration doesn't add anything because it simply says 'we could ask to leave the backstop'. A "joint legally binding instrument" on the withdrawal agreement which the UK could use to start a "formal dispute" against the EU if it tried to keep the UK tied into the backstop indefinitely. The extra assurances wrought from weeks of talks with the EU will move some of the prime minister's objectors from the "no" column to the "yes". The EU warns 'this is it' The UK is set to leave the EU on 29 March 2019 after voting to leave by nearly 52% to 48% - 17.4m votes to 16.1m - in 2016. Mr Juncker has warned MPs they would be putting everything at risk if they voted down the deal. "In politics sometimes you get a second chance," he said.