Scotland UKIP Leader: We Have Saga of PM Who Deep Down Doesn't Want to Leave EU

Leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, has written to the prime minister, offering to throw Labour’s support behind her Brexit deal if she makes five legally binding commitments – including joining a customs union with EU. Sputnik spoke about it to the Leader of UKIP Scotland Donald MacKay.
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Sputnik: Theresa May is travelling to Brussels today to seek a breakthrough on her Brexit deal after Labour ditched commitments to stay outside of a customs union with the EU post-Brexit. How significant is all this and will Theresa May be successful?

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Donald MacKay: I would take the view which I think would be consistent with other people in our party that there is a kind of elaborate charade going on trying to get a deal from people who have no interest in giving us a deal and that the best way forward should be and still could be, to repeal the European Communities Act 1972 and just leave; but instead of which we have this long drawn saga of a prime minister who deep down doesn't really want to leave the EU, trying to negotiate a deal with people who have a vested interest in making sure we don't get an attractive deal and that's where all the news content sort of revolves around.

So are these developments significant in the sense that they may be an attempt to stop Brexit from happening at all then yes… significant in the same side of the positive? Well, I have grave doubts I don't doubt the possibility that there may be something comes out of this which would be which would be Brexit, but as I say the EU cannot possibly allow Britain to leave the EU on anything like favourable terms because we didn't have a queue at the door from other countries wanting to do exactly the same thing. They are trying to make it as difficult as possible and the UK Government is basically making it easy for them.

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Sputnik: You mentioned there Brexit potentially could be averted or cancelled… What effect will this a backtrack from Labour today surrounding the Customs Union have on Brexit

Donald MacKay: Well, I would suspect that if the game is finished, whenever that is, we will either have a Brexit that's not really a Brexit or actually we be still in the EU. Labour's change is kind of going down that road. There may be internal problems within the Labour Party with people who don't like this sort of move but the overwhelming majority of the political establishment in the UK want basically to stay in the EU and whenever they say anything or wherever the proposed anything it's all basically designed to make sure that we don't really leave the EU. I think that hence my reference to an elaborate game — this is not in a way difficult. There are people within my own party who have discussed this in detail and whose advice I'm sure would be readily available to people if they wish it. If we're leaving this, then let's just leave, just get out.

We're perfectly capable of resolving any of those matters in our own time but when we start talking about presenting cases like old customs union and single markets and we're all going to starve and our hospitals will not have medicines… this is all tactics being used to imply that a country like Great Britain is going to sink beneath the waves if we don't embrace and that is complete nonsense. The media I'm afraid is largely to blame for this.

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I'm astonished at the kind of quality of reporting wherever things presented in a very negative light; we are perfectly capable of arranging your own trade deals of manufacturing our own goods and services and we don't need the rules and the regulations of the EU to do that. We manage to stagger along until 1972 without any help from these people whatsoever and while it is always a good idea to leave on a basis that creates the least inconvenience and disruption to our citizens, I think that this is no being used as a lever to try and ensure that breaks it doesn't really happen in the first place.

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Sputnik: On the subject of a no deal, it's an option that's been discussed a lot amongst the British population with recent polling still showing that a No Deal Brexit is the preferred choice of exit for the UK… with this in mind, is a no deal an option that should that be considered by the government?

Donald MacKay: Absolutely definitely. I think this has all been misreported because I would like people to categorically state the actual danger of no deal. I mean by that not people vaguely saying we won't have this and we won't have that but what physically will we be unable to do that we currently can do and that there's likely to be some measure of teething problems is not in dispute, but let's not elevate those into some kind of national crisis and that's what the media afraid of doing and as a result of which the public or becoming alarmed when we perfectly capable of governing ourselves, perfectly capable of continuing as we do at the moment, and ideally, of course, it would be better to come to some arrangement with the EU but in the absence of any goodwill to do that, then no deal option should certainly be on the cards.

The views expressed in this article are those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.

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