MPs WILL seek to bring forward legislation to stop Brexit this week, Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer has said.
He said the plan was to prevent the PM ‘from taking us out of the EU without a deal’ but he did not go into detail.
Cabinet minister Michael Gove refused to guarantee that the government would abide by it if it passed, saying: ‘Let’s see what the legislation says.’
The government is ‘not doing anything to facilitate a no deal’, he said.
Meanwhile, the EU’s lead Brexit negotiator has rejected Boris Johnson’s demands for the controversial Irish backstop to be scrapped.
The UK is due to leave the EU on 31st October, with or without a deal.
The prime minister says he is willing to leave without one ‘do or die’, rather than miss the deadline, which has prompted a number of opposition MPs to unite to try and block a possible no deal.
Starmer told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show: ‘The legislation is intended to ensure we don’t leave without a deal, that will require an extension.’
Labour’s shadow chancellor John McDonnell told Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday that plans to block a no-deal Brexit will be published tomorrow.
He said the ‘ultimate goal this week’ was to ‘ensure Parliament can have a final say’.
Gove told Andrew Marr: ‘We will see what the legislation says when it is put forward.’
Labour’s Starmer responded on Twitter, saying Gove’s response was ‘breathtaking’, adding: ‘No government is above the law.’
Any new law has to pass through all stages of both Houses of Parliament. This would usually take weeks, but Remainers say that it could be done in as little as three days this week.
In theory, the bill will be debated on Wednesday and must pass through all stages in the Commons.
If MPs passed the bill, it could then reach the House of Lords by Thursday, but consideration of the bill could spill into Monday. If the bill passes these hurdles it could gain Royal Assent, which formally makes it law.
This could be a tight timetable as there are as few as four sitting days before Parliament is suspended. This is due to happen between Monday, 9 September, and Thursday, 12 September, under plans announced by the prime minister.
