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In an interview with Bloomberg this week, Liam Fox said he supports Prime Minister Theresa May’s blueprint for close trade ties with the EU -- despite having “reservations.” Getting Brexit done is the priority, he said, because not implementing the referendum result would be disastrous for British politics.
“We must leave, and we must leave on the 29th of March -- not to deliver Brexit is the greatest political risk we could run,” said Fox, a longstanding euroskeptic who campaigned in 2016 for Britain’s exit from the bloc. “We should try to get as much of a final deal as we can get by the 29th of March, but it’s self-evident that if it’s a bilateral treaty, it can be revised later on.”
Fox’s endorsement of May’s plan -- and his appeal for pragmatism -- will help the premier as she battles to contain a backlash from passionately pro-Brexit politicians in her Conservative Party. Negotiations with the EU are in the final stages with less than six months before Britain’s scheduled departure, though May has signaled she’ll need to make more compromises to get a deal done.
Some Tory rebels already feel May’s gone too far to accommodate European demands and is betraying their vision of a clean break from the EU. Senior Cabinet members Boris Johnson and David Davis quit her government in protest in July, and hardliners in her party say the prime minister could be toppled or face more resignations if she goes any further.
Fox warned that Brexit itself would be at risk without compromise.
“We all had our own reservations about it, but that is the collective decision,” he said. “Whilst I may be very sympathetic with those who take an ideologically purist position, we are also politicians whose job is to be able to deliver.” [...]