Sturgeon calls on May to clarify Brexit transition deal
Nicola Sturgeon has demanded that Theresa May urgently clarify her plans for a Brexit transition deal, saying she is deeply concerned that businesses will soon start implementing contingency plans that would be “deeply damaging” for the Scottish economy.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Scotland’s first minister said she was sending a letter to Mrs May asking whether the UK government was working to secure a transition deal maintaining current EU rules for at least two years by the end of the year.
Ms Sturgeon has long opposed Britain leaving the EU, but she insisted that her intervention was not an attempt to obstruct its departure. She said she was motivated to write the letter after hearing directly and indirectly of numerous companies who say they will need to act soon to mitigate the related risks.
“There is a growing sense on the part of people I speak to, particularly across the business community, of a ‘five minutes to midnight’ kind of situation,” Ms Sturgeon said.
“I really fear that if there is not clarity on a transition period by the turn of the year, then we will start to see really regrettable things happening.”
Ms Sturgeon declined to name companies that are rethinking expanding their operations in Scotland, or considering moving elsewhere. But her letter to the prime minister echoes earlier warnings from leading business groups that failure to secure an early transition deal could cause a destructive fall in investment across the UK.
Mrs May suggested on Monday that a transition deal could be agreed only after Britain and the EU have agreed a deal on their future relationship, which is unlikely to happen until autumn 2018 at the earliest. But senior government officials insist Britain’s aim is to agree an “implementation period” early next year.
Scotland, which voted by 62 per cent to 38 per cent against Brexit in last year’s EU referendum, is seen as particularly vulnerable to the economic effects of leaving the EU, partly because relatively low population growth means the Scottish economy is more reliant on immigration.
Ms Sturgeon said Mrs May should confirm she wanted a two-year transition deal to be sealed by the end of 2017, and that this would not be contingent on agreement with the EU on future economic relations between Britain and the bloc.
“If she doesn’t know the answers to these questions . . . then that is deeply and profoundly concerning,” the first minister said.
She also raised the prospect of a constitutional crisis over Mrs May’s EU withdrawal legislation, which will give UK ministers powers over policy areas such as agriculture and fisheries — areas which were devolved from Westminster to Holyrood in 1999.
The UK government believes it should decide which powers to retain at Westminster in order to preserve the unity of the UK market and smooth future trade deals. But the Scottish government and the Labour administration in Wales say they will seek to deny “legislative consent” for the EU departure bill unless it is amended.
Legislative consent is normally required if Westminster seeks to pass laws on devolved matters, and some experts say failure to agree on the issue could lead to a constitutional crisis.
Ms Sturgeon said her government was considering passing legislation covering the contested areas in the Scottish parliament — raising the possibility that there could be contradictory laws emerging from Westminster and Holyrood.
“It’s not the desirable way of doing it,” she said, explaining her preferred outcome was that the UK legislation would be amended to meet Scottish and Welsh demands. “But if we have to, we will look at doing it through the alternative means,” she added.
Ms Sturgeon also said that while before June’s snap general election she had thought it was inevitable the UK would leave the EU, she now thinks there is a 10 to 15 per cent chance that the departure process — which she described as a “slow-motion car crash” — could be stopped.
“That possibility is there, if the alternative is going to be so devastatingly bad,” she said, adding that the Scottish National party’s 35 MPs would in the House of Commons continue to oppose leaving the EU.
While the SNP was not ready to call for a second referendum on EU membership, the argument for one might become “difficult to resist”, Ms Sturgeon added.
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