Thousands are marching for a second vote on Brexit two years since the Leave campaign’s victory in the 2016 referendum, as it emerged EU bosses are planning to stop recognising UK qualifications for hundreds of UK jobs in a ‘no-deal’ Brexit scenario.
The European Commission has said a directive which accepts qualifications for professions including dance teachers, doctors and gas engineers will expire if there is no withdrawal agreement.
The move would hit those scheduled to complete their training after the UK’s exit, the document said.
It came as anti-Brexit protesters marched through central London today to call for a fresh vote on the final terms and Boris Johnson warned the government against a ‘bog-roll Brexit.
Thousands of people march in central London on the second anniversary of the EU referendum to call for a public vote on the final terms of the deal
An EU memorandum said: ‘All persons who need recognition of their professional qualifications with a view to access a regulated profession are reminded of legal repercussions.
‘Subject to any transitional arrangement that may be contained in a possible withdrawal agreement, as of the withdrawal date, the EU rules in the field of recognition of professional qualifications no longer apply to the United Kingdom.’
The 2005 directive, which would expire without an agreement, covers regulated professions including medicine and finance.
Social workers, pharmacists, paediatricians and IT technicians are also among those on a long list of affected industries.
It came as thousands of EU supporters gathered in central London on Saturday to call on the British government to hold a final public vote on the terms of Brexit.
The ‘People’s Vote’ campaign, which includes several pro-EU groups, aims to ensure a public ballot ‘so that we can decide if a decision that will affect our lives for generations makes the country better or worse off’.
The marchers took to the streets of London to protest two years after the EU referendum
Gina Miller, who fought a legal case insisting that Parliament should vote on Article 50, takes part in the demonstration in central London two years since the referendum
Crowds gather on Pall Mall in London during the People’s Vote march for a second EU vote
Pro-EU demonstrators march two years to the day since Leave’s victory in the referendum
Actor Sir Tony Robinson attends the march demanding a vote on the final Brexit deal
Pro-EU demonstrators including Sir Tony Robinson march at the ‘People’s Vote’ demonstration
Matthew Mann, from south Gloucestershire, who moved to the Netherlands in 2016 for work, said: ‘I’m here to show what a European looks like.’
The IT consultant said: ‘I’m married to a French wife, I have two children who are dual national, and we live in Holland and are caught up in this administrative mess.
‘I have lived and worked across Europe, it’s home.’
University academic Robert Brady, 62, who works in the computer science department, said: ‘I have an Italian wife, I work in Cambridge, she works in Rome… I think we’re technically what’s called ‘border workers’.’
He added he thought a second referendum was ‘almost inevitable’ as ‘demographically, younger people are in favour, they want jobs, they don’t want to sing Elgar’.
Saturday marks two years since the Leave campaign won the referendum with 52 per cent of the vote to Remain’s 48 per cent.
Boris Johnson has urged the Prime Minister to deliver a ‘full British Brexit’ as Cabinet colleagues warned the UK is able to walk away without a deal.
Crowds gather on Pall Mall in London during the People’s Vote march for a second EU vote
EU supporters participate in the ‘People’s Vote’ march in central London on Saturday
A woman holds a pro-EU poster during the demonstration for a second vote on Brexit today
International Trade Secretary Liam Fox said the UK was not ‘bluffing’ about being prepared to walk away from talks with Brussels, and Brexit Secretary David Davis said there is ‘lots going on’ to prepare in case negotiations collapse.
It came after Airbus said that if Britain were to leave the EU without a deal it would be forced to reconsider its long-term position and put UK jobs at risk.
Katherine Bennett, Airbus’s senior vice president in the UK, said: ‘We don’t deal in idle threats. We seriously believe a no-deal Brexit would be catastrophic.’
BMW also warned that the political uncertainty was affecting its investment in Britain.
Katherine Bennett, Airbus’s senior vice president in the UK, told the Press Association: ‘We don’t deal in idle threats. We seriously believe a no-deal Brexit would be catastrophic.’
Mr Johnson said the public were keen to get on with breaking away from Brussels.
‘Across the country I find people who – whatever they voted two years ago – just want us to get on and do it,’ he said.
‘They don’t want a half-hearted Brexit. They don’t want some sort of hopeless compromise, some perpetual pushme-pullyou arrangement in which we stay half-in and half-out in a political no man’s land – with no more ministers round the table in Brussels and yet forced to obey EU laws.
EU supporters hold up a European flag and mock Donald Trump at the anti-Brexit march today
People march in central London calling for a vote on the final terms of the Brexit agreement
Crowds gather on Pall Mall in central London, two years to the day since the EU referendum
Two demonstrators wearing ‘Veterans for Europe’ T-shirts attend Saturday’s pro-EU march
‘They don’t want some bog roll Brexit, soft, yielding and seemingly infinitely long.
‘They want this Government to fulfil the mandate of the people and deliver a full British Brexit.’
But organisers of the People’s Vote march expect tens of thousands of people to show their support for a referendum on the final Brexit outcome.
Marchers will descend on Parliament Square, where speakers will include Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable, Tory former minister Anna Soubry, Labour’s David Lammy and Green co-leader Caroline Lucas.
Sir Vince is expected to say Brexit is not a ‘done deal’ or inevitable and can be stopped.
‘Parliament is fiddling at the margins while the country slowly burns,’ he is expected to warn as he calls on the Government to vote on the deal, or no deal, with the option of staying in the EU.