Britain could refuse to pay the £40billion Brexit divorce bill if the UK does not get a trade deal, David Davis today said.
The Brexit Secretary hailed the good progress which has been made in negotiations with Brussels.
But he said that ‘nothing is agreed until everything is agreed’ and the UK could take its financial offer off the table if a free trade deal is not thrashed out.
The Cabinet minister was suffering from a bad bout of food poisoning – and kept a sick bucket by his side during the interview.
Asked directly on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show if the UK could take back the money offer, Mr Davis said Britain could ‘if we don’t get the free trade deal’.
Mr Davis, who had been sick overnight, also joked about his illness, telling the presenter: ‘If the cameras suddenly switch to you your audience will no what happened.’
He also promised that Britain would regain control of its fishing waters after the Brexit transition deal finishes on New Year’s Eve 2019.
The Brexit Secretary hailed the good progress which has been made in negotiations with Brussels – but warned that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed
David Davis also promised that Britain would regain control of its fishing waters after the Brexit transition deal finishes on New Year’s Eve 2019. The poorly minister kept a sick bucket by his side for the interview as he was feeling under the weather
It comes after accusations that Theresa May betrayed fishermen by keeping control of the waters with Brussels for the 19-month transition.
What are the key points agreed in the Brexit transition deal?
Brexit Secretary David Davis and EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier were all smiles as they unveiled the Brexit transition deal
Rights of EU nationals
Britain has agreed that EU nationals arriving in the country during the transition period will have the same rights as Europeans living in the UK now.
Free trade deals
Britain will be able to negotiate and sign free trade deals around the world during the transition period.
However, they will only come into force after the transition period has ended.
The transition period
The transition period will end on 31 December 2021 – meaning Britain will have a 21 month implementation phase.
The Irish border
Britain and the EU promised to keep a soft Irish border.
Britain says it hopes to use technology to come up with plans to have an invisible border as part of the free trade deal.
If nothing is agreed then a ‘backstop’ agreement will come into force meaning the UK would agree to align closely enough with EU rules to avoid a hard border.
Divorce Bill:
Britain signed up to the Brexit divorce bill, which is around £40billion.
Mr Davis told the show: ‘In 2019 fishing will be on the current arrangements…and then (after the transition) we are going to be an independent coastal state making our own negotiations with our neighbours.
‘It will be under our control.’
But he hinted that Britain’s waters could still be traded away in the future, saying: ‘We will negotiate with our neighbouring states so we have access to their waters and they to ours.
‘But it will be under our control.’
Mr Davis’s comments come after a Brexit breakthrough was achieved this week when the EU signed up to the transition deal.
It means negotiations can now move on to trade talks.
Theresa May will mark the one-year countdown to Brexit with a day-long tour of the UK on Thursday.
She will embark on a Road To Brexit trip to show her determination to deliver an EU exit that works for every community.
On Thursday, Britain will be exactly 12 months away from formally bidding farewell to Brussels.
The Prime Minister will seek to meet workers and families in every nation of the UK.
But she has been warned by leading Brexiteer and Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg that Britain must have a clean break from the EU after the transition deal.
He warned the campaign to try to reverse the referendum outcome is gaining momentum in the UK.
But he said that the UK must not stay essentially tied to the EU by ‘sleight of hand’ and this would be a betrayal of the millions who voted for Brexit.
He said when Britain leaves the EU at 11pm on 31 December next year not single extra power will come back to the UK because of the transition deal struck.
Writing in The Express, he said: ‘If this was then to become the permanent state it would be one of the greatest failures in our island story. Is this a reasonable fear?
Theresa May (pictured with her husband Philip on the way to church today) been warned by leading Brexiteer and Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg that Britain must have a clean break from the EU after the transition deal.
Theresa May (pictured playing with the dog Blitz outside church today) has got EU leaders to sign up to a Brexit transition deal
‘It is at least possible, many things that were meant to be temporary have ended up being perpetual.
‘Income tax is perhaps the most famous example but it is by no means alone. The natural inertia of bureaucracies means that unless there is strong political impetus, the status quo pertains.
‘This would be a humiliation on the scale of Suez. It was then that the establishment decided that the only option for them was to manage decline, that there were no more broad sunlit uplands and that by our own efforts we could never succeed.
‘This led to the view that because we could not do well we should not even try.
‘Yet the embarrassment of Suez was caused by a plot hatched in secret and then only followed halfway to its conclusion.
‘Reversing Brexit would be abandoning something worthy because the establishment does not like it.’
Britain was left humiliated on the world stage when it ordered a botched invasion of Egypt in 1956 to regain control of the strategically important Suez canal.
Britain launched the invasion with Israel and France, but quickly the tripartite succumbed to international pressure to withdraw its troops.