Bell Ribeiro-Addy Claims Brexit Deal Vote Never Happened
Labour MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy is keeping busy with her pronouncements at Conference. She told a panel today:
“Remember when Boris did his Brexit deal, the final one? Remember MPs had to vote on this Brexit deal? Are you certain that MPs voted on a Brexit deal? Because a lot of people think that we voted on a Brexit deal that day, and that to me was very very concerning because that level of information going out to the public – even politicians were talking about voting for a deal because that’s what the media were putting out there. We voted on an implementation agreement – the deal was already done… a couple of nights before. We cannot have this level of misinformation when we’re talking about one of the most important things that has happened to this country, but that’s what happens all the time.”
Ribeiro-Addy seems to have got confused about how the Brexit deal worked. The Free Trade Agreement agreed between the EU and the government on 20th December could not have entered into effect without express parliamentary approval ten days later. The Guardian helpfully explained at the time: “Parliament was recalled for an emergency one-day session to approve the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement, concluded by Johnson and the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, on Christmas Eve.” Just because Bell didn’t bother to vote on it, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen…
