Tory quits the ERG warning Brexit is in jeopardy

Brexiteer MP Daniel Kawczynski. Photograph: Sky News. - Credit: Archant

A Tory MP has quit the pro-Brexit European Research Group (ERG) warning that it is putting Britain’s departure from the EU in jeopardy.

Daniel Kawczynski said the government needed to get Theresa May’s Withdrawal Agreement – which a number of ERG members continue to oppose – through Parliament if they were to ensure Britain finally leaves.

‘I don’t wish to be affiliated to a caucus … which I now perceive to be part of the problem in actually getting the Withdrawal Agreement across the finishing line,’ he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

‘From a practical perspective there are elements now within that caucus that are preventing this Withdrawal Agreement going through and therefore inevitably that will lead to possibly no Brexit at all, and that is not something I wish to contemplate. I think we should protect Brexit.’

Kawczynski said he opposed a call from ERG deputy chairman Mark Francois for Tory MPs to have a vote to show they had lost faith in May, even though party rules prevent another formal leadership challenge until December.


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‘I do disagree with Mark Francois on that. I don’t think the time has come for another leadership contest. I think we have to abide by the rules our party has set,’ he said.