EU's Jean-Claude Juncker tells UK: 'Get your act together' on Brexit
The European Commission president denies attempting to keep the UK in the EU as Brussels waits for MPs to approve a Brexit deal.
Sunday 30 December 2018 21:56, UK
European Commission President Jean Claude-Juncker has told the UK to "get your act together" over Brexit.
The top Brussels official claimed it is "entirely unreasonable" for Britons to believe it is up to the EU to "propose a solution", as he denied he is trying to keep the UK in the bloc.
Mr Juncker's intervened as a divorce deal agreed between Theresa May and Brussels remains unapproved by MPs.
The prime minister dramatically pulled a planned pre-Christmas vote in the House of Commons to avoid certain defeat.
The vote is now scheduled for the week of 14 January, with many MPs still fiercely opposed to the so-called backstop arrangement aimed at preventing a post-Brexit hard border on the island of Ireland.
Top cabinet Brexiteer Liam Fox warned the chances of the UK leaving the EU would be "50-50" if Mrs May's Brexit deal is rejected by MPs.
Mr Juncker told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag: "It is not us who are leaving the United Kingdom - it is the United Kingdom that is leaving the European Union.
"I find it entirely unreasonable for parts of the British public to believe that it is for the EU alone to propose a solution for all future British problems.
"My appeal is this: get your act together and then tell us what it is you want. Our proposed solutions have been on the table for months."
Mr Juncker added it was up to the UK to decide whether a final decision on Brexit is put to a second referendum, but that he is "working on the assumption that (the UK) will leave, because that is what the people of the UK have decided".
"I have the impression that the majority of British MPs deeply distrust both the EU and Mrs May," he said.
"It is being insinuated that our aim is to keep the United Kingdom in the EU by all possible means. That is not our intention."
Tory MP Nigel Huddleston, who backs Mrs May's deal, branded Mr Juncker's language as "inappropriate but not surprising".
The EU official's comments came after Dr Fox told The Sunday Times that Brexit would only be "100% certain" if MPs support the prime minister's agreement.
Dr Fox said rejecting the deal would be "incendiary" and that MPs must support it as "a matter of honour".
"Parliament cannot now, with any honour, renege on that result [of the referendum]," he said.
"Were they to do so, I think you would shatter the bond of trust between the electorate and parliament.
"And I think that would put us into unprecedented territory with unknowable consequences."
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has called on Mrs May to cut short MPs' Christmas break for an earlier vote.
He has accused the prime minister of trying to "run down the clock" and offering the Commons a choice between "the devil or the deep blue sea".
Mrs May has warned MPs if they do not back her they risk a no-deal Brexit or even no Brexit at all.
But former Brexit secretary David Davis predicted the prime minister will be defeated in January and have to return to negotiations with the EU.
"They will have to come back and deal again. The deal she's got is no good," he told LBC Radio.
"It will be very, very nerve-wracking for some people and some companies, but at the end of the day we will get a deal and it will be a better one than she has got.
"That's where I think it will go and that's what I think she should do."
Meanwhile, Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson has suggested the UK could establish new military bases in the Caribbean and Far East as Brexit offers the country a chance to become a "true global player once more".
He told the Sunday Telegraph: "This is our biggest moment as a nation since the end of the Second World War, when we can recast ourselves in a different way, we can actually play the role on the world stage that the world expects us to play.
"For so long - literally for decades - so much of our national view point has actually been coloured by a discussion about the European Union.
"This is our moment to be that true global player once more - and I think the armed forces play a really important role as part of that."
The newspaper cited a source close to Mr Williamson as saying new UK bases could be situated in Singapore or Brunei, or Montserrat or Guyana.