European Union workers must stay, Oxford heads tell May

Tory MPs including ex-chancellor Ken Clarke and former business minister Anna Soubry could still rebel.

The unity of the Government has been dealt a serious blow as Theresa May prepares to trigger the UK’s formal withdrawal from the European Union, with senior Conservatives taking pot shots at each other over the party’s handling of Brexit and the Budget.

The timing for any announcement is highly sensitive, with the SNP conference taking place this weekend in Aberdeen. He said the European Union stood ready to respond to any move by the British government to trigger the article of the Lisbon Treaty.

The bill is going back to the Commons when it is expected to once again be approved without those amendments before returning to the Lords. Two ministers are believed to have cancelled foreign trips.

“By a majority of four to one, MPs passed straightforward legislation allowing the Government to move ahead with no strings attached”.

May has previously argued that “no deal for Britain is better than a bad deal for Britain” while on Sunday her senior Brexit ministers used media interviews to discuss the contingency planning for what would happen if the United Kingdom could not agree a deal.

The committee said it had seen no evidence of “serious contingency planning” and called that a “dereliction of duty” by the government.

Asked by Marr about the effect of Brexit on Northern Ireland, Mr Davis said: “We have put that pretty much as our top priority”.

British Trade Secretary Liam Fox has rejected the notion of paying anything at all as “absurd”.

I’m told both Cabinet ministers are not contradicting each other.

“We are preparing for all the possible problems. That’s my real fear”. But he said the Brexit poll which counted was the “largest vote for anything in British history” on June 23.

He told ITV’s Peston On Sunday show: “I think that’s excessively pessimistic of that otherwise distinguished committee. The aim is to get a good outcome”.

Labour sources said: “If they are dismissed out of hand then they have got some problems”.

David Cameron, the pro-EU prime minister, fell on his sword and was replaced as leader of the centre-right Conservative Party and as prime minister by May, a shrewd and resilient politician.

The government, which is likely to be supported by a number of opposition MPs, has a majority of 17 in the Commons and has insisted that the rights of European Union citizens are a priority.

That would free up Mrs May to trigger Article 50 – starting the two-year period of negotiation before Brexit – as soon as tomorrow.

But she can’t do it until Parliament approves a bill authorizing the government to start the divorce process.