Hilary Benn calls for transitional arrangements for the financial services sector after Brexit
Hilary Benn has said that he will press the government for a plan to ensure that the UK still has access to the single market for the financial services sector.
The new chair of the Brexit select committee in parliament, which will scrutinise the government’s approach to leaving the EU, has said he wants the government to reveal more about its plans.
“There’s some very basic questions – what do you want to do to continue… that access to the single market that is so important to our goods and our services sector?” he told the Today programme this morning. “There are about a million jobs in financial services in this country.”
“We know the government is making assessments of the economic impacts… “It’s really important they share those assessments with parliament,” he added.
Philip Hammond, the chancellor, told the Treasury select committee yesterday that he would not be sharing any economic assessments of Brexit plans with parliament, as he did not want to give away the government’s negotiating hand.
The Labour MP and former shadow foreign secretary also called for the government to minimise uncertainty for business by promising to seek a “transitional arrangement” which would be put in place while the UK is negotiating an exit from the EU.
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“We saw recently Nissan for example, saying, quite reasonably, we’re not going invest any more unless we have some certainty about where the future trading relationships are going to be,” he said.
“One thing the government could do now is to make it absolutely clear it will seek a transitional agreement… so that we won’t tumble out after two years on WTO terms.”