SNP threaten to hold Brexit bill to ransom unless Nicola Sturgeon gets a seat at the negotiations with the EU
PM confirmed Government's key Repeal Bill may require a ‘legislative consent motion’ in the Scottish Parliament
THE SNP are threatening to hold Theresa May’s flagship Brexit bill to ransom unless Nicola Sturgeon is handed a seat at the top table for our EU negotiations.
The Prime Minister confirmed yesterday the Government's key Repeal Bill may require a “legislative consent motion” in the Scottish Parliament.
The law, which repeals the 1972 Act which took the UK into the European Economic Community, was one of eight Brexit bills unveiled in the Queen’s Speech.
But her admission potentially hands a veto to the Parliament in Edinburgh where the SNP governs as a minority administration.
Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, signalled they would be seeking a place in the Brexit talks in order to achieve a different arrangement for Scotland as the price of allowing the legislative consent motion to pass.
He told the BBC: “There needs to be a meeting of the joint ministerial committee - the Parliament in London, meeting together with the governments in Edinburgh, of Belfast and of Cardiff.
"I think it is right - and many people have said this - that the Scottish Government should be represented at the talks in Brussels.
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"For us, it is about maintaining our ability to trade through the European single market, to have the benefits of the customs union and, as a consequence of that, free movement of people."
Mrs May has been adamant the UK will leave the EU together and that there cannot be a separate deal for Scotland, which voted strongly against Brexit.
Mr Blackford played down suggestions they were threatening to veto the Repeal Bill, and insisted what the SNP was offering a compromise arrangement that respected the interests of both sides.
He added: "Of course that (a veto) is there but I am not talking about that. I am talking about the spirit of compromise. I am hoping that we can get some sense and a recognition that our interests are perhaps in this case not wholly at one with the rest of the United Kingdom.
"We are actually trying to be reasonable and say 'Look, we understand the position that you're in but also let's make sure that respect cuts both ways'."