Early evening summary
Rees-Mogg accuses Sunak of breaking his promise on retained EU law, saying 'blob has triumphed' over PM
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Tory former business secretary, has accused Rishi Sunak of breaking a promise he made during the Tory leadership contest, and of “administrative failure”, after the government abandoned the target Rees-Mogg set for the repeal of retained EU law. (See 4.15pm.) Rees-Mogg said:
The written ministerial statement breaks the prime minister‘s clear promise to review or repeal all EU laws in his first hundred days.
Instead, he has decided to keep nearly 90% of retained EU law.
This is an admission of administrative failure, an inability of Whitehall to do the necessary work and an incapability of ministers to push this through their own departments.
Regrettably, ‘the blob’ has triumphed and the prime minister has abandoned his promise.
In fact, Sunak did not promise to review or repeal all EU law within the 100 days (although, in the summer leadership campaign, when he made this pledge, he may not have been upset if Brexiter Tory members thought that was what his promising). The actual promise was: “The first set of recommendations as to whether these [retained EU] laws should be scrapped or changed would be made within the first 100 days.”
But Sunak also said he would “scrap or reform all the EU law and bureaucracy still holding back Britain’s economy by the next election”, which is still not a deadline he is likely to meet.
Updated