24 AUG 2018
William James, William Schomberg
FILE PHOTO: Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond leaves 11 Downing Street in London, Britain, July 2, 2018. REUTERS/Simon Dawson/File Photo
The row underscored the size of the challenge facing Prime Minister Theresa May as she enters a crucial few months that will determine Britain’s future relationship with the EU.
Chancellor Philip Hammond, seen as one of May’s most pro-EU ministers, has long been a target for the many pro-Brexit MPs in the Conservative Party who say he is too pessimistic about Britain’s future outside the EU.
On Thursday, Hammond distracted media attention away from the government’s announcement of how companies and individuals should prepare for the possibility of a no-deal Brexit when he highlighted what it could mean for the economy.
Hammond pointed to Treasury forecasts made in January that predicted a no-deal scenario would push up borrowing by about 80 billion pounds a year in 15 years’ time with the economy growing as much as 10 percent more slowly.
The move provoked an angry response from the leader of an influential group of pro-Brexit Conservative MPs who say a no-deal Brexit would not be as damaging as Hammond predicts.
“As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly,” lawmaker Jacob Rees-Mogg, head of the European Research Group, told the BBC, citing a Biblical proverb.
