Nicola Sturgeon to face UK ministers at British-Irish council

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is to face UK Ministers for the first time since the EU Withdrawal Bill was forced through the Commons without the consent of the Scottish parliament.

Sturgeon will attend the British Irish council today in Guernsey with Cabinet Office Minister David Lidington and Secretary of State Karen Bradley, alongside Welsh FM Carwyn Jones and Irish Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.

Sturgeon and Jones issued a joint statement ahead of the meeting calling once for the UK to remain within the EU single market – something which has been ruled out by Prime Minister Theresa May.

“In practice, the Prime Minister’s position on issues such as customs arrangements and regulatory alignment appears increasingly difficult to reconcile with the red lines, but she cannot come clean because she is held hostage by the Brexiteers in her Cabinet and Party. This cannot continue,” they said.

“We call on the UK Government in its forthcoming White Paper to commit to staying inside the Single Market and Customs Union recognising that this will require continued alignment with the EU regulatory environment.

The aim should be a 'Norway Plus' model on the basis that the red lines set out by the prime minister in her Lancaster House speech in January 2017 are not consistent with the national interest.”

After the EU Withdrawal Bill was passed with assurances to Tory rebels that the speaker could give them a final say, Sturgeon tweeted the move had been “another dollop of Brexit fudge with Tory party interests yet again taking priority over the interests of the country.”

Lidington said voters wanted to see the different governments cooperate.

“The UK Government, for its part, is committed to keeping up the pace, and improving the depth, of our cooperation,” he said.

“Whatever the inevitable political noise as we unpick the complexities of our membership of the EU, I will ensure that we maintain the depth of our ongoing engagement with the Scottish Government, including this week at the British-Irish Council in Guernsey. I hope that the Scottish Government will maintain their own side of that relationship.

“By working together, we will help secure a deal that sees us leave the European Union as a more modern country where all four nations have their voices heard, but also as one United Kingdom, as the people of Scotland voted for in 2014.”

Today’s meeting also coincides with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker's two-day visit to Ireland.