Philip Hammond set to announce new 50p coin to commemorate Brexit

Philip Hammond is set to announce the creation of a new 50 pence coin to commemorate Brexit.

The Chancellor will use today’s Budget to confirm the minting of the new coin, in a move that will be viewed as an attempt to win over disgruntled Leave-backing MPs in the Tory party.

The coin, expected to bear the phrase “Friendship with all nations”, will be released at 11pm on March 29th next year when the UK officially leaves the European Union.

According to The Sun, Hammond has now ordered the Royal Mint advisory committee to draw up a final design for the coin, which will require personal sign off by the Queen.

The move comes after lobbying from Tory MPs, including former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, for a coin to be produced which would mark the “monumental moment in British history”.

Hammond has been accused by his own backbenchers of being pro-remain in recent months, with Jacob Rees-Mogg, chair of the European Research Group of pro-Brexit Tory MPs, branding his departments analysis of the costs of Brexit as “dodgy Project Fear”.

But it is believed plans for the new coin had been circulating within the Treasury for months before the lobbying campaign.

A source close to the Chancellor said: “It’s an historic moment which will rightly be commemorated.”

The announcement follows a refusal from the Royal Mail to produce a commemorative stamp to mark the occasion, saying that Brexit remained too “politically controversial.”