ANY QUOTES MUST BE BE ATTRIBUTED TO SKY NEWS, SOPHY RIDGE ON SUNDAY

SOPHY RIDGE: We’ve heard a pretty extensive range of opinions on today’s show so let’s finish with somebody who is firmly behind the Prime Minister’s deal, the Conservative Party Chairman, Brandon Lewis, thanks very much for being on the show this morning.

BRANDON LEWIS: A pleasure, good morning.

SR: Well it’s not long now until this vote is it, around a hundred Conservative MPs say that they don’t like Theresa May’s deal, it looks like it will be really hard to get that through Parliament so what’s Plan B?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well actually Plan B is Plan A, it’s to get this deal agreed. It is the only deal that’s there on the table, it’s the only option we’ve got. If this deal doesn’t go through we have the risk of no Brexit, no deal potentially, Labour – and I saw Kier just a few minutes ago arguing for a second referendum effectively again. There’s a whole range of chaos that can come through whereas this is a deal that delivers on the referendum and does so in a way that is good for our economy so our focus over the next week, my focus as well as my colleague’s, will be on working with colleagues, talking to colleagues, we’ve got a lot of debates over the next few days where colleagues can see the detail, talk through the detail and I hope when they come to that vote on December 11th that they vote for the deal.

SR: You see I can’t work out if you actually don’t have a Plan B or if you really do have a Plan B but you don’t want to tell all about it, which one is it?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well look, the reality is we have got this vote on December 11th, we are focusing everything on doing what is right for the country and that is getting this deal through which delivers on, as Nick mentioned earlier and it is important in my constituency and others around the country, the end of free movement, the end of the Common Agricultural and Fisheries policy, the end of all that money going to Europe unaccounted for, the end of the direct jurisdiction of the ECJ but also doing it in a way that is good for our economy, the ability to deliver those trade deals so it is the right deal to go for. The reality is if you look at the make-up of Parliament, listen to what Kier Starmer was saying earlier today, what we hear from opposition benches and others in Parliament when this is discussed, actually there are people pushing for a second referendum, people pushing for no Brexit at all as well as no deal, so the real option for us is to get this deal through, that gives stability, it gives certainty and allows people to get us as a government back on to focusing on the domestic issues that people care about.

SR: But do you acknowledge that it is going to be chaotic if you don’t get the deal through? You know the numbers are looking really difficult, I think people would like the reassurance of knowing that you have got a plan. You don’t have to tell me what the plan is, you don’t have to go into the detail, I understand if you don’t want to say anything but have you actually got a Plan B?

BRANDON LEWIS: As I said, Plan B is Plan A. We’ve got to get this deal through because it is the deal that delivers on what people want. I go campaigning, I heard Gina earlier and I’m not quite sure where she’s been but I go all over the country every week, we’ve got people out knocking on doorsteps every week. What people at home tend to want to talk about is the things that affect them every day whether it’s their bin collections, their local school, a good NHS, a chance of a good job tomorrow. I want the Conservative party and the government to be able to get back to focus on those issues and to do that having delivered on what people voted for in 2016. This deal does that and it is, let’s be frank again, it’s the only deal that is out there, it’s the only deal coming from the EU, it’s the only deal that delivers for this country.

SR: Well I think there are probably a lot of us who would identify as BOB, bored of Brexit, and we heard Sir Kier Starmer say earlier that if the deal doesn’t go through parliament it is inevitable that they are going to move a no confidence motion. Is that something you are preparing for?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well as I say, I think we saw earlier on today in the interview with yourself that Kier was very open about the fact that they want, Labour’s whole aim is to frustrate Brexit. They came out with these six things they wanted to see, this deal effectively does deliver on that and it does it in a really positive way and yet Labour are still arguing not to support this and that’s because they do want this chaos, they want to try and bring the government down, to disrupt the country and to disrupt Brexit and what is very clear is that at the end of it…

SR: Are you preparing for that …?

BRANDON LEWIS: Let me just finish the point actually which is that Kier’s core point at the end of that, that he kept coming back to and as John McDonnell has done, is this desire for a second referendum and that’s again why getting this deal through I think is so important so it does deliver on Brexit for people.

SR: So just to bring you back to the no confidence motion, is that something you are preparing for?

BRANDON LEWIS: If Labour put a no confidence motion that’s something that we will have to deal with but actually the best way to prevent that is to get this deal through Parliament on December 11th.

SR: It is pretty clear that that is Plan A, to get the deal through and other people in your party though are looking at Plan B’s. Nick Boles, we heard from one of them earlier, he said he is going to support the Prime Minister’s deal but he is just looking at what happens if it doesn’t go through and this idea of a Norway plus option where the UK will be staying in a single market. Is that something that you think could work?

BRANDON LEWIS: I don't think the Norway option works. Nick’s a great colleague, he’s a good friend, I’ve worked with him in the Department together for a long time, he’s got a brilliant mind but the problem with the Norway option, which he did to be fair acknowledge in that interview you did with him, is that for a lot of people in this country one of the core reasons they voted to leave the EU isn’t dealt with in the Norway model and that’s the end of free movement. It also doesn’t stop the continued payments to the EU, something else people feel strongly about, so Norway isn’t the right option and again, I’ll come back to a very key fact, it’s not on the table.

SR: The thing is, he admits that as well, as you say, in the interview but he says the other option could be no deal which in his view would be like Thelma and Louise driving off the cliff. Surely as a responsible government it’s only right to look at other things that could avert chaos?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well none of us wants to see chaos. I think that no deal is a bad thing for the country and I also think that no Brexit is bad for the country and bad for democracy after that vote and I think that what people want to know is as their government we are focused on being ready for those things. We’ve said for a while that we’ve been planning for no deal. We don’t want it, we don’t think it’s where we should be or where we need to be but we have to be ready for that but the reality I think is most people want us to focus on getting a good deal for the United Kingdom that delivers on the referendum and I think people when they look at this will want to know that their government’s focus is entirely based on getting that good and the right deal approved in Parliament. We have got a few debating days, nine days, five days of debates roughly to go through and have that discussion and I hope as colleagues go through those debates, look at the detail of this, listen to the arguments and importantly, on Monday, listen to the Attorney General as well, I hope on December 11th we’ll get this deal approved.

SR: Are you ready for an election?

BRANDON LEWIS: I’m ready for the 2019 local elections, that’s when …

SR: Oh come on, you know what I’m asking you!

BRANDON LEWIS: We’ll be ready for the 2022 General Election. Look, I don't think anybody watching this programme having had two general elections and a referendum in the last three years, is looking for another general election. I’m not looking at a general election, I’m looking to get this deal through on December 11th and …

SR: Can you rule it out?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well I’m planning for the 2019 local elections, not for a general election. I don't think that’s where Parliament is, I don't think that’s where the country is. I think they want to see us as a government and as a Parliament getting on with this, getting this job done and getting back to focus on domestic issues that help people every day.

SR: And another row brewing over Brexit is over the legal advice, why is the government not publishing the full legal advice on Brexit, what are you so scared of?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well I think there’s a historic, centuries old custom in this country and proper legal precedent that that client confidentiality between lawyers giving advice to clients, whether it’s the government or anything else, that’s an important part of our constitution, the way that government works. We saw that through the Iraq War with Labour as well. However this is an unprecedented situation and that’s why we have got an unprecedented situation just tomorrow when the Attorney General will be making a statement to Parliament and I would hope again that when colleagues hear what the Attorney General has to say, they’ll be satisfied that the government has delivered what it said it would do on that vote a couple of weeks ago.

SR: Okay, now on a slightly different matter, you mentioned immigration earlier on and for many people that was the main reason that they voted to leave in that referendum. You probably don’t remember but you came on the show around a year ago when you were Immigration Ministers, have a little look what you said about the immigration White Paper: “We will publish our Immigration Bill and our White Paper pretty soon actually, it will be early next year.” Now that was back in December 2017, it’s still not been published. What’s happened?

BRANDON LEWIS: Well what’s happened, it’s always good to come back on the show on an anniversary to be able to talk through …

SR: Happy anniversary!

BRANDON LEWIS: And actually we’ll be talking about immigration during the course of this week actually in these debates and the reality is that as this negotiation with the EU has developed, what became very clear is the Immigration Bill is about setting out that outline of what our immigration policies will be. Now we outlined that at our party conference this year, the legal requirement to do that is to have that framework in place, the legal power to set our immigration laws, when we leave the European Union and shortly after, I mean literally about a week or so after I was on the show and said that last year, we got that agreement with the EU around EU citizens’ rights which was potentially part of that. We’ve also since then of course got the implementation period agreed which means that the new immigration laws won’t come into place until 2021 and therefore Parliament doesn’t need yet to look at that Immigration Bill because it’s still got 18 months to two years before it comes into force.

SR: Two and a half years on since the referendum when people sent a very, very clear message about immigration and we still don’t really know what the government’s strategy is …

BRANDON LEWIS: I disagree with you, no, I disagree with you on that Sophy. Look, what the Bill is about is setting out the framework, the legal power for us to set immigration rules against EU countries which at the moment we don’t have so that we said we’ve outlined and said we’re going to do and that has to be in place for when we leave the EU which is after that implementation period so Parliament has been focused on the legislation which time-wise it needs to do in order to prepare to leave. The immigration paper comes in 2021 in terms of our delivery but we have outlined what we want our future policy to be, there will be more details coming through shortly but we outlined at our party conference that we want to move to an immigration system that is about skills, making sure we have access to the skills this country needs so people can come here based on the skills that they’ve got rather than based on their geography and I think that is a very clear message.

SR: So when are we going to get this White Paper, is it going to be before the end of the year?

BRANDON LEWIS: I think you’ll see the White Paper very soon, I’m not …

SR: You said it would be very soon a year ago.

BRANDON LEWIS: I’m not going to be tempted to tie the hands of the Home Secretary, I think he will rightly come forward with that White Paper when he is ready to outline that in line with where we are in terms of not just the negotiations but the legislation for when we are ready to leave the EU and as I say, the new immigration laws now don’t come into place until 2021, that’s something that changed since that original quote.

SR: Okay, Brandon Lewis, thank you very much.

BRANDON LEWIS: My pleasure.