Dominic Raab has resigned as Brexit secretary, throwing the UK’s Brexit negotiations into further chaos.
The move comes hot on the heels of Theresa May’s announcement that her cabinet had backed the draft withdrawal agreement with the European Union.
In his resignation letter, Raab said that he “cannot in good conscience” back the draft proposal.
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“For my part, I cannot support the proposed deal for two reasons. First, I believe that the regulatory regime proposed for Northern Ireland presents a very real threat to the integrity of the United Kingdom”, continued Raab, who replaced fellow resignee David Davis in July.
“Second, I cannot support an indefinite backstop arrangement, where the EU holds a veto over our ability to exit.”
According to The Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn, Raab added that he didn’t “want to submit to the blackmail of my country” but insisted that he was “not calling for Theresa May to go” - rather, it was a “resignation on principle”.
Nevertheless, Newton Dunn says that “all eyes now on Michael Gove, Jeremy Hunt and Sajid Javid. If they go too today, it’s over for [May].”
In a further blow for the prime minister, Raab’s decision to quit was praised by Belfast MP Nigel Dodds - the deputy leader of the DUP, the faction on whom May relies for her slim House of Commons majority. In a tweet, Dodds offered Raab his thanks for “standing up for the Union”.
Meanwhile, former Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith told the BBC that Raab’s letter suggests he has felt ignored within government, and predicted that the impact of the resignation will be “devastating”.
Raab’s exit “makes it more likely both that other cabinet ministers follow and that the 48 letters calling for a no confidence vote [in Theresa May] go in”, agrees The Specator’s James Forsyth.
The outgoing Brexit secretary “has been getting increasingly frustrated” in recent weeks, Forsyth says, and “feels that he hasn’t been allowed to negotiate, that he could have got a better deal on the backstop if he had been allowed to pursue his chosen path”.
Raab was also reportedly overruled by May earlier this month during discussions with the Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney.
Indeed, before the draft withdrawal agreement had even been announced, reports suggested Raab was “preparing to lead a group of cabinet ministers arguing that a no-deal exit would be preferable to a deal that breaches their red lines”, according to Business Insider.
His resignation “also confirms what we already knew, which is that there are far too many Conservative MPs who are committed to voting against this deal for it pass even with a substantial Labour rebellion”, concludes the New Statesman’s Stephen Bush.
It also “makes it much harder to see how May can remain as Prime Minister”, Bush adds.