There is a big row brewing in the Tory party now after Phillip Hammond's comments in Japan about Britain following EU regulations and so on during the transition period (HERE). In particular Jacob Rees-Mogg, Peter Bone and IDS seemed exercised about it. I am not sure they have been listening. Bone, always ready to provide a quote for the media to show how disconnected he is from reality, said on TV that Hammond's comments weren't government policy and Mrs May should slap him down.
But it is they who are wrong. The PM can hardly slap him down since this (HERE) is the extract from her Florence speech dealing with the implementation period - she persists in calling it an implementation period although the EU call it a transition. It will really be an extension of the Article 50 negotiating period, albeit without us being represented in any way.
As I said in my speech at Lancaster House a period of implementation would be in our mutual interest. That is why I am proposing that there should be such a period after the UK leaves the EU. Clearly people, businesses and public services should only have to plan for one set of changes in the relationship between the UK and the EU.
So during the implementation period access to one another’s markets should continue on current terms and Britain also should continue to take part in existing security measures. And I know businesses, in particular, would welcome the certainty this would provide. The framework for this strictly time-limited period, which can be agreed under Article 50, would be the existing structure of EU rules and regulations.
Note that it was the UK's idea to ask for this transition and more importantly our suggestion that access should continue "on current terms". Poor old Phillip Hammond is vilified by the extreme Brexiteers for saying more or less the same thing.
