Yesterday’s Sunday Times; RTÉ’s Miriam O’Callaghan; Conservative MP Marcus Fysh

This morning.

On RTÉ’s Today with Miriam O’Callaghan.

Pro-Brexit Conservative MP Marcus Fysh spoke to Ms O’Callaghan in light of yesterday’s reports in The Sunday Times based on a leaked secret “Yellowhammer” report on the fall-out of a no-deal Brexit.

The newspaper reported that Britain faces “shortages of fuel, food and medicine, a three-month meltdown at its ports, a hard border with Ireland and rising costs in social care” if no deal is made.

During the interview, Mr Fysh alleged that the leaked memo was “left in a pub” for a journalist to find.

From the interview…

Marcus Fysh: “This is a scenario that doesn’t have to happen.”

Miriam O’Callaghan: “How are you going to avoid this? This is your own government’s assessment of what is likely to happen in the case of a no-deal Brexit.”

Fysh: “Michael Gove, who’s in charge of it and his assessment is that it doesn’t have to happen if we do the right things and that the Government is doing those things to make sure that this is not a thing that comes true.”

O’Callaghan: “But what can your government do, realistically do?”

Fysh: “The point is that we need to ready all of those involved in the cross border trade to make the right declarations, so they have the right papers, so that when they arrive at Calais, they can show the transit documents that they need to get through that border efficiently and then I don’t think there’s any prospect in that situation that the Border would fall over in such a disruptive manner which is at the core of all of these worst-case assumptions.”

“But, yeah, we need to make sure that everybody has the right information and is ready to do the right thing so that that doesn’t happen.”

O’Callaghan: “But I mean, even specifically, in relation to this, civil service detail in this report. According to the documents, petrol, import tariffs could inadvertently lead to the closure of two oil refineries while protests across Britain, which require significant amounts of police resources.”

Fysh: “Well I just thing that that’s, that’s a really bad assessment. I can’t see the logic of that position. I think, to be honest, the civil service have questions to answer, as to why this has been leaked and I think it’s part of an establishment effort to try to scare people. The point is that if you have cheap imports of fuel, then the fuel is available, otherwise those refineries don’t have a problem.”

O’Callaghan: “But Marcus Fysh, it’s almost like, with respect, Tory MPs, like you, are delusional. I mean this is your own civil service coming up with this detail. It’s dated this month, this is what they believe what might happen.”

Fysh: “This is what they have left in a pub for a journalist to find. I think that tells you all you need to know about the motivation. It could have come from the civil service, it could have come from anywhere. But the point is that we know that there are lots of people that don’t want Brexit to happen. And have been trying to scare people into not wanting it. And this is their, sort of, last throw of the dice. The reality is that Brexit is going to happen and we need to prepare for it and we need to prepare for it right.”

Listen back in full here

Related: Operation Chaos: Whitehall’s secret no‑deal Brexit preparations leaked (The Sunday Times)