Wetherspoons owner and Brexit ultra Tim Martin has claimed MPs could ‘give’ constituents £600 pounds each if the UK cuts all ties with the EU.
Do @trussliz Tim Martin @jessphillips agree with @Jacob_Rees_Mogg comments on dogs/brexit? #politicslive pic.twitter.com/iY4QYYOpT9
— BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) September 4, 2018
The bizarre claim came as he debated Brexit with Labour MP Jess Phillips on the BBC’s new show Politics Live.
He said: ‘I think we would be better off with no deal. As soon as you start off with a bill of £40bn on day one that is £600 for every person … it’s not a good deal.
‘You can abolish tariffs on 12 million products things people buy every single day in the shops and you can encourage foreign businesses to invest here because you are a free trading nation.’
He went on to suggest the UK’s links to the European Union were bad for the country prompting Phillips to sarcastically remark: ‘Attaching ourselves to the biggest market in the world would be folly … honestly.’
She added: ‘You are making out that my constituents are suddenly going to get given £600 pounds. My constituents are already in a enormous deficit, 1,000 jobs have been moved to Slovakia from Jaguar Land Rover so excuse me if I am not cheering for £600 they might get back from £40bn which they won’t feel the benefit of.’
Puzzlingly Martin then added: ‘You could give them £600.’
Of course this is not the first time the pub chain boss has made odd claims about Brexit. Earlier this year he decided to ‘broaden the horizons’ of his customers post-Brexit by banning various wines and beers from European countries in his pubs.
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