Responding to Stephen Barclay’s evidence session for the Select Committee for Exiting the EU, Liberal Democrat MP Wera Hobhouse said:

The Conservative Government is insistent on ending free movement, but it doesn’t have a plan to make it happen. The Cabinet can’t agree and therefore won’t release the immigration white paper meaning we are all being left in the dark, including the Brexit Secretary himself.

Stephen Barclay cannot answer how we will control migration without a hard border in Ireland. It is time the Government came clean and admitted that Brexit won’t end free movement. And why would we want to? As the Government’s own analysis shows, EU migration has been a real benefit to the UK economy. EU citizens living in the UK contribute positively to the tune of £4.7bn each year to the public purse.

Nobody voted for a chaotic visa system or to make the UK poorer. There must be a People’s vote, with the option to remain in the EU.