Theresa May will gather her squabbling cabinet at Chequers to hash out the government’s position on Brexit, but only after an EU leaders’ summit at the end of the month.
She and her top ministers will decide on the detail of the Brexit white paper on an away-day at the Buckinghamshire retreat, having previously pledged to publish the document in June.
With less than a year to go until Britain leaves the EU, the prime minister has yet to agree some of the fundamental details of what type of trading relationship she wants the UK to have with the bloc after March 2019.
Ms May is keen to show she is making progress on the process of leaving following criticism from foreign secretary Boris Johnson and a row with David Davis, the brexit secretary, in recent days.
“There’s going to be a lot happening over the next few weeks. People want us to get on with it and that’s exactly what we’re doing,” Ms May told reporters at the G7 summit in Canada.
The return of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill to the Commons next week will be followed by the 28 June European Council meeting.
Ms May said that at the gathering of EU leaders “we’ll be talking about finalising withdrawal agreement but also pressing on the future relationship”.
Before leaving for Canada, the PM was forced into crisis talks with Mr Davis who had challenged her so-called backstop plan to ensure no hard border on the island of Ireland. Then Mr Johnson was secretly recorded saying there could be a Brexit “meltdown”.
She said the foreign secretary had strong views on Brexit “but so do I”, as she attempted to downplay his outburst on how negotiations were progressing.
The prime minister claimed “nobody ever said it was going to be easy” to quit the EU but pledged to “deliver Brexit for the British people”.
Mr Johnson’s indiscreet remarks about Brexit, which saw him call for “guts” in the negotiations, emerged as Ms May was in mid-air en route to Quebec.
Additional reporting by agencies
