Contingency plans to cope with a no-deal Brexit have been put on hold by the government as the risk of the UK crashing out of the EU without an agreement has subsided.
Whitehall officials confirmed on Friday that Operation Yellowhammer — a national strategy aimed at preventing a run on food, fuel and the banking system in the event of a no-deal Brexit — had been paused by the government.
The government has spent £2bn on plans to mitigate the effects of the UK crashing out of the EU without an agreement, and thousands of civil servants were assigned to the project. Businesses have also spent substantial sums to cope with the scenario.
But the government has relaxed its contingency plans after EU leaders on Thursday agreed to push back the date of Brexit to as late as October 31.
This decision ended the possibility of a no-deal Brexit on Friday — the previous date on which the UK was due to leave the EU.
“The no-deal stuff will be ramped down because the risk is not immediate,” said one Whitehall official. “But the overall [contingency] plans will remain in place.”
EU leaders agreed on Thursday that the UK could leave the bloc before October 31 if MPs approve prime minister Theresa May’s withdrawal agreement.
There remains a risk that the UK could crash out of the EU without a deal on June 1 if Britain is still a member state on May 23 and fails to hold elections to the European Parliament.
James Cleverly, the Brexit minister responsible for no-deal planning, said: “I am going to keep working with the PM and government to get a deal so we can exit the EU as soon as possible. I’m also going to keep working on our no-deal preparations in case we have to leave without one.”
Philip Hammond, chancellor, defended the government’s spending on no-deal contingency plans after Labour criticism that the money had been wasted.
He said it would be “irresponsible” not to prepare for leaving the EU without a deal if it remained a possible outcome.
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“We spent £4bn so far on preparing for Brexit, but that is not just for a no-deal Brexit — much of that money would need to be spent anyway, putting in place systems to replace EU systems that we’ve been using up to now,” he told Sky News.
Over this weekend, one component of the government’s no-deal Brexit plans will be suspended — Operation Brock, a traffic management system meant to avoid gridlock in Kent.
Highways England told Kent MPs in a letter that a contraflow system established last month on the M20 and M26 motorways would be ended. Normal traffic arrangements would resume next week, ahead of the busy Easter weekend.
But the letter by Highways England also acknowledged that the possibility of a no-deal Brexit had not disappeared.
It said that contraflow equipment for the motorways would remain nearby “to ensure that we can activate Operation Brock again quickly and safely in the future, should it be required”.
