Politics: Theresa May is going to publish the leaked Brexit impact paper

The UK government has agreed to publish following pressure from Labour and some Conservative MPs.

LONDON — The UK government is going to publish the Brexit impact assessment leaked to the press this week.

A spokesperson for Prime Minister Theresa May said on Wednesday that the government will "comply with the will of the House" and publish the report into how Brexit could impact sectors of the economy as soon as practically possible.

May's decision to publish the report comes ahead of a parliamentary motion on the issue tabled by Labour.

On Tuesday the government had claimed the analysis was incomplete and would not be published until it was finished towards the end of Article 5o negotiations later this year.

Shadow Brexit Secretary Sir Keir Starmer will today to use an archaic parliamentary mechanism to give MPs a binding vote on whether the government should be published this new assessment much sooner.

"People voted to leave the European Union in part to give Parliament control about its own future. That means giving MPs the information they need to scrutinise the Government’s approach to Brexit," Starmer said.

"They should accept this motion and allow the country to have an informed debate about its relationship with Europe after Brexit."

It is the same mechanism that triggered a Commons vote on whether May should release an earlier Brexit assessment towards the end of last year.

However, the prime minister has decided to avoid a parliamentary showdown by agreeing to release the analysis once the parliamentary vote has taken place. Conservative MPs have been told to abstain from the vote.

"If the house decides it wants to see this analysis, even though it is provisional and has not gone through the proper processes, we will abide by the will of the house," a spokesperson for May said.

The document, which was put together by civil servants this month and then leaked to Buzzfeed News, shows that Britain would see lower economic growth under every likely Brexit scenario modelled.

The analysis looked at the impact of Britain leaving with either a free trade agreement, a Norway-style single market deal, or a no-deal scenario.

Under all three scenarios, Britain would be worse off than if the country decided to remain in the European Union, according to the analysis, which was intended to be presented to May's Cabinet in private over the coming days.

It found that with no deal, UK economic growth would be 8% lower than remaining in the EU and with a free trade agreement it would be 5% lower.

Even under the 'softest' option of remaining inside the European Economic Area but leaving the EU, growth would be 2% lower than staying in.

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The UK government has agreed to publish following pressure from Labour and some Conservative MPs. Read Full Story