Penny Mordaunt has repeated her notorious false claim that the UK was unable to stop Turkey joining the EU – insisting the veto would not have been used.
The Tory leadership contender, who also faces accusations of dishonesty over her stance on trans rights, was accused of ignoring “actual facts” that the EU treaty granted a block on new members.
Confronted with an interview from the 2016 Brexit referendum – when the Leave campaign was seeking to stir up alarm about migrants from Turkey – Ms Mordaunt replied: “The clip says it as I see it.”
On the BBC’s Sunday Morning programme, it was pointed out to the favourite candidate of Tory members that Article 49 of the EU treaty granted a veto on any country joining the bloc.
But she argued the crucial factor was David Cameron’s signal to Turkey that he wanted the country to join, claiming: “The British people did not have a say.”
Ms Mordaunt said: “David Cameron had given undertakings to Turkey that the United Kingdom would support its accession to the EU.
“Just because there’s a provision in a treaty doesn’t mean that the UK could ever have used that.
“And to have gone back on what was government policy in those undertakings he has given to Turkey – a key NATO ally – would have been crazy.”
However, Mr Cameron had said publicly that he believed Turkish accession to the EU was decades away, rather than a possibility in the near future.
It is believed he had suggested he would not trigger the UK’s veto to avoid a backlash from...
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