In the latest episode river-related Brexit shenanigans, Jacob Rees-Mogg has denied he will throw fish into the River Thames from a trawler.
The Tory MP was reported by The Daily Telegraph as planning to float past parliament during the bizarre stunt in protest at Theresa May’s “abject betrayal” of Britain’s fishermen.
It would be reminiscent of the heady days in the run-up to the EU referendum when a flotilla of Brexiteers sailed down the river and briefly engaged in “low level naval warfare” with a group of Remainer boats.
But Rees-Mogg told LBC Tuesday morning: “I’m not throwing fish anywhere. I am not a fish-thrower.
“I think this has got slightly out of hand. There was a suggestion a fishing boat should go up the Thames in protest against the delay in leaving the Common Fisheries Policy, but I won’t be throwing fish anywhere.”
“I have a nasty feeling that if I were to start throwing fish, they would be brought back in the wind and hit me in the face.”
Yesterday the UK and EU agreed a deal that will see the Britain leave the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) the day it exits the EU in March 2019.
But the UK will have to stick to CFP rules during the transition period and the EU will still set fishing quotas.
Rees-Mogg said the situation around fisheries policy was “deeply unsatisfactory” and the agreement as a whole “gives away almost everything” to Brussels.
He told BBC Newsnight: “I make no bones about it, I think this transition agreement is a very unsatisfactory agreement – not just on fish.
“The only thing that makes it acceptable is the hope that it is leading to a proper Brexit at the end of 2020.
“This agreement gives away almost everything and it is very hard to see what the Government has got in return.”
The “green” elements of the deal – those agreed by both sides – look like “concessions from the British government without counter-concessions in return”.
Rees-Mogg told LBC the Brexit transition period, when the UK will will have to abide by EU rules, was simply “purgatory before we get into heaven”.
Amid a backbench Tory rebellion against the fishing agreement, one Tory MP told the prime minister it would be harder to sell to voters than a “pint of cold sick”.