UK’s Shapps: Incorrect to say that we have not proposed new backstop ideas

While speaking to BBC Television on Friday, the UK Transport Minister Grant Shapps said that “the next big thing to happen will be around the next European summit and that’s not until the middle of October anyway and that is the time at which there may be something new to discuss,” Reuters reports.

He added that parliament will have plenty of time to debate “whatever new has come out, I hope, from this stepped-up effort by the EU and our diplomats to find a negotiated settlement.”

“There was probably just a first chink of light” from EU leaders. We are going to be ready either way,” Shapps.