Margallo ‘best advocate’ for Remain - GSD
Spain’s acting Foreign Minister, José Manuel García-Margallo, has become ‘the best advocate’ for Remain, the GSD said yesterday.
The party was reacting to comments by Sr García-Margallo, who said in a debate last week that Brexit would make a border closure “perfectly possible” in law.
The Spanish minister qualified his statement by saying his government had not considered such an option, but his comments nonetheless drew flak in Gibraltar.
“Comments made by Sr. Garcia-Margallo continue to be a stark reminder why it is important to give people who think like him no hope at the forthcoming referendum by voting Remain,” GSD leader Daniel Feetham said.
“Even though he tried to qualify that statement by saying that this was not an option that his Government had considered, it illustrates the dangers for Gibraltar.”
Mr Fetham said Sr García-Margallo had never shied away from using the frontier as a pressure point against Gibraltarians.
He recalled how in 2013, Sr García -Margallo told ABC newspaper that "the party is over" and a number of measures were then studied by the PP government including a toll payable at the frontier.
“Ultimately it was EU law that prevented Sr García -Margallo from proceeding with those restrictions because those restrictions would have been illegal,” he said.
“Without EU law Gibraltar will be hugely vulnerable.”