The college, the station, all of these buildings were invested in from funds from the eu. Funds which wont necessarily be replaced by governments in london and cardiff. My first question is why did people vote in large numbers against the European Union, the source of so much investment in this community . Good evening. twas the night before brexit. One more sleep, as one leave supporting blog tweeted today. By this time tomorrow, the Prime Minister will have triggered article 50 and britains departure from the European Union will be officially under way. As we will hear over the course of tonights programme, there is much still to be resolved. In a moment, emily gets marine le pens take on brexit and, of course, a whole lot more. But first im joined by our Political Editor nick watt in the studio, and by our diplomatic editor mark urban in berlin. Nick, what is exactly going to happen tomorrow . It will have the feel of a budget day. Theresa may will brief colleagues can only meeting of the cabinet, then she will do her normal Prime Ministers questions and that will be followed by her statement on the article 50 letter. At around the time she stands up in the commons, the uk ambassador to the eu Sir Tim Barrow will hand the real copy of the letter to the European Council president donald tusk in brussels, and donald tusk is then expected to tweet he has received it. That will mark the formal triggering of article 50. What we really want to know is what is in the letter . Im told the tone will be friendly, it will essentially set out the framework of her Lancaster House speech injanuary. What that said is a close trading relationship, but no membership of the european single market. What im told is going to be really interesting is what isnt in the letter. It will not get into generalities, you will not see a sum of money on what the uk is prepared or not prepared to pay for the exit bill and im told there will not be any date on a cut off date for when the rights of eu citizens in the uk will stop. The guiding thought is do not repeat the mistake of david cameron, who put too much detail in his letterfor his eu negotiations, and gave the impression that he was scared of walking away. Keep your cards close. 0k. Mark, what has been the reaction in europe today . I think what we can expect tomorrow is, firstly, expressions of regret that britain is going ahead with this. Then pretty swiftly after that, some fundamental declarations of principle. On the financial issue, i think you can expect a pretty hard line. The eus legal advice is that britain is liable for budget contributions, one person told me tonight at least 45 Billion Euros between now and 2020. And they simply will say they wont budge. By about one months time, the formal Negotiating Guidelines will have been given to the negotiator and i think things will go quiet for a while. For a whole load of reasons, including in this country and others. Then i think we will see things playing into next year with particularly the german strategy and that of the president of the European Council donald tusk, i think it will be to take a tough line and offer britain as many opportunities to change its mind as possible, right up to that vote on the terms of the deal as it is being proposed that will happen in parliament towards the end of the process. Nick, we cant forget today there has been another vote in scotland to request another independence referendum. And a predictable response from the uk government saying now isnt the time to have that. On thursday david davis will say to the Scottish Government and the other devolved administrations, the uk government doesnt want to hoard power. He will say he is prepared to hand back some, but not all powers on fisheries and agriculture, to those devolved administrations. David davis will do that when he sets out the next stage after the triggering of article 50, the great repeal bill. It annuls the Act Of Parliament that took us into the eec and it secondly brings back into uk law all the eu law. Really interesting on the next stage after that, what of those eu laws that will be in uk law, what they should appeal. He will say that isnt this parliament, that is that the next parliament, put it in the tory manifesto. Reaction will be very interesting. Thank you. Once the ceremonies of tomorrows triggering are done with, there is the possibility of no deal at all. We are joined by anna soubry and bernard jenkin. Good evening. Im an ex remainer. We are leaving the eu, so i dont know what you would call me. We ought to get the language right, i think. Are you a happy lever . Leaver . Of course im not. I think our country has lost the plot and i am extremely worried about our future. But weve got this vote, weve got to deliver it, the Prime Minister has been remarkably courageous in stepping up and accepting this button which she would clearly not have chosen, and shes now got to deliver four bespoke deals in under two years. Almost an impossible task. You dont think she can do it . I think shes got to be brave to say if we need more time, if we need a transition period shes got to do that. Most of all, shes got to resist the calls from dear bernard who will urge her with his merry band who have been wreaking havoc in my party for decades, to avoid a hard brexit which nobody in my constituency, nor i believe anywhere else in the country, voted for. Is it a problem if there is no deal . You said its almost impossible for her. Let me just find out from bernard, do you think it is a disaster if there isnt a deal . It depends what you mean by deal. I agree the idea we are going to finish up with a Comprehensive Trade Agreement with the eu within two years is extremely unlikely, not least because the eu would find it very difficult to agree such a deal. It takes the eu a very long time to agree these things. So i think anna is right that we finish up with some kind of transitional arrangement. What we should hope for is that we will sign sensible arrangements for Customs Facilitation and memoranda of understanding and that sort of thing. Which the eu has with every other Country Trades within the world, whether or not its got a trade deal. Hopefully well get the eu to accept our offer of free trade, that is zero tariff on manufactures, so that we can carry on trading more or less as we do at the moment. If the eu cant accept that, or they want us to pay too much for that, thats the point at which we have to say, no, thats ok, well pay the tariffs. There will be a process of adjustment if we have to introduce tariffs, but the adjustment will be much more severe fur some of the industries in the European Union that export so much more to our country than we do to them. And the british exchequer will raise billions and billions of pounds from the import tariffs from the eu which we can spend on supporting the motor industry, Inward Investment and investment allowances, grants to science and technology and other things that make us competitive. Anna, if you go into negotiations saying we have to come to a deal at the end of two years, youve lost your hand, havent you . Im not saying that. I think the Prime Minister wants a deal. We all want a deal. Im glad, because im afraid there are lots of people on your side who dont want a deal. They want us to fall off the cliff edge and go hanging. For a start, there is no cliff edge. Unless the eu is completely insane and not going to sign anything with us, not even the most basic Customs Facilitation deals. I cant believe the eu is as insane as that or as incapable as that. Its the time it would take to do that. This is really simple stuff. All our product standards. Are you saying this negotiation period is simple . A comprehensive Free Trade Agreement is complicated. Except there is one huge advantage to the eu and the uk, all our regulation is currently aligned. We arent like the eu and canada, or the eu and china, where theyve got to think about how they deal with the misalignment of regulation. We start from the same business. A car in the uk is the same as a car in the eu. Its exactly the same. We dont need to stop at the borders to prove they are cars. The problem is this idea, that its a simple process on trade, its not about trade. Dont misrepresent what i said. What im saying is, even if we come out of the eu without any trade deal, we will still have Customs Facilitation arrangement, product recognition, all of these things. Do you want there to be a formal deal, or do you want the uk to walk away having another chip to bargain with . When you say another chip to bargain with, the eu the demander in this negotiation, the uk is asking us to give money, they are asking us to give concessions. We are offering a blanket offer. We are saying you can have access to your biggest export market, exactly as you do now, without any costs or tariffs, if that is what you want. The choices for the eu, theyve got to decide. This is madness. We dont hold the cards. Yes we do. There are 27 members left in the eu. We need them much more than they need us. Im sorry, youve got to be honest about it. It is to everybodys mutual advantage that we have a Free Trade Agreement and recognition of Financial Services and zero tariffs and all those things. We are in a much stronger position than them. Weve got to get four deals. You havent let me explain this thing about the four hugely complicated deals we have to do. We have to sort out european citizens, eu citizenship. That in itself is difficult. Secondly, we have customs to sort out. Thirdly we have trade to sort out. Fourthly, we have to do a bespoke deal on security. They are all bespoke deals. And we are going to do all of that in about 18 months, and some of it is simple . Itsjust, youre not being honest with people about whats happening. And actually, what we are really doing. Ijust need to say this. All of this madness, this complexity, this nightmare of detail, when actually what we are doing is we are walking away from 500 million customers. What we have at the moment, a single market, which has provided decades of prosperity for our country. Which needs to be negotiated. Bernard, you are saying these negotiations can carry on, but would you be prepared to walk away, do you think we can walk away and not pay any money . If they ask us. First of all, article 50 is very clear. All our obligations fall away when article 50 reaches the end of the process. We wont have to pay a penny if we dont want to. If no deal is struck. And then the eu has the choice to take the uk to court. They wouldnt, because article 50 is in the treaties of the European Union and that trumps any of the other convention or treaty rules. They replaced the rules were leaving the eu with article 50 is about is the law that would apply. The idea of the European Court ofjustice would apply International Law and not their own treaties, it just wouldnt happen. So you are telling people we can just walk away, well have no bills at all, and we walk away onto Wto Rules And Regulations and tariffs, and no customs deal . There would have to be a customs deal. Do you really believe the eu would be insane enough not to do a Customs Facilitation deal with the uk . When they do it with america, with whom they dont have a trade deal, they do it with a number of countries they dont have a trade deal with. Bmw would be happy with that arrangement. This idea that we hold all the cards. So you think they are insane . I think we are insane for not being honest with people about the complexities and the dangers to our economy. We are jumping off the cliff. Thank you for a very energetic conversation and debate. Now, if the triggering of article 50 feels like the end of the beginning, what is there to say about that beginning . Its been nine months since we voted to leave and in that time weve heard an awful lot about the uks Divorce Terms but have politicians made enough effort to set up the negotiations to embrace the opportunities that brexit offers . Not according to leading brexiteer tim montgomerie. Heres his viewsnight. Hard or soft, clean or dirty, or do you want brexit to be cleaned . Month after month, people have been discussing brexit as if we were ordering from a menu. It has been a com plete ordering from a menu. It has been a complete waste of time. Once the Prime Minister had correctly interpreted leave as a vote to end free movement, we were, in the words of the president of the European Council, donald task, facing just two options. No brexit or heart brexit. And if anyone can overrule donald, it will not be asked. It is more likely to be frances next president or the new chancellor of germany. Take control was the winning slogan of vote leave. And we should and could have spent the last year the kind of britain we will soon be able to build. A british Immigration Policy to give us Skilled Labour for the city, Immigration Policy to give us Skilled Labourfor the city, for farms, four hospitals, without overloading Public Services for. Cheaper Energy Policies to revive manufacturing. And incentives to create more jobs up manufacturing. And incentives to create morejobs up north and more Affordable Housing down south. Such forwardthinking might have further encouraged eu leaders to strike a deal that kept them fully plugged into the uk economy. Nine months after britains historic brexit vote, some remain supporters are still trying to understand why so many of their countrymen voted to leave. On the eve of our formally beginning divorce proceedings, one of the most prominent remainers, former lib dem leader nick clegg has travelled to ebbe vale a town which saw the highest proportion of voters in wales that voted to leave the eu. Its also a town that received millions of pounds in funds from the eu. Heres the former deputy Prime Ministerfinding out why, for ebbe vales citizens, divorce from the eu was so much more appealing than its money. Singing. This is ebbw vale. A town of around 30,000 people in the heart of the Beautiful Welsh valleys. Once home to the largest steelworks in europe, ebbw vale today is in one of the most socially and economically deprived regions in the united kingdom. Singing. A quarter of working age adults are on benefits. Male unemployment is more than double the national average. And more than a third of the population have no educational qualifications at all. Singing. To any casual visitor, ebbw vale doesnt superficially look or feel like one of the most hard hit areas of britain. The Old Steelworks has recently been redeveloped at a cost of £350 million, creating new schools and colleges, a new hospital, and state of the art sports facilities, not to mention all the Construction Work involved in Building New Road and rail links into town. Ive also never been to a place with so many blue eu flags, adorning all these new buildings. They are literally everywhere. Thats because the eu has funded a sizeable part of all the regeneration here. A whopping £1. 8 billion has been invested by the eu in wales since 2014. Yet in the brexit referendum, 62 of people here voted to leave, the highest proportion in wales. So much of the investment here has come from the European Union. The college over there, the station over there, all of these buildings were invested in from funds from the European Union. Funds which wont necessarily be replaced by governments in london and cardiff. So my first question is, why did people vote in large numbers against the European Union, the source of so much investment in this community . Five and six. Monday night is bingo night at the ex servicemens club. Six and two, 62. Six and two. That is the percentage that voted out with brexit. It pains me to say that. My name is george mont, and from ebbw vale, born and bred. I voted to get out with brexit. I would like to put the great back in great britain. Because we are not governing ourselves, we are governed by people that we dont know. My name is maria williams. From ebbw vale, south wales. I voted out of brexit for two main reasons. To stop the Illegal Immigrants coming in and to get our Justice System back. My name is maureen windmill from ebbw vale, south wales. I voted out for brexit. One of the main reasons being any monies that weve received from europe to be spent on our town was spent on the wrong things. Fairly unanimous views from the bingo crowd, then. The next morning i met up with the leader of the ebbw vale business forum, phil edwards. He agreed to show me some examples of what people here feel has been misspent eu money. We started on the new £2. 5 million lift that takes you up the side of the Old Steelworks slag heap. Fantastic amount of money, over half a billion. Half a billion . The Drag