Brexit: Sam Gyimah says fresh referendum could be 'most sensible path' hours after quitting government

On the negotiations, the former universities minister said: ‘It is like playing a football game against another team when they are the referee and they can make the rules as they go along’

Sam Gyimah has said a fresh Brexit referendum might be the “most sensible” path if Theresa May’s deal is voted down in the Commons, just hours after he resigned from his government role.

Laying into the prime minister’s “deal in name only” agreement, the former universities minister confirmed he would vote against the UK-EU agreement in a crucial Commons vote in 10 days’ time.

With reports that up to 100 Conservative MPs are opposed to the deal, his resignation adds yet further pressure on Ms May, who has recently brushed off questions on whether she will step aside if her deal is defeated in the chamber on 11 December.

Mr Gyimah’s said the government’s decision to pull out of the bloc’s Galileo satellite navigation system, following EU-imposed restrictions, was a deciding factor in his resignation and a “foretaste of the brutal negotiations” the UK will go through over the future trading relationship.

“Looking at the deal in detail, we don’t actually have a deal,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “We have given up our voice, our veto and our vote. Our interests will be hammered because we will have no leverage.

“They [the EU] set the hurdles you have to clear. It is like playing a football game against another team when they are the referee and they can make the rules as they go along.”

Urging Ms May not to rule out calls for a Final Say referendum, he continued: “There is now a blocking minority in the House of Commons for almost every possible option which means that letting the people decide, now that we know more, might be the most sensible path for both Leavers and Remainers.”

“The prime minister has already taken one step in that direction by appealing to the country to put pressure on MPs to vote for her deal,” he said. “If you are going to appeal to the country to put pressure on MPs to vote for a deal, then by all means you give the decision to the country in terms of which direction we go in.

“If parliament was in deadlock, Theresa May could get herself out of that deadlock by backing a second referendum.”

Jeremy Wright, the culture secretary, also told the programme that he was “very sad” to see the universities minister walk away from the government over Ms May’s deal, which he acknowledged was not perfect, but the best available.

“All of my colleagues are going to have to make their own judgement about what they think about this deal,” he said. “The negotiation we have had with the European Union was always going to be a matter of compromise for both sides. You do have to compare this deal with the realistically available alternatives.

“Either we leave with no deal, which would have serious economic consequences, or we say to the British public, ‘I’m sorry you have got it wrong, you are going to have to do it again’ – which I think would have serious democratic consequences.

He added: “This isn’t a perfect deal, but I think it is the best one available.”

Mr Gyimah’s remarks, however, came as Michael Gove, the environment secretary, urged Tory Brexiteers to get behind the agreement in an article for the Daily Mail. He warned that Brexit could be “in peril” if the agreement is rejected by MPs.

“Does the deal deliver 100 per cent of what I wanted? No,” he wrote. “But then we didn’t win 100 per cent of the vote ... You can’t always get everything that you want.”