New PM has pledged to help EU citizens in the UK after Brexit – but not the 1.3 million British folk in the EU
Campaigners for British citizens in Europe say they are being treated as nonentities by Boris Johnson in his race to get Brexit over the line.
They say they have been completely forgotten by the new prime minister, who instead went out of his way to pledge that he would look after EU citizens in the UK in his maiden speech in Downing Street.
Continue reading...Likely new PM could find no-deal option thwarted by senior Tories such as Philip Hammond
Boris Johnson’s hoped-for triumphant march into Downing Street this week is set to be dampened by a carefully timed series of resignations by senior ministers, who will retreat to the backbenches with a vow to thwart any moves towards a no-deal Brexit.
The announcements by Philip Hammond and David Gauke that they will step down on Wednesday, immediately before Johnson is likely to head to Buckingham Palace, highlight the perilous political climate for Theresa May’s expected successor.
Continue reading...Tory leadership rivals kept informed about spiralling crisis in the Gulf as ex-naval chief blasts government
Admiral Lord West: ‘our political establishment have been focused on the election of a new prime minister’
Boris Johnson will be tested by a major international crisis in his first days as prime minister, senior military figures and politicians have warned, after Iran seized a British-flagged tanker in a move that raised tensions in the Gulf to new heights.
Johnson, who is expected to win the race to succeed Theresa May as Tory leader and be installed as the new prime minister on Wednesday, was kept informed about the spiralling crisis on Saturday by his rival for the top job, Jeremy Hunt, whom he is expected to reappoint as foreign secretary.
Continue reading...Legal threat comes as campaigners warn UK government that courts are being used to intimidate journalists
Letter: press freedom campaigners call for action on ‘vexatious lawsuits’
Related: The Great Hack: the film that goes behind the scenes of the Facebook data scandal
The businessman Arron Banks and the unofficial Brexit campaign Leave.EU have issued a legal threat against streaming giant Netflix in relation to The Great Hack, a new documentary about the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the abuse of personal data.
Continue reading...Pro-Europe grassroots groups to voice opposition to a Johnson premiership
Protesters will take to London’s streets on Saturday for a “No to Boris. Yes to Europe” march days ahead of Boris Johnson’s widely anticipated move into No 10.
A Boris toddler blimp was launched in Parliament Square at 10am, featuring salmon-pink skin, the politician’s trademark “faux-dishevelled hairstyle”, mismatched running gear and a Brexit-bus T-shirt, according to March for Change.
Continue reading...Exclusive: extra time could be used for renegotiation but will be billed as chance for no-deal planning
Brussels is preparing to offer Boris Johnson a no-deal Brexit extension beyond 31 October in an attempt to help him keep the Conservative party together and provide one more chance to strike an agreement deal.
The extra period of EU membership would be used for renegotiation but could be billed to Conservative Brexiters as an opportunity to prepare further for leaving without a deal.
Continue reading...Exclusive: newly elected EU chief suggests there could be emergency help for Ireland
The European commission’s new president has said a hard Brexit would have “massively negative consequences” for both Britain and the EU, and said Brussels could provide emergency help for nations such as Ireland that bear the brunt of such an outcome.
In her first interview since narrowly being approved for the post by the European parliament on Tuesday, Ursula von der Leyen said the withdrawal deal concluded between Theresa May and the commission’s chief Brexit negotiator, Michael Barnier, would remain the basis of any future talks.
Continue reading...Michel Barnier says the UK will ‘have to face the consequences’ of crashing out
Boris Johnson’s suggestion he could use the threat of no deal to win an improved Brexit deal for the UK risks falling on deaf ears in Brussels, the EU’s top negotiator has suggested.
Michel Barnier suggested, in an interview carried out in May for the BBC Panorama programme, that Theresa May’s negotiating team never tried to use the spectre of a no-deal Brexit despite calls from Tory hardliners to do so.
Continue reading...Report identifies Zimbabwe-style seizures as key concern in the event of a united Ireland
Some unionists in Northern Ireland fear Zimbabwe-style land seizures by Irish nationalists if the region joins a united Ireland, according to a report that lays bare anxieties about any Brexit-fuelled breakup of the UK.
Farmers and others with Protestant and unionist backgrounds worry that Catholic and nationalist neighbours would claim their land in a cultural, economic and political takeover by Dublin – “the mother of all fears”, the report found.
Continue reading...No 10 frontrunner wrote ‘pro-European letter’ to Tory peer’s widow a year before campaigning for leave
Boris Johnson revealed his support for the European Union’s single market in “a pro-European” letter written the year before he decided to campaign for leave, it has emerged.
The likely prime minister’s pro-EU market sympathies were said to be revealed in a letter of condolence to the wife of the late Tory politician Sir Leon Brittan, who died in January 2015.
Continue reading...The EU commission president candidate Ursula von der Leyen was booed by Brexit party MEPs as she spoke of her openness to extend the UK’s membership of the EU after 31 October. Speaking in Strasbourg before a vote on Tuesday evening to confirm her position, the outgoing German defence minister said: 'I stand ready for a further extension of the withdrawal date, should more time be required for a good reason.' The leader of the Brexit party, Nigel Farage, accused Von der Leyen of wanting to build 'a centralised, undemocratic, updated form of communism where nation state parliaments will cease to have any relevance at all'
Continue reading...Next PM will be told in ‘no uncertain terms’ that axing backstop amounts to no deal
Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt’s Brexit plan to axe the Irish border backstop from the withdrawal agreement will be rejected outright by the European Union, EU sources have said.
Informed sources say that it is doomed to failure and if the next prime minister goes to Brussels with such a plan, he will be told in “no uncertain terms” that it amounts to a declaration of no deal.
Continue reading...Candidate to lead European commission seeks to win over MEPs and seal knife-edge vote
The woman seeking to replace Jean-Claude Juncker as the European commission president has made last-minute pledges on the climate crisis, Brexit, an EU minimum wage and gender quotas for company boards as she faces a knife-edge vote on her candidacy.
In leaked letters to the leaders of two of the EU parliament’s main political groups, Ursula von der Leyen, who was nominated two weeks ago by the heads of state and government for the top EU post, has sought to win over critical left-leaning MEPs at the risk of alienating some on the right.
Continue reading...Cabinet members seek jobs under new PM with Liz Truss eyeing role of chancellor
Boris Johnson has begun receiving very public job applications from would-be cabinet ministers, with Liz Truss pitching to be a tax-slashing chancellor and Amber Rudd ditching her opposition to a no-deal Brexit in a bid to stay on as work and pensions secretary.
With Johnson on the brink of No 10, senior Tories have begun laying out their credentials for positions in his potential cabinet – some with more hope than others.
Continue reading...Nominee to lead European commission also says ‘precious’ backstop must be defended
Ursula von der Leyen, the nominee to lead the European commission, has signalled she will not reopen Brexit talks with the next British prime minister and stressed the “precious” Irish backstop must be defended.
She said she still hoped the UK would remain in the European Union, while indicating she had no intention to renegotiate the withdrawal deal agreed by Theresa May and EU leaders.
Continue reading...Rolling coverage of the day’s political news, including the row over the UK ambassador’s leaked memos and latest on Tory leadership contest
Jeremy Hunt, the underdog in the Tory leadership contest, has told President Trump on Twitter his comments about Theresa May “disrespectful and wrong”.
1/2 @realDonaldTrump friends speak frankly so I will: these comments are disrespectful and wrong to our Prime Minister and my country. Your diplomats give their private opinions to @SecPompeo and so do ours! You said the UK/US alliance was the greatest in history and I agree... https://t.co/hNeBWmyyVN
2/2...but allies need to treat each other with respect as @theresa_may has always done with you. Ambassadors are appointed by the UK government and if I become PM our Ambassador stays.
MPs have voted to introduce same-sex marriage in Northern Ireland, unless the power-sharing executive is revived by 21 October, by 383 votes to 73 - a majority of 310.
Continue reading...Email to members stops short of setting out party’s stance in event of early general election
Jeremy Corbyn has sought to draw a line under Labour’s Brexit travails by announcing a “settled” policy of backing remain in any referendum called on a Conservative deal.
The Labour leader has been under intense pressure to shift to an overtly anti-Brexit stance, but has insisted on consulting the party’s stakeholders in recent weeks, including the trade unions.
Continue reading...Party poised to announce move in surprise consensus but will still seek deal if elected in time
Labour is poised to declare it will campaign for remain in a second referendum on any deal put to parliament by a Conservative prime minister, after trade union leaders including Unite’s Len McCluskey backed a change of policy.
The joint position agreed by the unions on Monday would not commit Labour to an explicitly pro-remain position in all circumstances: unions also agreed Labour should seek to deliver a Brexit deal if the party won an election before the UK left the EU.
Continue reading...Tory leadership frontrunner pledges to leave the EU by 31 October ‘come what may’
Boris Johnson has pledged to get the UK “match fit for no deal” to ensure it can leave the EU on 31 October “come what may”.
The Conservative leadership frontrunner said there would be “no second chances” as he stressed that the Halloween deadline was real, “not fake”, in a comment aimed at his rival Jeremy Hunt.
Continue reading...Boris Johnson is being warned that embracing a disruptive no-deal Brexit would fuel nationalism in Scotland and risk the future of the union, as both opponents and supporters predict that he will now claim a decisive victory in the Tory leadership election.
Related: Brexit must work for the whole UK to see off Scottish nationalism
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