Officials to rework Brexit proposal after Johnson’s attack

British Prime Minister Theresa May has told officials to do more work on future EU customs arrangements after her foreign minister attacked one of her Brexit proposals as “crazy”.

Boris Johnson’s broadside against what some say is May’s preferred option for ensuring Britain’s new border with the EU is as frictionless as possible underlines the deep division over what post-Brexit ties should look like.

May’s decision to leave the EU’s customs union, which sets tariffs for goods imported into the bloc, is one of the main flashpoints in the Brexit debate, pitting companies and pro-EU campaigners against a group of eurosceptic MPs.

Johnson and other Brexit supporters have come out against a proposal for a customs partnership that would effectively see Britain collect tariffs for the EU, putting pressure on May to dump the plan.

May’s spokesman said on Tuesday that work was continuing on the two proposals on the table: the customs partnership and a highly streamlined customs arrangement that would rely on technology. The EU has dismissed both proposals.

“The prime minister asked officials to take forward that work as a priority,” her spokesman told reporters after her Brexit war cabinet failed to come to an agreement on which plan to pursue at a meeting last week. “Following last week’s cabinet subcommittee meeting, it was agreed that there are unresolved issues in relation to both models and further work is needed,” said the representative.

Brexit campaigners have criticised the customs partnership and they believed it had been shelved until business minister Greg Clark again made the case for the proposal on Sunday.

Johnson’s words were seen as a reaction to that.

“It’s totally untried and would make it very, very difficult to do free-trade deals,” Johnson said in an interview published in Tuesday’s Daily Mail. “If you have the new customs partnership, you have a crazy system whereby you end up collecting the tariffs on behalf of the EU at the UK frontier.”

The prime minister has to tread a fine line, mindful of fear that any new customs infrastructure at the border between Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland could reignite sectarian violence that has not been seen for decades. /

IF YOU HAVE THE NEW CUSTOMS PARTNERSHIP, YOU … END UP COLLECTING THE TARIFFS ON BEHALF OF THE EU