Tories still prepared for no deal
Boris Johnson has admitted for the first time during the election campaign that Britain could still leave the European Union without a deal.
The prime minister had previously suggested that a no-deal Brexit was off the table because he had an ‘‘oven-ready’’ deal that he would push through parliament if he won a working majority.
However, he said yesterday that the Conservative Party would remain in a ‘‘state of readiness’’ for a no-deal Brexit.
Johnson’s critics have repeatedly warned that Britain could crash out of the EU on December 31 if he fails to secure a deal.
The prime minister yesterday tried to appeal to Brexit voters, pledging measures to boost businesses after Britain leaves the bloc.
Johnson pledged to introduce new state aid rules to make it ‘‘faster and easier’’ for the government to protect jobs when an industry or company faced collapse. However, the policy could put him on on a collision course with Brussels over any future trade deal.
Asked about keeping no-deal preparations going, Johnson said: ‘‘Many of those preparations will be extremely valuable as we come out of EU arrangements anyway. So I think that they were the right thing to have done and to keep in a state of readiness.’’
He repeated his assertion that Britain and the EU would be able to strike a new free trade deal by the end next year, a time scale experts say is wildly ambitious.
Meanwhile, Johnson’s words about single mothers came back to haunt him yesterday, calling into question his own personal life and family relationships.
Appearing on radio station LBC, he was confronted by an angry listener who called the show to reference a 1995 article he wrote for The Spectator describing the children of single mothers as ‘‘ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate’’.
The caller, identified as Ruth, said: ‘‘Why are you happy to criticise people like me when you refuse to discuss your family?’’
Johnson replied: ‘‘These are 25-year-old quotations culled from articles written, I think, before I was even in politics.’’ He added: ‘‘I love my children very much, but they are not standing at this election. I’m not therefore going to comment on them.’’
Johnson, who has been married twice, has four children with his most recent ex-wife, who he separated from in 2018. He was frequently accused of adultery, and rumours have long swirled that he has a fifth child, a daughter, from an affair.
Johnson has also been accused of having an affair with American businesswoman Jennifer Arcuri, who recently divulged that he had told her he did, indeed, have five children.