Govt needs ‘guts’ on Brexit – Johnson
Boris Johnson has warned that Britain could end up ‘‘locked in orbit around the EU’’ in his most critical comments to date about Prime Minister Theresa May’s handling of Brexit.
The Foreign Secretary told Conservative donors that the country could end up effectively ‘‘in the customs union and to a large extent still in the single market’’ unless the Government had the ‘‘guts’’ to pursue the right policies.
He even joked that if President Donald Trump was in charge of Brexit, ‘‘actually you might get somewhere’’.
Johnson said it was ‘‘beyond belief’’ that the Northern Ireland border issue had been allowed to dictate policy, describing it as ‘‘allowing the tail to wag the dog’’. He also described Philip Hammond’s Treasury as ‘‘basically the heart of Remain’’.
One of the guests at the private dinner for 20 donors on Thursday recorded the comments. Johnson’s direct criticism of May’s negotiating strategy with the EU is likely to lead to renewed speculation about his future.
On what amounted to a chaotic day for the Government’s Brexit policy, May also made a series of concessions designed to head off a rebellion over the EU Withdrawal Bill next week.
The Government tabled five amendments to the Bill, one including an extension of the right to bring court cases under European law from three months after exit day to three years, provided the law suits have arisen before March 2019.
Downing Street also conceded that Britain could end up paying more money to the EU following the end of the transition period in 2020, after May announced that her ‘‘backstop’’ plan to avoid a hard border with the Republic of Ireland would have an ‘‘expected’’ end date of December 2021.
Meanwhile, Sir Alan Duncan, Johnson’s deputy at the Foreign Office, appeared to suggest it was possible that a referendum could be held on whether to accept the final Brexit deal.
May left London on a flight to the G7 summit in Canada yesterday believing she had headed off the latest crisis over Brexit, after placating David Davis when he had threatened to resign as Brexit Secretary.
But while May was en route, a transcript of a recording of Johnson’s remarks appeared on the Buzzfeed website. He had spent an hour answering questions during the dinner at the Institute of Directors in London, which followed a meeting of the Conservative Way Forward policy group.
Johnson said Brexit ‘‘will happen’’ but ‘‘the risk is that it will not be the one we want’’. He said there was a high chance of a Brexit that crossed the ‘‘red lines’’, keeping Britain ‘‘locked in orbit around the EU, in the customs union and to a large extent still in the single market . . . so not really having full freedom on our trade policy, our tariff schedules, and not having freedom with our regulatory framework either’’.
He said Remainers were too worried about short-term disruption to see the longer-term benefits, adding: ‘‘What they don’t want is friction at the borders. They don’t want any disruption of the economy. So they’re sacrificing all the medium and long-term gains out of fear of short-term disruption.
‘‘The fear of short-term disruption has become so huge in people’s minds that they’ve turned into a quivering wreck. They’re terrified of this nonsense. It’s mumbo jumbo.’’
He said the ‘‘prophecies of doom’’ were ‘‘pure millennium bug stuff’’, and continued: ‘‘The idea that we can’t track movement of goods, it’s just nonsense. Unless you make the change, unless you have the guts to go for the independent policy, you’re never going to get the economic benefits of Brexit. You’ll never get the political benefits of Brexit.’’
Turning to the subject of the US president, Johnson said: ‘‘Imagine Trump doing Brexit. He’d go in bloody hard . . . there’d be all sorts of breakdowns, all sorts of chaos. Everyone would think he’d gone mad. But actually you might get somewhere. It’s a very, very good thought.’’
However, he backed May to ‘‘go into a phase where we are much more combative with Brussels’’.
He said: ‘‘You’ve got to face the fact there may now be a meltdown. OK? I don’t want anybody to panic during the meltdown. No panic. Pro bono publico, no bloody panic. It’s going to be all right in the end.’’
A friend of Johnson’s said that it was ‘‘disappointing’’ that his comments had been recorded. Downing Street declined to comment. – Telegraph Group