1,000 WASTED DAYS
Exactly1,000 days ago, Britain voted to leave the EU. Today incompetent MPs and hard Brexit zealots have made us a laughing stock – and now Brussels is telling us ‘to think again’. The result...
BORIS Johnson yesterday told Theresa May he will still not vote for her deal despite her warning him Brexit is at risk.
The Prime Minister called her former foreign secretary into Downing Street for last ditch talks urging him to get behind her plan.
In a face-to-face meeting of around 40 minutes, Mrs May warned that failure to back her deal would result in a delayed departure from the EU.
She also expressed concerns that MPs could seize control of the process, meaning Brexit could be watered down or might not happen at all.
But Mr Johnson told her he would not back down unless she successfully renegotiated the Irish backstop.
‘His position remains the same,’ said a friend. ‘Unless there is some sort of movement on the backstop, he will not vote for the deal.’ The source declined to comment on whether the pair discussed in their meeting the suggestion of some Brexiteers that Mrs May should set out a timetable for her own departure in return for Tory MPs passing her deal.
Critics of Mr Johnson have accused him of posturing ahead of a future Tory leadership contest. But his supporters argue he has been consistent in his opposition to Mrs May’s plan.
In a newspaper column earlier this week, Mr Johnson argued it was not possible for ‘ anybody who believes in Brexit’ to vote for the withdrawal agreement.
He told how he had sought advice from his local constituency association on whether to ‘stick to my guns or fold’.
He wrote: ‘I could continue to oppose a deal that I believe is detrimental to the interests of this country, in the sense that we risk becoming a kind of economic colony of Brussels.
‘Or else I could compromise, and vote it through, on the grounds that there was now a real risk that Brexit would not happen at all – and in the hope that the many defects in the deal could be fixed later.
‘ My constituents were strongly of the view that I should not compromise. They assured me that they would support whatever decision I took – but they believed I should continue to vote against the deal.’
Mr Johnson argued that Mrs May’s agreement would leave the UK ‘in a position of almost unbearable weakness’ for subsequent talks on trade.
‘Unless we have some change – and at present, in the immortal phrase, nothing has changed – it is hard to ask anyone who believes in Brexit to change their mind,’ he said. ‘There is an EU summit this week. It is not too late to get real change to the backstop. It would be absurd to hold the vote before that has even been attempted.’
Since quitting as foreign secretary last July, Mr Johnson has repeatedly used newspaper columns to attack Mrs May’s Brexit strategy.
In his most controversial intervention, he claimed in September that her plans had strapped a ‘ suicide vest’ around the UK constitution and handed the detonator to Brussels.
Mrs May needs 75 MPs who voted against her Brexit deal last week, when she lost by a majority of 149, to switch sides if it is to pass. She is hoping to win over the DUP’s ten MPs.
‘He will not vote for the deal’