Brexit secretary Stephen Barclay has met his EU counterpart Michel Barnier in Brussels today after Jean-Claude Juncker insisted “we can have a deal” before the 31 October deadline.
Mr Barclay had suggested the UK should be given until the end of 2020 to come up with a replacement for the Irish backstop policy – but has been told today the EU could not consider a deal without a backstop or replacement arrangement.
It comes as Irish deputy prime minister Simon Coveney poured cold water over Boris Johnson's tentative claims of progress, saying: "We are not close to a deal".
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There is a 'wide gap' between solutions UK government is proposing and what the EU will be able to support, says CoveneyLabour's Naz Shah has called for the prime minister to sack a Tory minister who allegedly made Islamophobic remarks.
She was responding to complaints from Sajjad Karim, a Conservative Party member and former MEP, who said: "I have experienced conversations taking place with Islamophobic content directly about me, being conducted by very senior members of the Conservative Party - in fact parliamentarians, one of whom is in fact a serving minister at this moment in time.
"Ultimately, this is about values and if we allow Islamophobia, or any other form of discrimination, to go unchecked, what we are doing actually is undermining our own values."
Mr Karim has not revealed the name of the minister in question, but said he would give it to Conservative Party headquarters if they wanted to investigate the incident.
Ms Shah said: "Whoever this is, they are not fit to serve as an MP, let alone as a government minister.
"Boris Johnson must act, find out who it is and sack them."
Cross-party MPs are planning to table legislation to force the government to adopt a radical climate change target to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.
Ahead of a global wave of climate protests on Friday, Labour frontbencher Clive Lewis and Green MP Caroline Lucas have announced plans for a bill that would bring forward the deadline for net-zero carbon emissions by two decades.
Theresa May vowed to introduce a legally binding target to cut carbon emissions by 2050 after recommendations from independent climate change advisers - but campaigners want the government to move faster to tackle the looming climate crisis.
Brexit Party MEPs abstained from voting on a European Parliament resolution on Thursday which called on Iran to release imprisoned EU-Iranian nationals, including British citizen Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
The resolution called on Iranian authorities to “immediately and unconditionally” release all dual-nationals and human rights campaigners jailed as political prisoners.
As well as naming Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who has been imprisoned in Iran since April 2016, the resolution also named EU citizens Ahmadreza Djalali and Kamran Ghaderi, who are also being held in Iran.
The Muslim Council of Britain has said the latest revelations are a "manifestation of institutional Islamophobia" in the Conservative party.
Harun Khan, secretary general of the organisation, said: "An independent and specific inquiry into Islamophobia specifically is long overdue.
"Sadly the Conservative response has been woeful. From denial, through to now a reluctant commitment to a broad and watered down investigation that we fear will do nothing to address this problem.
"The fact that former MEP Sajjad Karim has confirmed a current serving minister has made Islamophobic comments directly about him, is extremely serious and indicative of the scale of the problem.
"Investigating this minister immediately is essential will be the latest test of the apparent resolve of the party. If no action is taken, and instead they remain a minister, it will yet again demonstrate its failure to take this problem seriously."
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