Evening summary
- Peers have voted for an amendment to the EU withdrawal bill saying that remaining in the EEA (the European Economic Area) should be a government Brexit negotiating objective. It was the 13th defeat the government has suffered on the bill in the Lords, and probably the one that does most to challenge the government’s Brexit plans because it is designed to keep the UK in the single market. Labour MPs were under orders to abstain in the division, but 83 of them - 44% of the total - voted with the Lib Dems in support of the amendment, tabled by the Labour peer Lord Alli. The crossbenchers also sided largely with Alli (50 for, 21 against). The bill will go back to the Commons quite soon where the government will try to reverse most or all of the Lords defeats, and certainly this one. But this will create a major headache for Jeremy Corbyn, who has refused to commit Labour to keeping the UK in the single market even though polls suggest this option is favoured by 87% of Labour party members.
- Downing Street has chosen not to deliver a public rebuke to Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, after he described the prime minister’s preferred post-Brexit customs plan as “crazy”. But the prime minister’s spokesman insisted the plan was still being considered as an option. (See 2.28pm.)
- Caroline Nokes, the immigration minister, has agreed to review decisions to deport highly-skilled immigrants to see whether “trivial mistakes” are to blame. (See 6.03pm.)
That’s all from me for this evening.
Thanks for the comments.
Peter Ricketts, a former head of the Foreign Office and now a crossbench peer, thinks EEA membership could end up as a useful insurance option for the government.
In last day of voting on amendments to EU Bill, Lords have just carried an amendment to make it an objective of the Govt to ensure U.K. can stay in Euro Econ Area after Brexit. Useful insurance against a crash-out scenario. And carried despite Labour Peers being told to abstain!
— Peter Ricketts (@LordRickettsP) May 8, 2018
We have not had a formal response from the government yet, but they are almost certain not to take such a benign view of the vote.
Full list of 17 Tory rebels over EEA
Here is the full list of 17 Tory rebels.
Lady Altmann
Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom
Lord Bowness
Lord Cooper of Windrush
Lord Cormack
Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint
Visount Hailsham
Lord Heseltine
Lord Inglewood
Lady McGregor-Smith
Lord Northbrook
Lord Patten of Barnes
Lord Prior of Brampton,
Lord Tugendhat
Lady Verma
Duke of Wellington
Lady Wheatcroft
83 Labour peers and 17 Tories defy their party whip to vote for EEA amendment
Here are the voting figures.
Some 83 Labour peers - 44% of the total - defied the whip and voted for the Alli amendment.
There were also 17 Tory rebels.
Updated
MPs who have been campaigning for a softer Brexit have warmly welcomed the Lords vote. These tweets are from Labour MPs.
From Chuka Umunna
.@UKHouseofLords votes 245:218 in favour of Lord Alli’s EEA amendments. Fantastic result - in line with the wishes of @UKLabour members, supporter, voters, the TUC and British business! The country, jobs and our economy must come first
— Chuka Umunna (@ChukaUmunna) May 8, 2018
From Stephen Doughty
Great news to hear Labour’s fantastic Waheed Alli’s amendment on #SingleMarket #EEA carried with cross-party support in Lords - taking strong stand against reckless hard #Brexit - unusually I went up to Lords to watch result in person! @Open_Britain @peoplesvote_uk
— Stephen Doughty (@SDoughtyMP) May 8, 2018
From Chris Leslie
There is some hope! Lords ignore party whips and vote to keep UK in the EEA Single Market. This means MPs will have chance to decide now - please RT to let @Keir_Starmer and @jeremycorbyn know that we cannot afford for Labour frontbench to abstain again when it comes to Commons.
— Chris Leslie (@ChrisLeslieMP) May 8, 2018
From Owen Smith, who was sacked from the shadow cabinet for calling for a referendum on the Brexit outcome
Despite the Whip, Labour Peers voted in significant numbers tonight and have won the vote to keep the option of Single Market membership on the table - ensuring the Commons will now have a vote to do the same. Democracy in action!
— Owen Smith (@OwenSmith_MP) May 8, 2018
And this is from the pro-European Conservative, Antoinette Sandbach
The #EEA amendment is carried in the Lords despite front bench opposition from Labour. This ensures that options are kept open and not closed down. 245 to 218
— Antoinette Sandbach (@Sandbach) May 8, 2018
What the EEA amendment says
Here is the amendment, amendment 110A, passed by the House of Lords in full.
Page 15, line 21, at end insert—
“(2B) But none of the remaining provisions may come into force until it is a negotiating objective of the Government to ensure that an international agreement has been made which enables the United Kingdom to continue to participate in the European Economic Area after exit day.
(2C) Regulations under this Act may not repeal or amend subsection (2B).”
Peers vote to keep UK in EEA by majority of 29 as many Labour peers defy orders to abstain
Peers have voted for the EEA amendment by 245 votes to 218 - a majority of 27.
It looks as if many Labour peers defied party orders telling them to abstain. The full figures will be available within the next few minutes.
UPDATE: The result was read out as 245 votes for the amendment, but actually it was 247 votes in favour, and 218 against - a majority of 29. See 8.12pm.
UPDATE #HouseofLords votes 247 for, 218 against amendment on the European Economic Area, so change to the #EUWithdrawalBill is made. Watch for more https://t.co/PeHbaXEuQ4
— House of Lords (@UKHouseofLords) May 8, 2018
Updated
Lord Alli is winding up now. He says the government is saying, if we wait long enough, they will tell us what their trade policy will be. That is not good enough, he says. He puts his amendment to a vote.
Lord Callanan, the Brexit minister, is winding up for the government now.
He welcomes Lady Hayter’s statement about Labour abstaining. And, since Hayter mentioned Boris Johnson, he says he wants to mention the shadow foreign secretary, Emily Thornberry. Her Today interview about how Labour did not want to be in the EEA, but wanted to end up “in the same place” (see 10.40am) did not clear things up, he says.
He says being in the EEA would not be right for the UK. And it would not suit Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, whose institutions are not suited to such a large economy, he says.
Shadow Brexit minister says joining Efta would rule out UK remaining in customs union
Back in the Lords Lady Hayter, the deputy Labour leader in the Lords and a shadow Brexit minister, is now winding up for the opposition. She says Labour thinks Theresa May made a grave mistake at the start of the Brexit process by sweeping various options off the table.
She says Labour has focused on preferred outcomes, not structures.
She says this amendment, that would put the UK in Efta (the European free trade association - which roughly, but not exactly, overlaps with the EEA), cuts across the amendment passed by the Lords recently saying the UK should be in the customs union.
Why, some peers ask.
Because Efta membership excludes customs union membership, she says.
- Shadow Brexit minister says joining Efta would rule out UK remaining in customs union.
She says the priority now should be getting the government to rule out a hard border in Northern Ireland.
She says Labour MPs have been asked to abstain in the vote.
Turning away from the Lords debate for a moment, Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, has issued this statement about the home affairs committee hearing earlier. She said:
We now have official confirmation that people are being kept in detention for over a year, that there were deportation targets and that some people were wrongly deported. This is after repeated denials by senior ministers, including the prime minister.
There can be no faith in a Home Office-led inquiry into the Windrush scandal overseen by government ministers. An independent inquiry is needed.
The government must come clean on its immigration policies and their effects. Until they do, they are in danger of losing all public confidence on this issue.
The Labour MP Stella Creasy says she and other Labour MPs are in the Lords chamber to listen to the EEA debate.
Standing at the bar of the House of Lords with other MPs listening to their debate now - willing them on to vote for Lord Ali’s amendment to give Britain a chance to negotiate membership of EEA #brexithaos https://t.co/bfLMCl87CG
— stellacreasy (@stellacreasy) May 8, 2018
Anne McIntosh, the former Conservative MP, is speaking in the Lords debate now. She says peers should not pass the Alli amendment because they are at risk of sending too many amendments back to the Commons. She says they should address the EEA issue when the trade bill comes to the Lords.
Updated
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard, the former Foreign Office permanent secretary who helped draft article 50, says he is sceptical of the EEA option. He says he is not sure if the Efta countries (Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein - countries in the EEA and Efta, but not in the EU) want the UK in it.
But if the UK were to apply to join, a different EEA might emerge. “I think we could do better,” he says. For that reason he is going to back the amendment, he says.
Angela Smith, the Labour leader in the Lords, issued this statement after the earlier two government defeats on the EU withdrawal bill. (See 4.22pm and 5.24pm.) She said:
These two amendments are a further opportunity for MPs to consider the finer details of this important legislation.
On our future working relations with EU agencies, many people – including within government – are only now becoming aware of the massive issues raised by our departure that ministers need to get right.
It was also a nonsense for the government to include a fixed exit date – something that could overshadow the crossing of every ‘t’ and dotting of every ‘i’ in the negotiations. The House of Lords amendment is not about stopping Brexit but the fine print of when and how the agreements are concluded.
The Labour peer George Robertson is speaking in the debate now. He says he was Europe spokesman for Labour in the Commons at the time of the Maastricht debates in the early 1990s, and at the time Labour made alliances with the Tory Eurosceptics. He says at the time Labour colleagues questioned their tactics. But they achieved the first defeat of the government for years.
He says the front bench in the Lords has been very successful up to now. It has defeated the Lords on a number of issues, giving MPs the chance to vote again on key matters. But they have not “over-egged” matters. He says, if the front bench in the Lords judge that Labour should abstain on this amendment, he will take their advice.
Our front bench has been incredibly successful up to now by taking a careful and calculated view about the issues.
If it is their calculated view tonight that we should not vote for this amendment, then I’m going to accept that judgement and I won’t vote for the amendments.
Updated
This is what Patrick Cormack said about Boris Johnson in the debate just now. (See 6.42pm.)
If anybody’s undermining the government at the moment, it’s the foreign secretary rubbishing the prime minister .... What sort of example are we being given by a cabinet that is rent asunder by the foreign secretary, the second most important cabinet minister, rubbishing the prime minister in the columns of the Daily Mail.
Michael Forsyth, the Conservative former cabinet minister and a keen Brexiter, is speaking now. He says Lord Alli suggested the UK would not get a good Brexit deal. That undermines the government’s negotiating position, he says. He says nothing is agreed until everything is agreed and, if the EU does not offer the UK a good deal, it will not get its £39bn. He says people voted to leave the EU in the referendum. Peers have to respect that decision, and should not undermine it, he says.
What [Lord Alli] is proposing is that we fly in the face of the biggest democratic vote in our history.
Patrick Cormack, another Conservative, says if anyone is undermining the government at the moment, it is the foreign secretary “rubbishing the prime minister”.
Forsyth says Cormack is known to be not very keen on the foreign secretary. The microphones pick up another peer saying: “He’s not alone in that.”
Updated
Here is the quote from Lord Mandelson about EU immigration carrying on after Brexit - despite what the government says.
As for free movement of labour, it is already open to Britain to operate less liberal labour market policies and we can do so as EEA members. Let’s be honest ... [the government] knows fully well that businesses and public services in our country will continue to need EU nationals as employees, and that’s why they are prepared to allow them to keep coming, whatever they say or don’t say now. And to pretend otherwise, in my view, is simply to perpetrate another Brexit fraud on the British public.
Mandelson says ministers will allow EU immigration to continue after Brexit - despite what they are saying
Mandelson says that, for the hard Brexiters, these arguments will not matter. For them, Brexit is a matter of politics, not economics.
But, for everyone else, jobs and wellbeing will be at risk.
He says no country the size of the UK has tried to join the EEA but not the EU. As a large economy, the UK would be well placed to negotiate a good deal, he says.
He says the government knows the public services, including the NHS, will still need EU nationals after Brexit. That is why they intend to allow EU immigration to continue - despite what they are saying now.
- Mandelson says ministers will allow EU immigration to continue after Brexit - despite what they are saying.
He concludes by saying this amendment, 110A, will allow the House of Lords to do their duty to the country.
In the Lords debate Lord Mandelson, the Labour former business secretary and former European commissioner, says services are not the same as goods. WTO rules apply to goods, but not to services.
He says it would be “extremely hard” to negotiate a free trade agreement with the EU covering services.
So there is no prospect of a trade deal with the EU amounting to “Canada plus, plus, plus,” he says. He says, as a former European trade commissioner and a UK trade secretary, he has seen this from both sides. It will not be possible for the UK to get what it is seeking, he says.
He says the only want to maintain services access after Brexit is membership of the EEA.
It is not possible for us given EU rules and the red lines of the British government for us to achieve anything like the sort of trade agreement the government speaks of.
Without effective WTO rules for trade in services and without the likelihood of a full bilateral agreement covering all services, we have to maintain our services access by other means.
The only dependable means available to us outside the EU is membership of the EEA.
This would give the UK access to the single market by right, he says. That would apply to the UK’s pre-eminent exports - financial services and broadcasting services.
He says these services are vital.
Financial services alone account of 25% of all UK services exports, he says.
If the UK leaves the single market, without the EEA passporting rights would be forfeited. The impact on cross-border delivery of services would be savage, he says.
Updated
Lady Verma, the Conservative former international development minister under David Cameron, is speaking in the debate now. She says her commitment to her country is as strong as Theresa May. The House of Lords does have the right to ask the Commons to think again, she says. Having listened to all sides of the debate, she says peers should take the opportunity, by passing this amendment, to ensure MPs get the chance to debate staying in the EEA.
The EEA is not the same as the single market, it excludes the common agricultural policy and the common fisheries policy, it is not under the jurisdiction of the European court of justice.
Remaining as a member of the EEA offers business certainty and will enable us to influence through the many committee networks that exist for non-EU members.
Updated
Peers start debating amendment saying UK should stay in EEA
In the House of Lords peers have just started debating an amendment tabled by the Labour peer Lord Alli saying the UK should stay in the European economic area.
Alli says what he is proposing is in line with Labour party policy and what Labour members want.
Minister agrees to review decisions to deport highly-skilled immigrants to see whether 'trivial mistakes' to blame
Yvette Cooper, the committee chair, says she is concerned that the Home Office does not seem to be looking into the problems experienced by highly skilled migrant workers. She says it may reflect a “culture of disbelief” in the Home Office. And it may be that officials are just under pressure to remove people to hit the migration target.
Nokes says there is a pressure to get decisions right.
Q: So why have you not looked into what is happening, to find out how many of these cases are serious fraud cases and how many involve “trivial mistakes”.
Because there have been only two working days since this issue was flagged up by Cooper in the Commons on Wednesday, Nokes says.
Q: Could you do this this evening?
I thinks so, says Nokes.
- Immigration minister Caroline Nokes agrees to review decisions to deport highly-skilled immigrants to see whether “trivial mistakes” are to blame.
In the committee hearing Labour’s John Woodcock is now asking about how skilled migrants are being threatened with deportation over apparently minor mistakes on tax returns. The Guardian has been highlighting this issue.
Caroline Nokes, the immigration minister, says that of course she is concerned about any cases where rules are being wrongly applied.
Q: Are you reviewing how HMRC operates?
Not at the moment, says Nokes. But she says the Home Office will look at this.
She says up to now she has been preoccupied with Windrush cases.
Q: Britain is being made to look unwelcoming. These people are being treated as if they were terrorists.
Nokes says she does not want this country to seem unwelcoming. She says there needs to be a culture change in the Home Office.
Sir Philip Rutnam, the Home Office permanent secretary, says the Home Office uses HMRC data to see if people have misled either the Home Office or HMRC.
With the Home Office, people have an incentive to overstate their earnings. But, with HMRC, they have an incentive to understate them.
He says there are cases of people giving a high figure to the Home Office (so that they meet an income threshold for remaining), but a low figure to HMRC (to minimise tax).
Q: Have you, or one of your nearest or dearest, ever made a mistake with a tax return.
Probably, says Nokes.
She says the government wants to welcome people who play by the rule. But it wants to get things right too, she says.
Back in the home affairs committe, the Conservative MP Tim Loughton asks Sir Philip Rutnam, permanent secretary at the Home Office, why there have been so many leaks from the Home Office.
(Many of them were to the Guardian.)
Rutnam says they may not come from the Home Office. Leaks are unacceptable, he says.
Q: What have you done to stop them?
Rutnam says he has sent a message to staff about the leaks. And he has convened meetings to discuss the problem.
Q: Has anyone been suspended or caught?
Rutnam says a number of inquiries are underway. He is pursuing this with all the vigour he can. He is “extremely unhappy” about the number of leaks that have taken place.
May suffers 12th Lords defeat on EU withdrawal bill as peers vote against specifying 29 March 2019 as Brexit day
The government has suffered another defeat in the House of Lords on the EU withdrawal bill. Peers voted by 311 to 233 - a majority of 78 - in favour of the Duke of Wellington’s amendment removing the reference in the bill to exit day being 29 March 2019.
That’s the second defeat on the bill in the Lords today, and the 12th defeat since the bill started its report stage in the upper house.
This is what the Duke of Wellington told peers when moving his amendment 95 to the EU withdrawal bill, removing the reference to exit day being 29 March 2019. He said:
We know beyond any doubt that for the purposes of this bill we leave the EU on March 29 2019. But this date should not be defined and specified in case it becomes necessary and in the national interest to agree an extension as provided in article 50 ...
We should give ministers a bit more flexibility to secure and obtain ratification of the best possible deal, which will do the least damage to the economy and the national interest.
In the Lords peers are now voting on amendment 95 to the EU withdrawal bill, tabled buy the Conservative peer, the Duke of Wellington.
This would remove the specific reference in the bill to 29 March 2019 being Brexit day.
Originally the bill did not include a date for “exit day”. But the government amended the bill when it was in the Commons to specify 29 March 2019 as Brexit day in an apparent concession to Brexiters that was dismissed as pointless and counter-productive by pro-European Tories.
Labour and the Lib Dems are backing the duke’s amendment. The Labour peer Stewart Wood says relations with Europe were rather different when the duke’s more famous ancestor was around.
Strange days. The 9th Duke of Wellington today proposes an Amendment to remove a fixed date for Brexit. Things have moved on since his ancestor, the 1st Duke, remarked: "We always have been, we are, & I hope that we always shall be, detested in France."https://t.co/yXxtHOSMqs
— Stewart Wood (@StewartWood) May 8, 2018
Back in the home affairs committee Yvette Cooper says the committee has heard “loads” of cases of people being detained in immigration detention centre for no apparent reasons.
Ind says some of these people have a “very significant backstory” that the MPs are not aware of. And some of these people have a criminal past that is not apparent from what they have said in public.
Q: Around half are asylum seekers?
No, says Ind. It is fewer than that. And the only asylum seekers are people who applied for asylum after being detained.
Yvette Cooper tells 'slippery' Home Office boss MPs find him hard to believe as targets row continues
In the Commons home affairs committee the Labour MP John Woodcock asked about the evidence given to the committee last month by Amber Rudd, the then home secretary, and Glynn Williams, director general for border, immigration and citizenship at the Home Office. At the hearing Rudd said the Home Office did not have targets for the deportation of illegal immigrants. Williams backed her up.
Those replies were wrong, and triggered a backlash that led to Rudd’s resignation.
Sir Philip Rutnam, the Home Office permanent secretary, told Woodcock:
The discussion of targets at that committee hearing was regrettably confused.
He said that Williams was talking about published targets.
But Woodcock said the information given by Williams was “demonstrably inaccurate”. He said at one point Williams talked in what were apparently general terms about there being no targets.
Rutnam said that Woodock’s account of what happened was “unfair and incorrect”. Rutnam responded:
Quite a lot turns on the semantics of what “target” means.
Woodcock put it to him that Williams had “deliberately obfuscated”. Rutnam replied:
I would accept that there was a lot of confusion.
He went on to make an announcement.
- Sir Philip Rutnam, permanent secretary at the Home Office, told the committee that he has asked Sir Alex Allen, the PM’s adviser on ministerial standards, to carry out an investigation into how Rudd was briefed on deportation targets ahead of her select committee hearing last month. Rutnam said that work would start today.
Tim Loughton, the Tory MP, then asked Hugh Ind, director general of immigration enforcement at the Home Office, if he had briefed Rudd before the meeting that targets for deportations did not exist. According to the Evening Standard, Rudd said there were no targets for removals after being told by Ind that there were no targets.
Ind said he did not want to answer, because civil servants were not supposed to discuss the advice they gave to ministers.
Yvette Cooper, the committee chair, then complained about the approach Rutnam and Ind were talking. It “all feels really slippery”, she said. She went on:
Because of the way you are responding to our questions ... it makes it very hard for us to have confidence in the information you are giving us.
- Cooper told the Home Office permanent secretary his “slippery” approach made it hard for MPs to believe his answers.
Rutnam hit back:
The idea of appearing slippery in front of a select committee is absolutely not the way I want to do my job.
But he said there was “quite a lot of reflection to be done” in the Home Office about how Rudd was briefed ahead of last month’s committee hearing.
Updated
Government loses vote on EU agencies amendment to EU withdrawal bill by majority of 71
In the Lords the government has just lost another vote. Peers passed amendment 93 (see 3.19pm and 4.06pm) by 298 votes to 227 - a majority of 71.
Updated
Back in the home affairs committee Hugh Ind says he received a performance related bonus in 2016. But it was not related to hitting removal targets, he says.
Back in the Lords the Bishop of Leeds has pushed his amendment to a vote. The division is taking place now.
It is amendment 93. You can read the text of it here, on the marshalled list of amendments (pdf).
The BBC’s Danny Shaw has more from the home affairs committee hearing.
Home Office official Hugh Ind tells @CommonsHomeAffs that removal targets were set in 2017-18, 2016-17 and 2015-16, but a decision was made not to have targets for 2018-19.
— Danny Shaw (@DannyShawBBC) May 8, 2018
Hugh Ind says his senior team set a target of 12,800 enforced returns in 2017-18, which was later modified so that it would be 230-250 per week. #windrush @CommonsHomeAffs
— Danny Shaw (@DannyShawBBC) May 8, 2018
In the Lords Lord Callanan, the Brexit minister, is wrapping up now. He says the amendment tabled by the Bishop of Leeds (see 3.19pm) is unnecessary, because there is nothing in the bill to stop the UK mirroring EU law or participating in EU agencies after Brexit.
But the amendment could be seen as showing that the government intends to do these things, he says. He says that would be misleading.
He says nothing would be gained by having the amendment in the bill.
Home Office did have targets for deportation of immigrants in past, MPs told
Cooper asks about the Home Office having targets for the removal of illegal immigrants.
Ind starts by saying that it is a complicated matter, and he would like to write to the committee.
Then he clarifies, and accepts that he has had targets for enforced removals for some years. But the department does not have a target for this year, he says.
Q: So was the focus on people who were easiest to remove?
Ind says the focus was on proper preparation.
Q: And what was the check in the system to ensure people were not removed wrongly?
Ind says there were several in the system. He says people in his department know the important of treating people properly.
And decisions get reviewed by a gatekeeper who is capable of over-riding decisions.
Updated
Sir Philip Rutnam, permanent secretary at the Home Office, who is giving evidence alongside Nokes and Ind, says it will take “a small number of weeks” to conclude checking deportation cases to make sure no one was wrongfully removed.
Immigration minister gives evidence to Commons home affairs committee about Windrush
Caroline Nokes, the immigration minister, and Hugh Ind, director general of immigration enforcement at the Home Office, are now giving evidence to the Commons home affairs committee.
Yvette Cooper, the committee chair, begins by saying that, although the hearing is about immigration detention centres, she will start by asking about Windrush.
Nokes says the Home Office has not yet identified any Windrush migrants wrongly deported. But some were wrongly detained, she says.
In the House of Lords peers have now started debating the EU withdrawal bill.
The first amendment being considered is amendment 93, which clarifies the bill so as to make it clear that after Brexit the UK can replicate any new EU law in domestic law and can participate in EU agencies. It has Labour and Lib Dem support, which is why the government is set to lose if it goes to a vote, but it was tabled by the Bishop of Leeds, Nick Baines.
Baines has just finished his speech. He said his amendment was in line with government policy, because the government has said it may want to copy new EU laws after Brexit.
On the World at One Dominic Grieve, the Conservative former attorney general and one of the government backbenchers speaking out in favour of continuing customs union membership, said that he could understand why Theresa May had chosen not to sack Boris Johnson for his customs partnership remarks. But it was “particularly regrettable” that Johnson had spoken out as he did, Grieve said:
I don’t think [Johnson] is in any way inhibited by normal propriety in government.
I can well understand that, seeing the difficult issues that we are having to confront which are very divisive, the prime minister should accept these rather extraordinary bursts of misbehaviour by Boris. I can see why, in view of the difficulties and the divisions, it may be an exercise in restraint on her part but it doesn’t make it any more desirable that a cabinet minister should express himself in the pages of the Daily Mail in this fashion.
Grieve also suggested that an “overwhelming number” of MPs were in favour of staying in the customs union, or something similar. He said:
I think you will find there are an overwhelming number of members of parliament who think that a continuing relationship with the EU, facilitating frictionless trade, is absolutely essential for our economic interests.
No 10 lobby briefing - Summary
Here are the main points from the Number 10 lobby briefing.
- Downing Street chose not not rebuke Boris Johnson for describing the prime minister’s preferred post-Brexit customs plan as “crazy”. (See 12.50pm and 1.16pm.) In the past the foreign secretary has been publicly reprimanded by Number 10 for using a newspaper intervention to engage in freelance policy making. But today, in what seemed like a determined effort to avoid escalating cabinet feuding on this issue, the prime minister’s spokesman declined repeated invitations to criticise Johnson for what he said. He would go no further than pointing out that that customs partnership plan Johnson is now rejecting was contained in the Mansion House speech that Johnson and all other cabinet ministers fully supported.
- May told cabinet ministers it was “very important” to resist two amendments to the data protection bill being debated tomorrow that would bring in Leveson arrangements opposed by newspapers. The amendments would establish a new inquiry and bring in the original Leveson proposal for newspapers that do not sign up to a Leveson-approved regulator to have to pay full costs in libel cases even when they win. MPs are due to vote on them tomorrow. The spokesman said May raised this in cabinet. He said:
The prime minister said it was very important for the government to resist amendments which could undermine our free press. Almost £50m of public money has already been spent on investigating phone hacking and establishing a further public inquiry requiring great time and expense is not a proportionate solution to allegations that have already been the subject of several extensive police investigations or ongoing investigations by the information commissioner’s office.
The prime minister said the government remains committed to a voluntary system of independent press regulation. The amendment on section 40 [of the Crime and Courts Act] would force the press to sign up to a system which has already been outright rejected by the majority of publications. It is also unnecessary and disproportionate given we now have an independent and strengthened system of regulation with Ipso making continue improvements, such as the introduction of a mandatory arbitration scheme in line with Lord Justice Leveson’s recommendations.
The prime minister said many would consider it against natural justice that, even if a newspaper was found not to be at fault, they could still end up having to pay costs.
- Downing Street dismissed reports that skilled migrant workers are being deported because the Home Office is misapplying immigration law and treating minor paperwork errors as evidence of bad character. The Guardian highlighted this problem on Sunday, and my colleague Amelia Hill has written up various examples. But, when asked if the prime minister was worried that the rules were being enforced in too draconian a fashion, the spokesman said robust checks were “essential”. He said:
Tier one applications are complex, and they require detailed consideration and verification of evidence with HMRC. Where discrepancies are identified, applicants are given an opportunity to explain them. Robust checks are essential to avoid the potential abuse of our immigration or tax system and where abuse is identified it is right that the government acts accordingly.
Where there has been clear evidence that applicants have deliberately given false information to the government, the courts have upheld our refusal decisions.
- No 10 said that the police have released all sites linked to the Skripal poisoning case in Salisbury for decontamination. The issue was discussed at cabinet today and the spokesman said:
The police have now released all the sites for decontamination, except for the Skripal house. Clean-up work is well under way and the priority is making the sites safe so they can be returned to use and Salisbury can get back to normal.
The ongoing investigation is one of the largest and most complex ever undertaken by counter-terrorism policing. Over 250 officers from across the counter-terrorism policing network have been deployed, alongside over 160 officers from Wiltshire Police and a range of experts and partners. Officers continue to trawl through over 5,000 hours of CCTV and examine over 1,350 exhibits that have been seized. Around 500 witnesses have been identified and hundreds of statements have been taken.
Cabinet praised the resilience of the residents of Salisbury in the face of widespread disruption caused by Russia’s reckless actions. The city is safe and it is open for business.
- The spokesman said the government would not be adopting the proposal from the Resolution Foundation thinktank for all Britons to receive £10,000 when they turn 25, funded by a change to inheritance tax. When asked about this, the spokesmans said:
We do not have any plans to adopt this idea.
But when asked about another proposal in the Resolution Foundation report, for pensioners who work to be required to pay national insurance, with the proceeds going to fund improvements in social care, the spokesman said he would not talk about tax matters ahead of the budget. The difference in the way the spokesman responded to the two questions may be explained by the fact that, according to a Sunday Times story at the weekend (paywall), the national insurance plan is being actively considered by ministers. It said:
Nearly 1.3m “silver strivers” — those working beyond the state pension age — would have to start paying national insurance to prop up the social care system, under plans being considered by the government.
At present, people stop paying national insurance when they reach state pension age. But under the proposed “care tax”, the 12% charge would continue to be levied, raising about £2bn a year.
- The spokesman confirmed that the government still thought it was “right to maintain the Iran nuclear as the best way of neutralising the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.”
- The spokesman dismissed a “speculation” a report in today’s Financial Times (paywall) saying the Department for International Trade is set to get rid of hundreds of members of staff. But the spokesman said the department had a total budget of £431.6m, which was £97.3m more than the various bodies that promoted international trade before it was set up in 2016. Here is the start of today’s FT story.
Liam Fox’s trade department is set to axe hundreds of officials who promote British exports to countries such as China and Brazil, in cuts that will undermine the government’s claim to be building “a global Britain”.
Staff at the Department for International Trade have been told to expect up to 10 per cent of trade promotion jobs to go because of a budget squeeze, which has pitted Mr Fox against the Treasury.
The cuts mean that while Mr Fox has already hired up to 800 staff to negotiate trade deals after Brexit, his department is simultaneously cutting officials who work on the ground helping British companies sell their products in emerging markets.
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Dominic Grieve, the Conservative former attorney general who led the backbench revolt that saw Theresa May defeated on the EU withdrawal bill in December and who has signed an amendment saying the UK should stay in the customs union, has given an interview to the World at One. These are from the BBC’s Insaf Abbas and from MailOnline’s James Tapsfield.
Dominic Grieve on Boris Johnson's Brexit intervention: "Discussions within government are confidential... If you don't like the collective position - at that point you have to resign." @BBCWorldatOne #bbcwato
— Insaf Abbas (@insaf_abbas) May 8, 2018
Dominic Grieve says Boris Johnson's 'extraordinary bursts of behaviour' do not respect 'normal propriety in government'
— James Tapsfield (@JamesTapsfield) May 8, 2018
No 10 declines to rebuke Johnson over his 'crazy' comment about PM's Brexit customs plan
This is what the prime minister’s spokesman told journalists at the lobby briefing when asked if Theresa May was happy for Boris Johnson to go round describing her customs partnership proposal as “crazy”. (See 9.33am and 12.50am.) The spokesman said:
There are two customs models that were first put forward by the government last August, and most recently they were outlined in the prime minister’s Mansion House speech which the entire cabinet was signed up to. Following last week’s cabinet sub committee meeting, it was agreed that there are unresolved issues in relation to both models and that further work is needed. The prime minister asked officials to take forward that work as a priority.
When reporters kept pushing the spokesman on this point, he kept reverting to these talking points. For example, was Boris Johnson speaking on behalf of the government when he said what he said? “There are the two models. Work is ongoing in relation to those,” the spokesman said.
But the spokesman did say May had full confidence in Johnson.
And, when asked about Greg Clark’s interview on the Andrew Marr Show on Sunday (pdf), the spokesman said that the business secretary was “talking generally about the need to ensure as frictionless as possible trade with the EU”. That was not the way everyone interpreted Clark’s remarks; others thought he was talking up the customs partnership proposal, and highlighting disadvantages with the alternative “highly streamlined customs arrangement”, or maximum facilitation (“max fac”), model that Johnson prefers.
Photograph: Alan J Davidson/SHM/REX/Shutterstock
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I’m just back from the Number 10 lobby briefing. And - as is often the case in politics - the most significant thing is what was not said.
- No 10 declines to rebuke Boris Johnson over his “crazy” comment about prime minister’s customs partnership plan.
The prime minister’s spokesman was repeatedly invited to criticise or disown Johnson’s comment, or to accept that in saying what he said, Johnson was breaching collective responsibility. But, beyond pointing out that Johnson and other cabinet ministers supported the Mansion House speech, which said the customs parntership and the highly streamlined customs arrangement were both viable post-Brexit customs options, the spokesman would not engage on those points, and just kept stressing that the two options were under consideration.
In January this year, on another occasion when Johnson used a pre-cabinet newspaper intervention to do some freelance policy making, Theresa May was quite happy to slap him down in public.
Presumably this time she is afraid of provoking the Tory Brexiters like Jacob Rees-Mogg. (See 9.41am.)
I will post more comments from the briefing soon.
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The People’s Vote campaign, which is calling for a referendum on the final Brexit deal, has also said that Boris Johnson is right about the customs partnership. Echoing what Chuka Umunna told Sky (see 11.30am), it put out a statement from the Labour MP Rupa Huq saying:
Boris Johnson description of Theresa May’s preferred option of a ‘customs partnership’ as a ‘crazy system’ is typically intemperate but rooted in truth.
The prime minister’s plan would replace today’s frictionless trade with a bureaucratic nightmare of tracking goods not just at the border but more or less anywhere and everywhere they are stored or distributed.
But the prime minister is also right to oppose Boris Johnson’s favoured option of ‘maximum facilitation’ which will maximise nothing but the costs to British businesses and British consumers.
So-called max fac would require the government to explicitly and deliberately break their promise of no infrastructure at the Irish border, and place customs barriers between British companies and their biggest market.
To put jobs first, to protect the Irish peace process and to give our young people a future we should stay in the customs union and single market and put any final Brexit deal to a people’s vote.
I’m off to the Number 10 lobby briefing now. I will post again after 12.30pm.
And here is the statement that Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, has released about Heidi Alexander replacing Val Shawcross as deputy mayor for transport.
My excellent Deputy Mayor for Transport Val Shawcross is retiring after 18 years at the GLA, and I want to thank her for her service. I'm delighted to announce that Heidi Alexander has agreed to fill the position. Read my full statement: pic.twitter.com/KdFui2jBw3
— Mayor of London (@MayorofLondon) May 8, 2018
Here is my colleague Jessica Elgot on possible replacements for Heidi Alexander as MP for Lewisham East.
Current names being floated by Labour sources to replace Heidi Alexander - Lewisham councillor @SakinaZS, NEC member @ClaudiaWebbe, GMB's @nadinehoughton1, and ex-MP Katy Clark.
— Jessica Elgot (@jessicaelgot) May 8, 2018
Not at all guaranteed for a left-winger, local Momentum group is very split.
Heidi Alexander quits as Labour MP to be London deputy mayor
The Labour MP Heidi Alexander will quit the House of Commons to be Sadiq Khan’s deputy mayor for transport, setting in motion what could be a fierce battle for her safe south London seat, my colleague Jessica Elgot reports.
In the comments BTL the most recommended comment at the moment is one complaining that the media don’t do more to call out Boris Johnson for his “lies”.
But, in relation to his Daily Mail interview (see 9.33am), for once even his fiercest critics over Brexit are saying that, on the core point, he is telling the truth. That was the argument that Chuka Umunna, the leading Labour pro-European, was making on Sky’s All Out Politics a few minutes ago. Umunna said that he did not accept the Johnson argument that the UK would do better economically by negotiating its own trade deals outside the EU than it would by staying in. (This is the main argument that Brexiters use when they explain why they are opposed to Theresa May’s customs partnership plan, although the government’s Brexit impact analysis published in March showed that government economists it’s nonsense.) But Umunna said he did agree with Johnson’s claim that the customs partnership proposal would prove unworkable.
Umunna said there was an obvious solution available to the government.
Why are we wasting time talking about something that is impossible? There is a solution starting us in the face. The EU have offered the UK a bespoke arrangement, which is for us to continue to participate in the European Economic Area and the customs union, and we are prevaricating and wasting all this time when we could take advantage of those things.
And on the government’s own economic impact assessment we know that, if we are going to leave the European Union, being part of those economic structures are the least worst option for the economy.
This is from the Sun’s Steve Hawkes.
Boris Johnson's extraordinary blast not universally approved by Brexiteers in the party - they believe the "full frontal attack" on the PM is misguided
— steve hawkes (@steve_hawkes) May 8, 2018
Labour thinks EEA membership won't work but wants to 'end up in same place', says Thornberry
It is the final day of the EU withdrawal bill’s report stage debate in the Lords today and the government is facing defeat when two amendments get put to the vote. One would clarify the ability of the UK to participate in EU agencies after Brexit, and the other would remove the line in the bill specifying 29 March 2019 as exit day. Both votes should be over before 6pm.
But peers are also expected to vote on one of three amendments tabled by the Labour peer Lord Alli saying that saying in the European Economic Area - ie, staying in the single market, like Norway - should be a negotiating objective for the government.
Labour peers have been told to abstain on this amendment, which means the government can be reasonably confident that it will be able to vote it down, but, as the Observer reported at the weekend, more than 40 Labour peers are expected to defy the whip and vote with Alli.
On the Today programme this morning Emily Thornberry, the shadow foreign secretary, was asked why Labour was not voting to keep the EU in the EEA. She was specifically asked about the argument made by the Labour pro-European Chuka Umunna, who says the party should vote for the Alli amendment in the Lords so that MPs get a chance to vote on this issue when the bill returns to the Commons.
Our supporters would be shocked to see our party collude with Theresa May in preventing the Lords from sending an EEA amendment to the Commons and standing in the way of the UK continuing to be part of this framework of rules that protects people https://t.co/9v2d9Jo9hT
— Chuka Umunna (@ChukaUmunna) May 8, 2018
Asked about the Umunna argument, and when it was put to her that a lot of Labour supporters would expect the party to back continuing EEA membership, Thornberry replied:
I understand that, and I have a lot of respect for people who are pressing us on this. But we’ve looked at the Norway model. I’ve been out there, Keir [Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary] has been out there, the truth is that that model will not fit the British economy. The Norwegian economy is very different from ours. We are the fifth largest economy in the world. We do need to have a British, bespoke deal. That does mean remaining close to the single market.
In a way, we want to end up in the same place. It is just that the mechanism that is being put forward is simply one that technically we don’t believe will work. And it is for that reason that we have differences with a lot of our colleagues, whom we have a great deal in common with. It is just that this particularly mechanism is not going to work.
Bernard Jenkin, the Conservative backbencher and a leading Brexiter, told the Today programme this morning that he thought Theresa May would end up having to abandon her customs partnership proposal. He said:
I think the prime minister is very anxious to try to bring the whole party together around some kind of compromise proposal and the argument is going on about this. I think in the end she will have to drop it because it will prove unworkable.
I think it is a bit of an act of self-deception to say that we are leaving the customs union but we are still going to apply the common external tariff to all the imports coming in from the EU.
Here is some, fairly random, Twitter comment on the Boris Johnson customs partnership intervention.
From Tony Connelly, RTE’s Europe editor
Worth noting Boris Johnson approved the Customs Partnership model last August. All UK position papers submitted in the Brexit negotiations were signed off by the Cabinet. "This paper details the Government’s aspirations for the UK’s future customs arrangements" was the preamble
— Tony Connelly (@tconnellyRTE) May 8, 2018
From Tim Bale, a politics professor who has written a history of the modern Conservative party
Her Majesty's Government regrets to announce the death of Cabinet Collective Responsibility: murdered last night by the Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson. https://t.co/FusJFu9hCz via @MailOnline
— Tim Bale (@ProfTimBale) May 8, 2018
From Stewart Wood, a Labour peer and former adviser to both Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband
Boris Johnson has called his PM's flagship proposal to keep the Govt together on Brexit "crazy". He seems to be still in his job. Which must mean the PM has given up on any pretence of having political authority inside the Cabinet. pic.twitter.com/L7U1pighYz
— Stewart Wood (@StewartWood) May 8, 2018
From my colleague Rafael Behr
I see new trailer for Boris Resigns is out. No actual release date. Build-up getting a bit dull now.
— Rafael Behr (@rafaelbehr) May 8, 2018
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Conservative backbencher and chair of the European Research Group, which represents Tory MPs pushing for a harder Brexit, has - not very surprisingly - backed Boris Johnson.
Boris hits the nail on the head. https://t.co/RPJjaMLfBl
— Jacob Rees-Mogg (@Jacob_Rees_Mogg) May 8, 2018
Boris Johnson accuses remain-voting cabinet colleagues of reviving 'project fear'
Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, has never been a politician for whom loyalty to the boss has been a strong point, but even by his standards his interview with the Daily Mail, attacking Theresa May’s preferred option for customs with the EU after Brexit as “crazy”, sets a new benchmark for what you might term uncollegiality. May is trying to maintain that her “customs partnership” scheme, or a variant, is still a viable option. But Johnson’s interview, which amounted to an implicit threat to resign over this issue, has probably killed it dead. Here is the Mail story. Here is our own overnight version.
And here is the Mail splash in all its glory.
MAIL:Boris goes up War on ‘crazy’ no 10 Plan #tomorrowspaperstodsy pic.twitter.com/F22PZNbHhI
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) May 7, 2018
Johnson’s comments also included a fairly obvious swipe at Greg Clark, the remain-voting business secretary who used an interview with the Andrew Marr Show on Sunday to talk up the advantages of the customs partnership plan, implying that thousands of car industry jobs could be at risk if new customs rules - the ones backed by Johnson, he suggested- put just-in-time supply lines at risk. Johnson told the Daily Mail:
Colleagues in cabinet have different concerns about different aspects of the argument and it’s entirely right that they should make their points.
But we should be looking at the opportunities and thinking confidently about the UK and believing what we can do rather than succumbing to a sort of project fear mark 2,3,4,5,6.
So far Number 10 has not responded to the Johnson interview. But they will have to say something at the 11am lobby briefing.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9am: Frances O’Grady, general secretary of the TUC, and Carolyn Fairbairn, director general of the CBI, speak at the launch of the Resolution Foundation intergenerational commission report. As Robert Booth reports, its proposals include a plan for every person in Britain to receive £10,000 when they turn 25.
9.30am: Theresa May chairs cabinet.
10am: Serco and Mitie executives give evidence to the Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee about the collapse of Carillion.
12pm: Downing Street lobby briefing.
3.30pm: Caroline Nokes, the immigration minister, and Hugh Ind, director general of immigration enforcement at the Home Office, give evidence to the Commons home affairs committee.
After 3.30pm: Peers resume their debate on the EU withdrawal bill. The government faces the prospect of defeat on two motions, relating to EU agencies and having a fixed date for exit day, and Labour faces a rebellion over an amendment that would keep the UK in the EEA (European Economic Area).
As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I plan to post a summary at lunchtime and another in the evening.
You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here.
Here is the Politico Europe round-up of this morning’s political news from Jack Blanchard. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’ top 10 must reads.
If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
I try to monitor the comments BTL but normally I find it impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer direct questions, although sometimes I miss them or don’t have time.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.
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