This from Sky’s Beth Rigby who says Williamson wanted police involvement as he “would have been cleared”.
NEW: .@GavinWilliamson tells me he “wanted a police investigation because I would have been cleared. They would have had to have evidence. That is what I wanted” Tells me he believes this was “a witch hunt from the start” & “in a kangaroo court with a summary execution”
— Beth Rigby (@BethRigby) May 1, 2019
Updated
The UK’s first female defence secretary Penny Mordaunt will continue in her role at the Government Equalities Office, which has responsibility for “gender and LGBT equality”, says the Ministry of Defence. She was minister of state for the armed forces from 2015 to 2016.
🗣 🇬🇧 @PennyMordaunt speaking following her appointment as Defence Secretary: “I’m delighted to be back at the Ministry of Defence. It is an honour and privilege to work with the best armed forces and defence civilians in the world.”
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) May 1, 2019
Updated
The Liberal Democrat deputy leader Jo Swinson is also calling for the police to investigate the leak.
She’s written to Met police commissioner Cressida Dick, asking her to investigate if the leak is a breach of the Official Secrets Act. Gavin Williamson denies being behind the leak.
For the Defence Secretary to leak from the National Security Council is a grave dereliction of duty.
— Jo Swinson (@joswinson) May 1, 2019
There must be a criminal investigation to determine whether there has been a breach of the Official Secrets Act. My letter to the Met Commissioner 👇🏼 pic.twitter.com/QBnzO7WXvg
Updated
The Conservative and Labour parties both say they welcome the recall petition in Peterborough to unseat disgraced ex-Labour whip Fiona Onasanya. More than 7,000 constituents voted to trigger a byelection.
The Conservative’s parliamentary candidate for Peterborough, Paul Bristow, said: “The people of Peterborough deserve a better MP who will vote in parliament to deliver Brexit. I’m delighted this result gives local people the chance to make their voices heard and vote for a better MP – and it will be a choice between Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour candidate and me.”
He pledged: “I’ll be fighting hard throughout this campaign to show why it is only a Conservative MP who can truly tackle crime and deliver the jobs and investment Peterborough needs, as well as to ensure Brexit is a success for the local community.”
Labour’s party chair, Ian Lavery MP, said: “Labour campaigned hard for a victory in this recall petition.”
“We’re delighted they will now have the chance to vote for a Labour MP in our excellent candidate, Lisa Forbes. Labour will move the writ tomorrow.”
He pledged the party would fight “vigorously” to retain the seat and also said it was a two-horse race, with the choice between Labour and the Conservatives.
“The voters of Peterborough will have a stark choice: between the Tories who have cut police numbers while crime is rising, or Labour who will put more bobbies on the beat and cut crime; the Conservatives who are destroying our NHS, or Labour who will provide the doctors and nurses local hospitals in the region desperately need.
“And voters will have the choice between a Labour party which will invest to create high-skilled, well-paid jobs, or the Tory policies that have left too many people here in Peterborough striving but barely surviving.”
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage said his Brexit party will also field a candidate, giving rise to speculation that he could throw his hat into the ring for a seat in Westminster.
Updated
Labour MP Nia Griffith, the shadow defence secretary, has called for a police investigation.
She said: “The Tories are in chaos and incapable of sorting out their own crisis. Conservative infighting has undermined the basic functioning of government, and has now potentially put security at risk. The police must urgently investigate.”
Updated
The foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has commented on Gavin Williamson’s departure but said he thought there “was no alternative outcome”.
Arriving in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia, he said: “On a personal level I’m very sorry about what happened for Gavin’s sake, but given the gravity of the situation there was no other alternative outcome.”
Updated
How the investigation unfolded
It took just a over week from the UK’s National Security Council meeting on 23 April to the sacking of Gavin Williamson, according to a timeline from the Press Association.
The next day the Daily Telegraph newspaper revealed Theresa May had agreed to allow Chinese telecoms giant Huawei to help build Britain’s new 5G network - despite security concerns raised by cabinet minsters at the meeting.
Labour called for an investigation and, on 25 April, Dominic Grieve – who chairs the parliamentary intelligence and security committee – said the leak was “deeply worrying”.
Home secretary Sajid Javid said it was “completely unacceptable” for any minister to release sensitive information.
Gavin Williamson and foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt denied they were responsible and Williamson said neither he nor any of his team had “divulged information from the National Security Council”.
On 26 April, ministers who were at the NSC meeting were reportedly told by cabinet secretary Sir Mark Sedwill to confess or deny if they were behind the leak.
Sources close to international trade secretary Liam Fox and international development secretary Penny Mordaunt denied either were involved.
On 27 April, reports emerged that cabinet members were expected to be summoned for interviews as part of a formal inquiry. Ministers and their aides were reportedly given questionnaires to fill in, explaining where they were in the hours after the NSC meeting.
China’s ambassador to the UK, Liu Xiaoming, defended Huawei, calling on the government to act independently and resist external pressure.
The next day Jeremy Hunt said he was quizzed as part of the investigation and was prepared to hand over his phone, adding that the UK should exercise “a degree of caution” about the role of large Chinese firms such as Huawei.
On 29 April, the US delivered a warning that there is no safe level of involvement by Chinese tech giant Huawei in the 5G networks of western powers.
And on 1 May Gavin Williamson was sacked as defence secretary after the inquiry into the leak.
Updated
Meanwhile the commentators are predicting the likely atmosphere in parliament, with the Mirror’s Kevin Maguire suggesting Labour will shout out the name of the departing defence secretary next time national security threats are mentioned.
Two words Labour will shout back next time the Tories claim Jeremy Corbyn's a threat to national security: "GAVIN WILLIAMSON."
— Kevin Maguire (@Kevin_Maguire) May 1, 2019
Updated
The Guardian’s political correspondent Peter Walker says Theresa May “considers the matter closed” and there’s no need for a police investigation
New: No 10 doesn’t think Gavin Williamson needs to face a police inquiry or lose the Tory whip: “She now considers the matter to be closed.”
— Peter Walker (@peterwalker99) May 1, 2019
Earlier I said there was no modern precedent for a minister being sacked as a result of a leak inquiry. (See 5.59pm.)
In 1986 Leon Brittan did resign after approving the leak of a letter from the solicitor general attacking Michael Heseltine over Westland.
But it is not an exact parallel. Number 10 did not need to conduct a genuine leak inquiry on that occasion because they knew full well who was responsible; Downing Street itself had ordered the leak. Margaret Thatcher feared that the subsequent Commons debate would bring her down but she survived, partly because it was felt Neil Kinnock did not quite nail the case for the prosecution.
That’s all from me for tonight.
My colleague Catherine Avery is taking over now.
Gavin Williamson has released his letter to the PM.
In it he says that he was not involved “in any way” in this leak and that he accepts the assurances of his staff about their not being involved.
— Gavin Williamson MP (@GavinWilliamson) May 1, 2019
This is from Sky’s Alistair Bunkall.
Spoken to Gavin Williamson. He swore on his children’s life to me that he didn’t leak the Huawei news and neither did his staff. Said he believes this is the settling of a vendetta between him and Mark Sedwill
— Alistair Bunkall (@AliBunkallSKY) May 1, 2019
Voters trigger byelection in Peterborough after successful recall petition against Fiona Onasanya
Tonight we’ve had the appointment of the first female defence secretary, Penny Mordaunt.
In another first, Fiona Onasanya has become the first MP to face recall. There will be a byelection in her Peterborough constituency after more than 10% of registered voters signed a petition demanding one following her conviction for lying about a speeding ticket.
The recall process was introduced by the coalition government, but the only previous attempt to use it failed because the petition launched after the DUP MP Ian Paisley was suspended from the Commons did not hit the 10% threshold.
Onasanya is free to stand in the byelection but as she has been expelled from Labour she would have to stand as an independent and would therefore have almost no chance of winning.
Updated
This is from Sky’s Beth Rigby.
NEW ON WILLIAMSON: Told PM informed Williamson in her House of Commons office at 5.30pm that she was going to sack him. Also told by a source close to him that "he didn't do it" and that he interrupted his holiday in Scotland to co-operate fully with the inquiry
— Beth Rigby (@BethRigby) May 1, 2019
Rory Stewart appointed international development secretary
Rory Stewart, the justice minister, has been appointed international development secretary.
That is an unusual example of a minister being appointed to a job for which he is well qualified. Stewart, a former diplomat, has extensive experience of Iraq, where he helped administer a province after the war, and Afghanistan, where he set up a development NGO.
In a recent interview with the Spectator, he said he was good at helping countries to recover. He was talking about why he might stand as a candidate to replace the prime minister – arguing that his experience rebuilding war-torn Iraq would be useful for Brexit Britain. It might not have been the best argument to advance to Tory activists, but it explains why he will relish this job.
He said:
Difficult periods need different types of people. One of the reasons why I would be tempted towards this job is that we desperately need to rebuild ourselves internationally after Brexit. I am one of the only people in parliament who is a genuine specialist ...
That’s been my life. I’ve written four books about it, done three television documentaries about it, I’ve taught it at Harvard, I’ve spent more than a decade living in funny countries and working there. I’ve done it as a developer, as a diplomat, I’ve done it in war zones.
Updated
Sir Vince Cable, the Lib Dem leader, has called for a criminal investigation into Gavin Williamson. He said:
This story cannot begin and end with dismissal from office.
What is at stake is the capacity of our security services to give advice at the highest level.
This must now be referred to the Metropolitan police for a thorough criminal investigation into breaches of the Official Secrets Act.
Williamson denies being responsible for NSC leak
This is from the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg.
Just spoken to Gavin Williamson who still denies he was the source of the leak from the National Security Council - says neither he nor his team would ever leak from NSC
— Laura Kuenssberg (@bbclaurak) May 1, 2019
Penny Mordaunt appointed defence secretary
Penny Mordaunt, the international development secretary, has been made defence secretary.
In her new role, she will also continue as minister for women and equalities, No 10 says.
Mordaunt is a former junior minister at the Ministry of Defence. As MP for Portsmouth North, she has good links with the navy with whom she serves as a reservist.
Updated
May's letter to Williamson saying he's been sacked
Here is Theresa May’s letter to Gavin Williamson sacking him.
Updated
There is no precedent in modern times for a cabinet minister being sacked as a result of a leak inquiry.
In fact, it is hard to think of a precedent for any leak inquiry actually reaching a conclusion.
Hugh Dalton did resign as chancellor in 1947 after giving information about his budget to an evening paper lobby journalist shortly before he delivered it. A short paragraph got published before the speech had been delivered, and he resigned. But there was no great mystery at the time about what had happened, and Dalton never denied being responsible - unlike Williamson, who issued a statement last week denying he had given the Huawei story to the Daily Telegraph.
Updated
Gavin Williamson sacked as defence secretary for Huawei leak
Downing Street has just put out this press release:
The prime minister has this evening asked Gavin Williamson to leave the government, having lost confidence in his ability to serve in the role of defence secretary and as a member of her cabinet.
The prime minister’s decision has been informed by his conduct surrounding an investigation into the circumstances of the unauthorised disclosure of information from a meeting of the National Security Council.
The prime minister thanks all members of the National Security Council for their full cooperation and candour during the investigation and considers the matter closed.
Updated
Theresa May's evidence to Commons liaison committee - Summary
Here are the main points from Theresa May’s evidence to the Commons liaison committee. As expected, she did not exactly open the book on her entire Brexit strategy (such as there is one). But there were various things that she said that we had not heard before.
Just as importantly, she struck a slightly new tone. She has now given up even pretending that no deal would be more acceptable than a bad deal. And in the past at these sessions, the most tetchy exchanges have always been those between May and Yvette Cooper, her Labour shadow in the 2010-15 parliament who now chairs the Commons home affairs committee. But no longer. May v Cooper was abrasive, but the two MPs who clearly infuriated her most were the Tory Brexiters Sir Bernard Jenkin and Sir Bill Cash. Maybe John Peet is right (see 3.30pm) and she’s finally had it with the ERG.
Here are the main points.
- May hinted that the government and Labour were closer in what they want on a customs union than people realise. Labour says it wants a customs union with the EU, while the government says it just wants a customs arrangement. Speaking to Labour’s Hilary Benn, she said:
One of the discussions we have been having ... is the whole question about customs arrangements for the future. Various terms are used in relation to customs. Sometimes people use different terms to mean the same thing.
And later she told Cooper:
We are sitting down [with Labour] and talking about what it is that we both want to achieve in relation [to customs]. I think actually there is a greater commonality in terms of some of the benefits of a customs union that we have already identified between ourselves and the official opposition.
May also stressed that the political declaration already agreed with the EU allowed for a “spectrum” of outcomes on customs in the future trade talks. In her opening statement she also said she hoped the cross-party talks could result in a deal. She said:
We’ve been having constructive, meaningful talks which are continuing.
There are differences on issues but on many of the key areas - particularly on the withdrawal agreement - there is common ground.
We know that we need to end this uncertainty and do it as soon as possible and I hope a deal can be done. We certainly approach this with an open mind.
- She said there was a chance for the UK to use Brexit to develop “world-leading” border technology. This came when Cooper cast doubt on whether technological solutions were available that could minimise delays at the border. May replied:
I don’t accept the bigger picture you have set out.
I know the reference you have made to technology but an awful lot of work has been done on technology that is available at the borders and the opportunities that the UK has, actually.
I think there is an opportunity today for the UK to be introducing ways of dealing with these issues at our borders that could be world-leading.
One of the problems with this debate has consistently been that very often it’s framed in terms of existing models and it’s important for us to be looking at the new models that are available and can be used in these areas.
- May hinted that the planned Brexit transition might have to be extended beyond December 2020. Asked if there would be enough time to conclude a UK-EU trade deal by the end of next year, when the transition is due to end, May replied:
Obviously the time has been reduced in relation to that ... It is still possible to achieve it by the end of December 2020.
When asked if that meant she was ruling out an extension to the transition, she again said it was “possible” to conclude the final deal by the end of next year, but she also said the withdrawal agreement would allow the transition to be extended.
- May admitted that the planned three-year spending review, due to be announced this summer, could be scaled back if the Brexit deal is not passed. The review, which will cover spending starting from the 2020-21 financial year, could cover jsut one year, she conceded. (See 3.57pm.)
- She said parliament would not approve a no-deal Brexit. Asked if it was impossible to leave the EU without a deal, she replied:
What I think is that parliament will act to insist the UK government is not willing to leave without a deal.
Actually leaving without a deal is not entirely in the hands of the UK government because the issue of the extensions to article 50 rests with the whole of the EU sitting around that table.
Updated
Julian Lewis, the Conservative chair of the defence committee, goes next. He is asking about Huawei.
(This must have been scheduled at the last minute. Huawei was not included in a list of topics to be covered released by the committee this morning.)
Q: Do you accept that the Chinese regime engages in systematic cyber espionage against us?
May says the UK is willing to call out those people who are engaged in this. There are state players and non-state players doing this.
Q: Do you accept that Huawei is deeply linked to the Chinese state and its hostile intelligence agencies?
May says Huawei is a private company. But May says she is very concerned about protecting national security.
Q: You are not contradicting me when I say it is intimately linked to the Chinese state.
May says it is a private company. But the government has put considerable resources into cyber security.
Q: Why did David Lidington say legally speaking Huawei was a private company. Isn’t that vacuous given it is legally obliged to cooperate with the communist Chinese regime?
May says what is important is how you deal with cyber security. She says Huawei products are closely reviewed. The most recent review found no evidence of state interference.
Lewis concludes by telling May she should read the unredacted copy of a report addressing this produced by the intelligence and security committee. He suggests that, if she does read it, she will realise that Huawei is suspect.
And that’s it. The hearing is over.
I will post a summary soon.
Q: People are annoyed at how Brexit has held up policy on other issues. When will the social care green paper being published?
May says it is not the case that all work on this has been shelved.
Q: But the green paper is ready. When will it be published?
May says she recognises how strongly people feel about this.
This is a short-term, a medium-term and a long-term issue, she says.
The green paper will be published “at the earliest opportunity”.
Q: But when?
May says Wollaston is assuming that there is a completed green paper. She does not accept that.
May suggests planned Brexit transition may have to be extended beyond December 2020
May says she thinks it is still possible to negotiate the final trade deal by the end of 2020.
- May says it is “possible” that the final Brexit deal could be concluded by December next year - implying there is a good chance the transition may have to be extended.
Q: Would you rather pass your deal by compromising with Labour on a customs union? Or by offering a confirmatory vote?
May says she does not accept the premise of this.
She hopes to get an agreement with Labour. But there are a number of issues to resolve.
Sarah Wollaston, the Change UK MP who chairs the liaison committee, goes next.
Q: Shouldn’t the final deal be put to the people?
May says she has not changed her view since she last discussed this with Wollaston. MPs must abide by the result of the referendum, she says.
David TC Davies, the Conservative chair of the Welsh affairs committee, goes next.
Q: If MPs do not pass a deal, would you prefer no-deal, or no Brexit?
May says she wants a deal to pass.
Q: Can I conclude you would not support a no-deal Brexit?
May says the best option is to have a deal.
And she says, if it looks as if there will be no-deal, parliament has made it clear it will act to prevent this.
The withdrawal agreement does not give everyone what they want. But it is the best option available.
Q: Do you think cabinet ministers have undermined you?
May says it is important to leave with a deal.
Q: The failure to leave on 29 March is a failure, isn’t it?
May says she wanted to leave then and voted for it. But others would not.
Q: Why can’t you accept Scotland having the same autonomy in the UK as the UK does in the EU? The EU can’t stop the UK holding a referendum.
May says her view is that Scotland has had an independence referendum.
Q: What do you feel about calling a climate change emergency?
May says climate change is one of the biggest problems facing the world.
But the term “emergency” suggests something that has just arisen. That is not the case, she says.
This is from the Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn.
Intriguing that every time PM is asked (3 times now) if she’s pursuing a customs union with Labour, she responds not with a denial, but: “It depends what your definition of a customs union is”. As so often with Brexit, a grand fudge to please all/none appears to be under way.
— Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) May 1, 2019
The SNP’s Angus Brendan MacNeil, the chair of the international trade committee, goes next.
Q: You used to say there were three options: a deal, no-deal or revoking article 50. Now you are raising a second referendum as an option. (See 3.04pm.) What has changed?
May says she does not accept that there has been a change.
Q: So why did you mention a second referendum?
Because some MPs have floated the idea, she says.
Q: There have been 120 governors of the Bank of England, all of them men. Would you like the next one to be a woman?
May says she does encourage women to apply for top jobs.
Rachel Reeves, the Labour chair of the business committee, goes next.
Q: The chief whip reportedly told cabinet yesterday that they had to go for a second referendum or a customs union. (See 9.26am.) Do you agree with him?
May says she will not comment on what was said at cabinet.
Q: Do you agree with what Jeremy Hunt, the foreign secretary, said yesterday about Tory MPs not approving a customs union.
May says it depends what you mean by customs union. She says it is not always clear what people mean.
Q: Do you support higher fees for EU students?
May says no final decisions have been made on this.
Q: Would higher fees discourage students from coming?
May says higher fees have not discouraged other foreign students from coming. But she wants people to come here for the quality of the educations.
Q: If fees were higher for UK students wanting to study abroad, would that help in the fight against burning injustices.
May says there are excellent universities here in the UK.
Q: So you are relaxed about higher fees for EU students here, and UK students studying abroad.
May says it is the quality of education that counts. She says it is not for her to decide what other countries charge.
May admits three-year spending review could be scaled back if Brexit deal not passed.
Nicky Morgan, the Conservative chair of the Commons Treasury committee, goes next.
Q: Are you concerned about Brexit uncertainty costing business hundreds of millions of pounds?
May says she thinks investment will be unleashed if there is a Brexit deal.
Q: So would you like to get a deal as soon as possible, rather than wait until October?
May confirms that is the case.
Q: Have you got a date in mind for when MPs might vote on this again?
May says she wants to do it as soon as possible, and “well before that extension deadline [31 October] comes into play”.
Q: What will you do about the spending review?
May says the chancellor also wants a deal soon.
If there were to be no deal agreed soon, the Treasury would have to decide what to do about the spending review.
Q: Do you have a plan? Would there be a one-year review instead of a three-year one?
May says that has yet to be decided.
- May says the three-year spending review due this summer could be scaled back if the Brexit deal is not passed.
Q: Will there be a revised economic impact assessment if you propose a different plan?
May says the government would have to consider that. The economic analysis published last year did cover various scenarios, she says.
She says she would want parliament to have the information it would need to be well informed.
Updated
Q: Do you share my frustration that the NI border is being used as an excuse by the EU to be difficult? If there were to be no deal, both sides would want to keep the border open.
May says she will not comment on the EU.
But at the heart of the Good Friday agreement is a compromise: people can be Northern Ireland citizens, and free to travel to Ireland easily. That is important to preserve.
Andrew Murrison, the Conservative chair of the Northern Ireland committee, goes next.
Q: You said a few weeks ago the UK was not ready to leave without a deal on 29 March because not enough work had been done in Northern Ireland. What has been done since?
May says the government has now being working with the Irish government to revive talks aimed at restoring the Northern Ireland executive.
Cooper says it feels like they are going “around in circles”.
Q: Are you ruling out any change to the government’s position on customs?
May says she is having discussions with Labour on a range of issues.
They have similar aims. They both want to protect jobs.
How that can be achieved has not been wholly identified, she says.
Cooper says is really worried that, if May does not shift, the UK will just be stuck.
Cooper says there are three solutions to tariffs: the Chequers plan for collecting tariffs for the EU; new technology; and actually staying in the customs union. Which is it?
May says the government is still discussing this with Labour.
But she does not accept Cooper’s claim that the technological solution are not available.
She says there is a chance to produce a “world-leading” approach to customs.
Q: It sounds like you are ruling out being part of the common external tariff. In or out?
May says the government has set out in the political declaration a spectrum of options on this, for further discussion.
The government is discussing this with Labour. It will find out if there is a possible “landing zone” for a deal.
Q: It sounds like you are stuck. Your definition of compromise seems to be everyone else saying you were right. What evidence is there that you might move?
May says she has shown a willingness to compromise on other issues.
On customs, it is important to sit down and “tease out” the different elements.
Yvette Cooper, the Labour chair of the home affairs committee, goes next.
Q: Are you still ruling out the UK being part of the common external tariff?
May says, if the UK wants to have trade agreements on goods, it needs to be able to vary tariffs.
Q: So are you ruling out being in the common external tariff for goods?
May says under the government’s plans the UK would be able to have a CET with the EU, but different tariffs for the rest of the world.
Q: So are you going back to the Chequers plan for the UK to be able to collect tariffs on behalf of the EU.
May says the political declaration makes it clear that this issue is yet to be resolved.
Q: So it sounds you are not shifting on customs. You talk about compromise. But has nothing changed?
May says, in the talks with Labour, both sides are talking about what they want to achieve. There is “a greater commonality in terms of some of the benefits of the customs union” that they have identified, she says.
Can we come to an agreement? “I hope we will be able to,” May says.
This is from the Economist’s John Peet.
Clear from PM’s tone at Liaison Committee that she is increasingly fed up with and disinclined to appease Tory hardliners and the ERG. Not before time
— John Peet (@JohnGPeet) May 1, 2019
Stephen McPartland, the Conservative who chairs the regulatory reform committee, goes next.
May says the government is looking at how commitments given by the government on workers’ rights can be guaranteed.
Sir Patrick McLoughlin, Tory chair of the European statutory instruments committee, goes next.
Q: Would you now rule out leaving without a deal?
She says parliament will act to insist the UK government will not leave without a deal.
But this is not entirely in the hands of the government, she says. It is also up to the EU.
McLoughlin urges the government to reconsider its decision not to publish the bill.
Cash says the UK will be subject to EU laws passed beyond closed doors. That amounts to “castrating parliament”, he says.
May says, during the transition, there will not be time for new laws to be introduced and negotiated and agreed.
Cash rejects that, saying there is a procedure allowing MPs to be accelerated.
Sir Bill Cash, the Tory Brexiter and chair of the European scrutiny committee, goes next.
May says she does not accept his argument that the UK will continue to see the ECJ having a remit in the UK after Brexit.
Cash reminds May he said she should resign three weeks ago.
Q: Why have you not published the EU withdrawal agreement bill?
May says the government will publish it when the work on it is over.
Q: But the agreement has been concluded.
May says more work is going on. For example, the government is incorporating the Gareth Snell amendment in the bill.
Bernard Jenkin, the Tory chair of the public administration and constitutional affairs committee, goes next.
Q: You were not obliged at the EU summit to accept an article 50 extension, were you?
May says parliament had passed legislation calling for this.
Q: But it just required you to seek an extension.
May says this was an act of parliament. If you are obliged to seek an extension, the implication is that you are also required to accept it.
She says, if she had asked for an extension and been given it by the EU, and if she had then turned it down, that would have looked very odd.
Jenkin says, if she had asked the attorney general, she would have been told she was not obliged to agree an extension.
Q: Is it right that you will not leave the EU without a deal?
May says she stands by what she has said in the past about no deal being better than a bad deal.
When she first made that argument, at Lancaster House, she was talking in the abstract.
Now she has a deal, and a good one.
Q: So if the Commons refuses to approve a deal, you will want the UK to stay in indefinitely.
May says the UK will only stay in if article 50 is revoked.
Q: Would the votes include a second referendum?
May says neither the government nor the opposition is proposing this.
May suggests Labour's customs union policy and government's very similar
Q: Will the options being put to MPs include a customs union?
May says the government would discuss this with Labour.
Q: Will it include a customs union?
May repeats her answer. Hilary Benn, the Labour MP asking the questions, says he would expect Labour to propose this, since it is their policy.
May says various terms are used, and sometimes they mean the same thing.
Theresa May's session with the Liaison Committee of senior MPs has just begun. News klaxon not sounding yet. "The government’s policy is that we want to leave the EU with a deal, and that is what we continue to work for," she says.
— Heather Stewart (@GuardianHeather) May 1, 2019
- May suggests Labour’s customs union policy and the government’s are very similar.
Updated
May says the talks with Labour have been “constructive” and “meaningful”.
She hopes a deal can be done with Labour.
If not, the government will bring it to the Commons and hold a series of votes.
She says there are four choices: leaving with a deal, leaving without a deal, holding a referendum, or revoking article 50.
- May says there are four choices facing MPs: leaving with a deal, leaving without a deal, holding a referendum, or revoking article 50.
(Is this a hint as to the options that the government might put to MPs if it holds its own indicative votes?)
Theresa May's evidence to Commons liaison committee
Theresa May is giving evidence to the Commons liaison committee.
The session should last 90 minutes, and it will be all about Brexit.
Gove says he hopes to have the chance over dinner with the US president Donald Trump when he visits the UK to make it clear to him that he needs to take climate change seriously.
Gove says the UK has cut its carbon emissions faster than any other G7 country since 2010.
That has happened because of a partnership between government and the private sector, he says.
He says it is important to ensure that dealing with climate change does not hold back economic growth, because that growth is necessary to trigger the innovation that will led to new ways of tackling climate change.
But he says that he accepts the government needs to do more.
Sir Edward Leigh, a Conservative, asks Gove if he agrees that the socialist command-and-control economies of Eastern Europe have the worst record on the environment.
Gove agrees. He cites Venezuela as another example.
Gove says the government is spending £5bn every year helping developing nations deal with climate change.
Gove says five of the warmest years on record have occurred since 2010.
A warming world would result in the desertification of large parts of the earth, he says.
Gove says climate change is a crisis that all politicians have to meet.
He says the first politician to make this clear was Margaret Thatcher. She was a Christian who believed in stewardship, and scientist who believed in the facts.
There is a “green thread of ambition” running through Conservative thought, he says.
Caroline Lucas, the Green MP, says Gove’s words are “honeyed”, but we need to see action too. She says if Gove is serious, he must accept the need to cancel the third runway at Heathrow. She says aircraft travel could end up accounting for two fifths of UK emissions.
In response, Gove says his department is working on plans to make honey for environmentally sustainable.
Michael Gove, the environment secretary, is responding now.
He says Theresa May wanted to be present for this debate, but cannot attend because she is giving evidence to the liaison committee later.
Corbyn says we have a chance to act. This opportunity won’t be available to other generations. It is for this generation to take it, he says.
Corbyn says the UK government’s attempts to cut carbon emissions do not go far enough.
He says an emergency does not have to be a catastrophe.
He says this could be used as an excuse to rebuild the economy.
Corbyn says he was very disappointed by the recent statements made by Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, about the Amazon rain forest.
He says the world is in danger of making extinct species that it has not yet discovered.
Corbyn says austerity has reduced the UK’s capacity to respond to climate disasters.
The UK must take serious steps on debt relief to help countries around the world respond to climate change.
He says UK aid should not fund fossil fuel projects.
Corbyn says homes must be made more energy efficient.
And he says there must be more investment in cycling and in public transports.
He also calls for forests to be expanded. Sadly, the UK has some of the lowest levels of forest coverage in Europe.
Corbyn says he would like to see coalfield areas becoming hubs for industries like batteries and energy storage.
And he says basic products should be flown across the world if they can be transported in a more environmentally-friendly way.
Corbyn says David Attenborough said in his “brilliant” recent programme on climate change that the world stood at a turning point. The future of life on the planet was at stake, he says.
If there is a climate emergency, radical and urgent action must be taken, he says.
He says global emissions will have to fall by 45% by 2030.
The hidden hand of the market will not save us, he says. And technological solutions will not emerge out of nowhere, he says.
Corbyn says massive government intervention is needed to develop technological answers.
Corbyn says air pollution is damaging children in cities around the world, before they reach the age of five.
And it is working-class communities that suffer most. The better off, who are often the most responsible, can pay their way out of trouble, he says.
He says some of the 60m refugees in the world today are climate refugees.
Steve Brine, a Conservative MP, asks where coal fits in Labour’s vision of a low-carbon future.
Corbyn says he is coming on to that. He wants carbon reduction, he says.
Justine Greening, the Tory former cabinet minister, says Corbyn is being too party political. Is he willing to agree a cross-party approach to climate change?
Corbyn says he is willing to talk to anyone on this issue. He says he sat down with other leaders recently when they met Greta Thunberg.
Philip Dunne, a Conservative, asks Corbyn if he regrets saying coal mines should be reopened when he stood for the Labour leadership in 2015.
Corbyn says he does not regret anything he said in that contest. He says the way coalfield communities in places like south Wales were treated under the Tories was disgraceful.
Corbyn says he joined WWF as a schoolchild. He says WWF says 60% of birds, mammals and reptiles have been lost since 1970, a year many MPs can remember.
Corbyn says he hopes the UK can host the climate change conference in 2020.
The UK must make it clear to President Trump that he needs to re-engage with the Paris climate change agreement.
But that agreement is not enough, he says. He says even if every country met its obligations, there would be a 3C rise in global temperatures. That would mean southern Europe, the horn of Africa, central America and the Caribbean facing permanent drought. And cities like Miami and Rio de Janeiro would be lost to rising sea levels.
Corbyn says in his time as an MP he has learnt that change does not come from politicians. It comes from the people.
Colin Clark, the Conservative MP, asks Corbyn if he accepts that natural gas has done a great deal to promote decarbonisation. Will Corbyn protect jobs in this sector?
Corbyn says, if Clark is asking about fracking, Labour is opposed to that.
Caroline Lucas, the Green MP, intervenes to say she is glad to see Corbyn is following the Green party’s lead.
Corbyn says he and Lucas are on exactly the same side on this issue.
Corbyn says it was inspiring to see schoolchildren protesting about climate change outside parliament recently.
He says it was humbling having children out there determined to teach adult politicians the importance of tackling climate change.
Corbyn opens debate saying MPs should declare climate emergency
Jeremy Corbyn is opening the Labour debate on climate change.
Here is the Labour motion. It is saying the Commons should declare a climate emergency.
That this house declares an environment and climate emergency following the finding of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change that to avoid a more than 1.5°C rise in global warming, global emissions would need to fall by around 45% from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching net zero by around 2050; recognises the devastating impact that volatile and extreme weather will have on UK food production, water availability, public health and through flooding and wildfire damage; notes that the UK is currently missing almost all of its biodiversity targets, with an alarming trend in species decline, and that cuts of 50% to the funding of Natural England are counterproductive to tackling those problems; calls on the government to increase the ambition of the UK’s climate change targets under the Climate Change Act 2008 to achieve net zero emissions before 2050, to increase support for and set ambitious, short-term targets for the roll-out of renewable and low carbon energy and transport, and to move swiftly to capture economic opportunities and green jobs in the low carbon economy while managing risks for workers and communities currently reliant on carbon intensive sectors; and further calls on the government to lay before the house within the next six months urgent proposals to restore the UK’s natural environment and to deliver a circular, zero waste economy.
Updated
Corbyn's spokesman says media partly to blame for Hobson/antisemitism row
Jeremy Corbyn’s spokesman said that while the Labour leader absolutely condemned the antisemitism in the John Hobson book (see 11.01am), he did not believe it was wrong to write the foreword, saying the issue had been exaggerated by inaccurate reporting.
The book, the spokesman said, had been praised by other politicians but was “clearly a text of its time and its era”, adding that it also included “racially offensive phraseology” about other groups.
Jeremy’s foreword was talking about the broad ideas around imperialism and Hobson’s analysis, and how they applied to today. He wasn’t writing an introduction to the book so he doesn’t talk about either of these things.
Asked if Corbyn should apologise given the worries expressed by the Jewish Labour Group and others, the spokesman said some of the blame should be placed on the media.
I would say that it’s not surprising given the way some of these things are reported. It doesn’t just apply to this story, but quite a few others. It’s not surprising that people reading that think that Jeremy or other people in the Labour party are saying things that they’re clearly not.
Asked if Corbyn stood by the foreword, the spokesman said he did, adding:
It was fine to write a foreword to Hobson’s Imperialism and to talk about the big issues it raised.
Updated
Number 10 has not ruled out Theresa May backing a customs union with the EU, the Daily Mail’s Jason Groves reports.
No 10 spokesman refuses to rule out customs union deal with Labour. Says May not in favour but adds: 'I can't pre-empt what will come out of the talks'
— Jason Groves (@JasonGroves1) May 1, 2019
Being outside the customs union will not automatically mean the UK can strike a trade deal with the US, experts have told the Brexit select committee today.
Sam Lowe, research fellow at the Centre for European Reform, said the government may have to make a choice between China and the US if it exits the EU without a customs deal. He told the committee:
The US have specified if you do a deal with China, they are going to have some issues in their agreement with you, so you are put in this awkward situation of having to chose.
The issue of the UK’s alignment with the EU’s customs union post Brexit is one of the critical focuses of the current talks between the government and Labour.
Economist Ruth Lea said remaining in the customs union but not in the EU would be “the worst possible world” because the UK would not have a say in any deal the EU struck with third countries.
But Lowe said the realpolitik was that deals with third countries were difficult to seal.
He said a trade deal with India was highly unlikely and he was not convinced that the British public had the appetite some of the hard Brexiters for a US trade deal.
Does leaving the customs union grant you some opportunities?. Yes possibly, I would argue they are not as wide as people might argue.
Then you have to look at what is the trade off? What is the economic benefit of these new agreements versus us being in a customs union.
As it stands there is no economic evidence to suggest that the new free trade agreements would compensate us for the loss of leaving the customs union, there are potentially political awards in that you can announce to the public that we have a new trade agreement with the US and it makes a good headline, but from economic perspective less so.
Updated
PMQs - Snap verdict
PMQs - Snap verdict: An exceptionally dull PMQs, but one which raised a particularly interesting question, or rather two. The main one, obviously, is why, during a session lasting more than three quarters of an hour, not one MP asked about Brexit? It remains the biggest crisis facing the country for decades. The situation is unresolved, and the government is deadlocked. Yet no one could be bothered to ask May what might happen next.
Why?
It is not that it does not matter anymore. And there is no evidence to suggest that MPs have suddenly stopped caring, that Mark Francois has come back from his Easter hols having resolved that EU membership isn’t that bad after all, or that Ben Bradshaw has changed his mind about a second referendum.
May will be answering questions about Brexit at the liaison committee this afternoon. But no MP ever passes up a chance to raise an issue they care about on the grounds that someone else might ask the question later.
So why the conspiracy of silence? I can think of two possible reasons - one robust, and the other more speculative.
First, there are local elections in England and Northern Ireland tomorrow and for the two main parties, the Conservatives and Labour, Brexit has probably become an electoral millstone. The Tories are ashamed at their failure to deliver it, and Labour’s policy is an elaborate fence-sitting exercise that leaves it open to attack from both sides. The biggest party in the Commons with a Brexit record it might actually be proud of is the SNP, and it is probably no coincidence that the only Brexit-related question (although it sounded more like one about higher education) came from Ian Blackford, the SNP’s leader at Westminster.
As for a speculative explanation, it felt like the Commons is still incapacitated by Brexit ennui. Like the rest of the population, MPs might just be fed up with it all. In the endless debates before Easter every conceivable Brexit theory and argument has been raised, and no one seems to have any plausible idea as to how the deadlock can be broken. It felt as if they did not say anything about Brexit because there was nothing left to say.
So instead we had a PMQs devoted to an array of domestic issues. They may have been important, but none of the exchanges crackled with the energy you get when great matter are at stake, or reputations are being won or lost. Jeremy Corbyn focused on poverty and public services and, although he very effectively exposed the big gap between May’s aspirations when she became PM and her record (her defence of government policy was even more lacklustre than usual), it nevertheless felt low key. May came under just as much pressure from the Tories Tom Tugendhat, on Huawei, and Johnny Mercer, on the prosecution of soldiers who served in Northern Ieland during the Troubles. But even those exchanges did not light up the session.
And that begs the second question. For the past few months, as it has hamstrung the executive and vetoed Brexit, the Commons has seemed more powerful than ever. But today as soon as the subject switched away from Brexit, it sounded irrelevant. How could that be?
It is because both are functions of no one party having a majority. MPs can block Brexit, but they don’t seem to be able to do anything else. All-powerful and powerless at the same time, that’s the paradox of this parliament.
Updated
Labour’s Diana Johnson asks why Ireland has been so much better at providing compensation for those affected by the infected blood scandal than the UK.
May says an independent inquiry is underway. But she agrees that it should have been launched earlier.
And that’s it. PMQs is over.
Sir David Amess, a Conservative, asks about the Music Man project, for children with disabilities, and says Southend should get city status.
May praises the work of Music Man. And she commends Amess for his city status campaign.
This is from the Spectator’s Isabel Hardman, who ran the marathon for charity.
Starting to wonder if I should have asked people to sponsor me sitting through this PMQs. It’s far more gruelling than the marathon and seems to have gone on far longer too.
— Isabel Hardman (@IsabelHardman) May 1, 2019
The Conservative Jeremy Lefroy asks May if she will ensure Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who remains in jail in Iran, that she has not been forgotten.
May says she and the foreign secretary constantly raise this case with their Iranian counterparts. The case has not been forgotten, she says.
The SNP’s David Linden asks about the problems faced by parents with very sick babies.
May says the government is looking at this issue. A minister will discuss this with Linden.
Johnny Mercer, a Conservative MP, asks about a former soldier who has been charged with attempted murder over an incident in Northern Ireland over 40 years ago. What is May doing to protect people like this?
John Bercow, the Speaker, says MPs must observe sub judice rules.
May says the current arrangements in relation to historic deaths in Northern Ireland is not working for anyone. There were more than 3,500 killings. Most were committed by terrorists. Service personnel must be treated fairly, and the government is considering legislation, she says.
Tom Tugendhat, the Tory chair of the foreign affairs committee, says the decision to allow Huawei to build part of the new 5G infrastructure is “extraordinary”. The UK will be “hosting a dragon”. Why is the UK ignoring the concerns of its allies?
May says the UK is reviewing its arrangements for 5G infrastructure. Decisions will be announced in due course. Considerations will include the need for security, and for diversity of supply, she says.
Labour’s Teresa Pearce asks about a constituent who went on holiday to Dubai, was forced to sign a confession for a drugs offence and jailed for 25 years. His family have tried to get him transferred back to the UK. But that has not happened, suggesting the prisoner transfer agreement is worthless.
May says she will look into this case.
This is from the FT’s Jim Pickard.
this session of #pmqs is a riposte to those who thought May-Corbyn exchanges would be more interesting if only they stopped banging on about Brexit
— Jim Pickard (@PickardJE) May 1, 2019
Labour’s Jim Cunningham asks if May still stands by her manifesto commitment to maintain free TV licences and bus passes for pensioners.
May says she stands by her manifesto. The BBC has the money to continue providing free TV licences for over-75s, she says.
Marion Fellows, the SNP MP, asks about payday loans. Universal credit is forcing more people to use these companies. Will May stop the roll-out of UC to stop people having to rely on “these vultures”.
May says UC claimants can get 100% advances. And the Scottish government has powers over welfare that it is not using, she says.
Updated
The SNP’s Deidre Brock asks May to “spill the beans” on Cambridge Analytica visiting Downing Street. She has had a letter from a minister saying no meetings took place. But now the Foreign Office have told her that a series of meetings took place. When did ministers meet Cambridge Analytica or AggregateIQ (AIQ)?
May says she has responded to these questions. The UK government publishes more transparency data than the Scottish government, she adds.
Charlie Elphicke, a Conservative, asks about a constituent who took her life while suffering from post-natal depression. Will the government do more to support the mental health of mothers returning to work?
May sends her condolences to the woman’s family. This is an important issue, she says. The government is looking at a returners’ programme to help people going back to work, especially mothers with young children.
Paul Williams, the Labour MP, says people in his constituency are fed up with anti-social behaviour and rising crime. Cleveland police have lost 500 officers. Will May review its funding needs?
May says the police are getting more money. But the issue of dealing with crime is not just about policing. It is also about what can be done to turn young people away from crime and violence. That is why she held a knife crime summit last month.
Ian Blackford, the SNP’s leader at Westminster, says the Scottish government will match tuition fees for EU students until 2021. Will May match that, or spread a hostile environment?
May says the Scottish government has said EU students will get free tuition until 2024, but English students will have to pay.
Blackford says May’s policy is blinded by ideology. The government is proposing giving EU students visas for three years. But Scottish university courses normally last four years. Will the government allow students going to Scottish universities four-year visas?
May says students in Scotland can convert their visas. She says it is a bit rich for the SNP to accuse her of being ideological.
Corbyn says there is an obvious connection between lower police numbers and rising crime. The government has cut council budgets by 50%. Poverty is up and violent crime is up. The government is more concerned about promoting austerity and tackling injustices. Can May explain why things are getting worse?
May says the NHS has had it biggest cash boost for years, employment is at record high, and more pupils are in good schools. Conservative councils are the ones that provide the best services, she says.
Corbyn says May seems to have her head in the sand. Some £7bn has been cut from adult social care since 2010. We need a strategy to ensure people get the help they need.
He turns to crime, and says violent crime is rising. The police have too few staff to investigate. Does May agree there is a violent crime epidemic?
May says Corbyn referred to care companies. Referring to Four Seasons going into administration, she says there should be no effect on the elderly in their homes.
She accuses Corbyn of quoting crime figures selectively. And she criticises him for voting against tougher laws on knife crime.
Corbyn says life expectancy has fallen by six months. Things are getting worse. In one of the richest countries in the world food banks are handing out 14m food parcels a year to people who don’t have enough to eat.
May says the best route out of poverty is to be in work. There are record numbers of people in work, she says. She says this government is taking decisions to allow people to keep more money in their pockets. On fuel duty freezes and tax cuts, Labour voted against.
Corbyn says many of those getting food parcels are in work. Even Amber Rudd, the work and pensions secretary, said universal credit is making the situation worse. There are 1.4m people who need social care. Does May agree with Damian Green who wants to tax the over-50s and take away their benefits?
May says the government has put more money into social care. But is it not just about funding. As some Labour MPs say it is, May says it is also about best practice.
Jeremy Corbyn joins May in congratulating those who ran the marathon.
He wishes people a happy May Day on international workers’ day.
Tomorrow there are local elections, he says. He says May promised to fight against burning social injustices when she became PM. But yesterday the Social Mobility Commission said inequality was entrenched.
May starts by saying Corbyn should have welcomed the union. It is the first time he has not welcomed a union in this house, she says.
(Her joke falls flat.)
She says there is a real commitment in government to tackle inequality. Labour offers failed policies, broken promises and piles of debt.
Corbyn says social mobility so going backwards. Life expectancy is falling for the first time since 1945. People can expect to live shorter lives than they did in the past.
May says that is not the case. People are not expecting to live shorter lives than in the past. The government is taking steps to ensure people can live healthy lives. The Tories are improving people’s lives. Corbyn has just voted against government policies.
John Lamont, a Scottish Conservative, says on this day in 1707 Scotland and England come together to form the United Kingdom.
May thanks Lamont for highlighting this. She says all MPs will want to mark this. Under the SNP public services are getting worse because they are focusing on holding another independence referendum.
Theresa May starts by sending her best wishes to Chloe Smith, the Cabinet Office minister who has had a baby.
She congratulates those MPs, Commons staffers and lobby journalists who took part in the marathon.
This is from Labour’s Chris Bryant.
I have never seen the Commons so empty for #PMQs
— Chris Bryant (@RhonddaBryant) May 1, 2019
An empty chamber, a vacant political agenda, a vacuous government.
PMQs
PMQs is about to start.
I always do a snap summary, but today I will do it at the end of the whole session, not straight after the May/Corbyn exchanges, because May v her party and the Commons is a more important story at the moment than May v the Labour leader.
Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.
BrexitCentral’s Jonathan Isaby has some bad news for journalists ...
Lots of Theresa May today: PMQs at noon then several hours before the Liaison Committee of Select Committee Chairs at 3pm. But don’t hold your breath for anything exciting. “She has no intention of creating any news,” confides one close to her...
— Jonathan Isaby (@isaby) May 1, 2019
Nearly 8 million people in Britain eligible to vote in the European elections are not yet registered, my colleague Sarah Marsh reports.
The figures have been highlighted by the anti-Brexit campaign, Best for Britain. They have an online tool which enables people to register to vote and to request a postal vote which is available here.
Government cancels no-deal Brexit ferry contracts at cost of £50m
The government has has cancelled all its no-deal Brexit contracts with cross-channel ferry companies at a cost of around £50m to the tax payer, it has emerged.
The cancellation fee comes on top of the £33m it is paying out to Eurotunnel in an out-of-court settlement over the award of the £103m ferry contracts in December including two contracts, worth around £90 with DFDS and Brittany Ferries.
They were contracted to guarantee transport capacity across the channel for medicines and other critical goods that were put at risk by potential deals in Dover or Calais in the event of a crash out.
The decision to cancel the contracts altogether comes just weeks after the government cancelled its no-deal contingency plans on foot of the extension of article 50 to the end of October.
It had already cancelled on of the three ferry contracts in February after it emerged the shipping company, Seaborne, would not be able to lease any boats in time.
Updated
Here is some more comment on the Corbyn/Hobson/antisemitism row.
The historian Robert Saunders has posted a thread on Twitter starting here.
I teach Hobson's "Imperialism" for an undergraduate course. Hobson was *both* a profoundly important thinker *and* viciously anti-Semitic. That Corbyn wrote a Foreword does not make him an anti-Semite but it does say something about his blind spots. THREAD https://t.co/OANkdXBRxZ
— Robert Saunders (@redhistorian) May 1, 2019
And here is one of his key posts.
7. I don't for a moment think Corbyn was endorsing Hobson's anti-Semitic views. But he either didn't notice them or didn't think they mattered. That has been a consistent blindspot for him, which says something troubling about the lesser status of anti-Semitism on the Corbyn Left
— Robert Saunders (@redhistorian) May 1, 2019
My colleague Jonathan Freedland has also posted a Twitter thread on this, starting here.
He defended a mural depicting hook-nosed Jewish bankers playing Monopoly on the backs of the poor
— Jonathan Freedland (@Freedland) April 30, 2019
He said two Jewish critics didn’t understand “English irony”
And now we learn that in 2011 he praised a book packed with anti-Jewish conspiracy theory https://t.co/JaJLv8OJAQ
And here is one of his key posts.
A Labour spokesman now says that “Jeremy completely rejects the antisemitic elements” of the book’s analysis - but if that’s true, why didn’t he reject them in the foreword where he so warmly praised the book?
— Jonathan Freedland (@Freedland) April 30, 2019
This is from the Financial Times’ Gideon Rachman.
To me, most shocking bit about Corbyn/Hobson is not what Corbs fails to say about H's anti-semitism, but his argument in the preface (as quoted by @Dannythefink) that Nato represented US military occupation of Europe and that Soviet allies had greater independence. Our future PM!
— Gideon Rachman (@gideonrachman) May 1, 2019
And this is from the Herald’s Iain Macwhirter.
If Hobson's "Imperialism" is an anti-semitic tract, it means every university course in politics and international relations has been promoting hatred of jews. https://t.co/Z9AMBDN2ja pic.twitter.com/XWS1Pi00YN
— Iain Macwhirter (@iainmacwhirter) May 1, 2019
Updated
Here is Theresa May leaving Number 10 a few minutes ago on her way to the Commons for PMQs.
It will be disappointing if we get through PMQs without anyone asking about the Daily Mail splash.
Wednesday’s Daily Mail: Wife of ex-Putin crony’s £135,000 dinner with PM #bbcpapers #tomorrowspaperstoday (via @Hendopolis) pic.twitter.com/ncYxqAHfWu
— BBC News (UK) (@BBCNews) April 30, 2019
And here is how the story starts.
Theresa May and six female cabinet members had a night out with the wife of a former Vladimir Putin ally who had donated £135,000 at a Tory fundraiser.
Lubov Chernukhin was entertained by the prime minister at the five-star Goring Hotel in Belgravia on Monday evening.
It is understood the banker won the dinner as an auction prize at the Conservative party’s Black and White ball earlier this year. The £135,000 bid takes Mrs Chernukhin’s donations to the Tories over the past seven years past the £1million mark.
The party has insisted that Mrs Chernukhin, now a British citizen, is not a ‘Putin crony’. But the money will raise fresh questions about the Tories’ links to Russia just a year after the Salisbury spy poisoning.
As BuzzFeed’s Alan White points out, if Theresa May is unhappy about the story, she can blame Liz Truss, the chief secretary to the Treasury, who revealed that the dinner had taken place by posting a picture on her Instagram feed.
A huge shout out to actual cabinet minister Liz Truss, who managed to gift the Daily Mail a story about Theresa May and other senior Tories having dinner with an oligarch's wife while trying to get some likes on the 'gram pic.twitter.com/f9PgHFUxHF
— Alan White (@aljwhite) May 1, 2019
Campaigners fighting to stop the expansion of Heathrow have failed in their attempt to block the new runway in the high court, my colleague Sandra Laville reports.
Corbyn's praise for pre-WW1 anti-imperialist Guardian writer triggers fresh antisemitism row
In her various media interviews this morning Rebecca Long-Bailey, the shadow business secretary, has also been defending Jeremy Corbyn over the latest antisemitism row - this one prompted by a book written by a radical Guardian journalist more than 100 years ago.
The writer was John Hobson and the book was Imperialism: A Study, published in 1902. It was about the link between capitalism and imperialism, and Hobson argued that the desire to open up foreign markets was driven by excess capital at home. His thesis was influential with Marxist, and you can see why it appealed to Jeremy Corbyn, who wrote an approving introduction to a new edition published in 2011.
But there’s a problem. Many of the banks and financial houses described by Hobson were run by Jews and there is a clear strain of antisemitism running through the book.
This has all been flagged up today by the Times columnist and Conservative peer Daniel Finkelstein who quotes this passage from Imperialism. Hobson wrote:
These great businesses — banking, booking, bill discounting, loan floating, company promoting — form the central ganglion of international capitalism. United by the strongest bonds of organisation, always in closest and quickest touch with one as other, situated in the very heart of the business capital of every state, controlled, so far as Europe is concerned, by men of a single and peculiar race, who have behind them many centuries of financial experience, they are in a unique position to control the policy of nations ...
Does anyone seriously suppose that a great war could be undertaken by any European state, or a great state loan subscribed, if the house of Rothschild and its connections set their face against it?
You can find the whole of Hobson's Imperialism: A Study here https://t.co/gLzwKyhNBX
— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) April 30, 2019
Here is a longer excerpt of the bit about the "men of a single and peculiar race" which concludes by mentioning the House of Rothschild (page 63-64) pic.twitter.com/NRdhMmFKSj
In his column (paywall) Finkelstein also quotes more explicitly antisemitic views expressed by Hobson in an earlier book. And he concludes:
Mr Corbyn is praising as “correct and prescient” a directly antisemitic analysis.
Did Mr Corbyn not read the book before he praised it? Did he read it but, as with the Mear One mural, not notice that it was antisemitic? Did he realise it but decide it didn’t matter because there were other more important things about it?
One thing is clear. The problem of left-wing antisemitism isn’t really about Israel. It’s much more deeply embedded than that.
MPs who have criticised Corbyn in the past for his stance about this have seized on this as fresh evidence that the Labour leader is at the very least unduly complacent about antisemitism.
This is from Labour’s Wes Streeting.
My advice to any Labour MP today: refuse to defend Jeremy Corbyn lauding a book containing classic antisemitic tropes. If he wants to defend the indefensible he should go on the airwaves and defend himself. He has a responsibility to explain himself. https://t.co/ioOVhJJ1O3
— Wes Streeting MP (@wesstreeting) May 1, 2019
This is from Labour’s Margaret Hodge.
For Corbyn to praise a book packed full of antisemitic conspiracies - the very same conspiracies directed at me - is disgusting. Ignoring this book's blatant antisemitism is inexcusable & part of his shameful record of condoning antisemitic hate.https://t.co/5S048bSMvm
— Margaret Hodge (@margarethodge) May 1, 2019
And this is from Ian Austin, the MP who resigned from Labour earlier this year over Corbyn’s stance on antisemitism and foreign policy generally.
Jeremy Corbyn endorsed book that peddles racist stereotypes of Jewish financiers and imperialism as “brilliant” and a “great tome”.
— Ian Austin (@IanAustinMP) April 30, 2019
He attacked the USA and Nato, but defended the Soviet Union and Venezuela.
He is completely unfit to lead the Labour Party. https://t.co/76zU2xzx4y
But others are less censorious. This is from Tristram Hunt, the historian and former Labour MP who is not a Corbyn supporter.
It wld be reductive to categorise JA Hobson as only an anti-Semitic thinker. Like too many on the Left, he did make a racist & ugly alignment of ‘Jewish finance’ with imperialism. But he was also an important figure, worthy of study, within the 20th century liberal tradition.
— Tristram Hunt (@TristramHuntVA) May 1, 2019
This is from the former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, who is sympathetic to Corbyn.
Anti-Corbyn plotters are getting desperate. To perpetuate their antisemitism slander they are lambasting Jeremy for writing, in a blurb to JA Hobson's Imperialism's new edition, that it was both “brilliant” and “very controversial at the time''. They need to try much, much harder
— Yanis Varoufakis (@yanisvaroufakis) May 1, 2019
These are from Sunder Katwala, a former head of the Fabian Society, the Labour-affiliated thinktank (and not a Corbynite).
I wasn't aware of the strong role of anti-semitism in JA Hobson's accounts of the Boer War and imperialism more broadly (set out by @dannythefink here)
— Sunder Katwala (@sundersays) April 30, 2019
Hobson among the most influential New Liberal, Fabian and left thinkers at the start of 20th centuryhttps://t.co/u7fiU33gHO
Hobson, as key influence on CP Scott, is big figure in Guardian history, esp anti-war tradition begun in Boer War. His role in paper's debate on 1914 cited here.
— Sunder Katwala (@sundersays) April 30, 2019
References tend to be laudatory. His antisemitism may be forgotten/not known.https://t.co/nHBS1PSNny
And this is from the historian Chris Williams.
In the 90s I taught Hobson to students (including poss @macklin_gd?) and ignored the antisemitism, probably because I thought that it was just more nearly-ubiquitous-late-C19th-antisemitism, and I wanted to cover his economic critique. Mea culpa, I prob wouldn't do that in 2019.
— Chris Williams (@Chris_A_W) May 1, 2019
For the record, this is what Rebecca Long-Bailey said about the row.
The guy in question was a political thinker of his time, whether you agree with his opinions or not.
Numerous Labour and Conservative colleagues have commented on him, whether that’s negatively or positively, taking certain parts of his thinking into consideration.
But in no way would the Labour party or Jeremy Corbyn condone any antisemitic comments in any way.
And this is what a party spokesperson said about this.
Jeremy praised the liberal Hobson’s century-old classic study of imperialism in Africa and Asia.
Similarly to other books of its era, Hobson’s work contains outdated and offensive references and observations, and Jeremy completely rejects the antisemitic elements of his analysis.
Updated
In an interview on the Today programme Rebecca Long-Bailey, the shadow business secretary and a member of Labour’s negotiating team in the cross-party Brexit talks, was asked about the reports (see 9.26am) about Theresa May preparing to give in to Labour demands. She said she thought ministers might have to agree to the UK staying in a customs union (Labour’s key demand). “I think pragmatically that they potentially may have no option in order to be able to push this deal through,” she said.
She went on:
We are fleshing out the details to see how far the government can move towards us and then we will be able to ascertain how far we are able to move towards them.
There are certain issues that we think they will be prepared to move on and we might be prepared to support certain positions.
There are certain areas which we haven’t seen any movement at all.
We want to take a view on the whole package, the whole deal, to see if there has been any true movement.
May to face questions from MPs amid claims she is preparing for deal with Labour
Theresa May is taking PMQs today, and then spending 90 minutes giving evidence to the Commons liaison committee (the one comprising chairs of all the Commons select committees - a sort of Commons captain’s XI, although that might be crediting them with more glory than they deserve). The last time she answered questions in public was almost three weeks ago (her Commons statement after the EU summit agreeing the Brexit delay until October). In theory this means these two sessions should be ripe for producing news, although experience suggests that there is no limit to May’s ability to get through a public grilling without giving anything away.
May will be speaking in the context of reports in Conservative- supporting papers claiming she is close to doing a deal with Labour to get her Brexit plan through the Commons. This is from the Daily Mail story, by Jason Groves and Jack Doyle.
The Tories may have to accept a permanent customs union to get Brexit through parliament, the cabinet was warned yesterday.
In a blunt analysis, the government’s chief whip Julian Smith said there was no chance of passing a version of Mrs May’s deal without Labour’s support – and warned that the government could be ‘sunk’ if it tried.
A source said Mr Smith told yesterday’s meeting of the cabinet: ‘It’s a customs union or a second referendum, and we are not having a second referendum.’
Culture secretary Jeremy Wright reportedly said after a 90-minute discussion in No 10: ‘The options are like being in an acid bath because there are no good options’.
And this is from the Daily Telegraph’s version, which is the front page splash.
Brexiteers still believe Mrs May can win round Tory rebels by making changes to the Northern Irish backstop, but the prime minister appears increasingly convinced that support from Labour is the only way to get the stable majority she needs for a divorce deal and the trade talks to come.
Downing Street sources insisted last night that the government remains opposed to joining a customs union with the EU after Brexit - Labour’s number one demand - but leave supporters fear Mrs May will agree with Labour a form of customs union in all but name.
Michael Gove, the environment secretary who campaigned for leave in the EU Referendum, backed Mrs May in yesterday’s meeting, suggesting that the Tories might have to give ground to Labour so that Jeremy Corbyn could claim victory in the talks and sell the deal to his MPs.
Mr Gove told ministers that it would be better to have the “unpalatable” outcome of a deal with Labour than the “disastrous” outcome of Brexit not happening at all ...
Sources said Mr Gove argued that if a withdrawal agreement bill - the legislation needed to achieve Brexit with a deal - contained a promise to deliver the “benefits of a customs union” it would allow a Tory Government to pursue an independent trade policy while leaving a future Labour government room to pursue a full customs union.
TELEGRAPH; May ‘on verge of caving in to Labour’ #tomorrowspaperstoday pic.twitter.com/GU8F6pMonm
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) April 30, 2019
None of this is confirmed, and it is possible that these stories have been briefed as a pre-emptive hit by ministers who want to stop May doing a deal with Labour. But with luck by the end of the day we may get some clues as to whether or not this speculation looks sound.
Here is the agenda for the day.
10am: The high court rules on a legal challenge against government plans for a third runway at Heathrow.
10.40am: Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, publishes a plan to increase Scottish exports.
12pm: Theresa May faces Jeremy Corbyn at PMQs.
Around 1pm: Jeremy Corbyn opens a debate on a Labour motion saying the Commons should declare a climate emergency. Michael Gove, the environment secretary, will respond for the government.
3pm: Theresa May gives evidence to the Commons liaison committee about Brexit.
3.15pm: Facebook and Twitter executives give evidence to the joint human rights committee.
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 when I finish after May’s evidence to the liaison committee.
You can read all the latest Guardian politics articles here. Here is the Politico Europe round-up of this morning’s political news. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’s 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 it is 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 questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply ATL, although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.
Updated
