Afternoon summary
- Johnson has also said he would be “utterly amazed” if the UK could not get the EU to agree a new withdrawal agreement without the backstop. See 2.52pm for a full summary of the speech.
- Nick Boles, the Tory MP leading attempts to get parliament to legislate to block a no-deal Brexit, has said he could well be deselected by his local party because of his activities. In an interview with the BBC’s Political Thinking with Nick Robinson podcast, he said he would probably be deselected if there were a vote now. He explained:
One hundred people in my local party have written in saying they’re outraged by what I’m saying and want to de-select me. And the truth is that many of them used to belong to Ukip only about a year ago. They’re entirely entitled to their view and they’re entitled to be members of the Conservative party and they’re entitled to deselect me but I am not going to change what I believe is in the interest of the 80,000 people that I represent in parliament because of a hundred people in my constituency party.
- The Lords EU justice sub-committee has expressed concerns about the government’s failure to give a long-term commitment to retaining the Human Rights Act. In a letter to the committee, Edward Argar, a justice minister said that the government was committed to retaining it “while the process of EU exit is underway” but that after that it would consider the matter further “in the full knowledge of the new constitutional landscape”.
That’s all from me for today.
Thanks for the comments.
Have a good weekend.
Anand Menon, the academic who runs the UK in a Changing Europe project, has written a good article for Guardian Comment explaining what he felt when he was on the Question Time panel last night and the audience loudly cheered the prospect of a no-deal Brexit.
Here is an extract.
Metaphors matter. And Brexit has become a metaphorical cornucopia (if you see what I mean). Perhaps nowhere is this more true, and more damagingly and misleadingly so, than when it comes to the question of “no deal”.
When you hear the phrase, it’s natural to think of some kind of commercial exchange. So, for example, I’ve decided to trade my old car in. I take it to the garage to part-exchange it, and the person makes me an offer I can easily refuse. So I drive the old car home.
That’s a no deal, but it is absolutely not a good analogy for Brexit. In commerce, as a rule, the default outcome – the situation if no transaction takes place – is the status quo ante. No deal, no change. With Brexit, if we leave the European Union with no deal, we don’t simply carry on as before. Far from it.
What will happen instead is that a whole swathe of rules governing all manner of transactions with the EU – covering, among other things, travel, security cooperation and trade – will cease to apply. Losing chunks of law isn’t easy; pointing this out isn’t “Project Fear”. This will be disruptive, and there’s no point claiming otherwise. Thinking, “Sod it, it’s been almost three years, let’s just leave” is fair enough, but be aware of what it means.
And here is the full article.
Liam Fox has also reaffirmed his opposition to the UK staying in the customs union for good, saying that would “not be delivering Brexit”, the BBC reports.
Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, has said that other countries are to blame for the fact that the UK does not have alternative trade deals ready by 29 March to replace the existing 40 EU ones that will lapse if the UK leaves without a deal. Asked about this revelation in today’s Financial Times (see 10.57am), he said:
[The agreements are] not just dependent on the UK. Our side is ready. It is largely dependent on whether other countries believe that there will be no deal, and are willing to put the work into the preparations.
Willamson says Corbyn should be 'more mature' and join cross-party Brexit talks
Gavin Williamson, the defence secretary, has said Jeremy Corbyn should adopt a “more mature” attitude to the cross-party Brexit talks and participate, instead of boycotting them until Theresa May rules out no deal. On a visit to MOD St Athan in the Vale of Glamorgan, Williamson said:
The prime minister reached out across the House of Commons, giving the Labour leader the option to talk and discuss how best to take things forward, and he’s just turned round and refused to do this, despite the fact that so often he’s talked to so many other organisations and groups.
I very much hope that he will rethink his position and take a more mature and considered attitude.
Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA
Theresa May left Downing Street by car shortly after 3pm on Friday without speaking to reporters, the Press Association reports. She is due to spend the weekend at her country retreat, Chequers.
Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images
Boris Johnson's speech and Q&A - Summary and analysis
Here are the main points from Boris Johnson’s speech and Q&A. There is a lobby correspondent joke about how, whenever a politician gives a “wide-ranging speech”, that’s because they are making a pitch for the leadership. This speech wasn’t a full-on “wide-ranging” one because what Johnson had to say about domestic policy was quite threadbare, but there were snippets of low-tax, decentralising thinking in it that, in other circumstances, might have made news. However, they were overshadowed by his comments on Brexit (which were scarcely plausible) and his comments on the EU referendum campaign (which were downright dishonest).
Here is a summary.
- Johnson falsely claimed that he had not used alarmist anti-Turkish messages during the 2016 referendum campaign. (See 12.20pm, 12.37pm and 12.48pm.)
- He claimed that it was “overwhelmingly likely” that the EU would agree to a withdrawal agreement with the UK that did not involve the backstop and that involved the UK retaining half the £39bn due to the EU until a trade deal has been concluded. He said the government had not even asked for the backstop to be removed. It should, he said. He claimed that the UK would be “flexible” and that the EU only ever made concessions at the last moment.
We should take out the Irish backstop and use the transition period with a mutual commitment to maintain the status quo – zero tariffs, quotas or regulatory checks – to negotiate a new free trade deal, and a new partnership, not based on the backstop, as is currently proposed, but on the PM’s Lancaster House speech.
And we should withhold at least half of the £39bn until that deal is concluded.
If we mean it , if we are determined, and if we make it clear that this is our best and final offer, I would be utterly amazed if we cannot get agreement on these terms.
EU leaders have said, firmly and repeatedly, that the backstop must stay and that the UK must pay what it owes as it leaves. Johnson is, of course, right to say that in some circumstances the EU does budge at the last minute in negotiations, but in the Brexit process EU leaders have been mostly very consistent in their demands and there is no evidence at all that they are wiling to offer concessions on the scale Johnson envisages. In fact, the opposite seems more likely.
- He claimed that a no-deal Brexit leading to the imposition of UK-EU tariffs could not happen. He said:
[Britain and the EU are] run by highly intelligent, sensitive people who understand democracy and who respond to the needs of their constituents, particularly businesses. And they are not going to want to exit with a bristling palisade of sharpened stakes, in the form of tariffs, on either side of the channel. That is not going to happen, absolutely not. So when people talk about that kind of no deal, I just don’t think it’s remotely credible.
- He said that in some respects May’s Brexit deal was worse than staying in the EU. (See 11.45am.)
- He claimed he was not someone who deprecated other countries and cultures. He said:
I am not a nationalist, if by that you mean I’m a xenophobe, or someone who deprecates other countries and cultures. Absolutely not, far from it.
Mikey Smith at the Mirror has done a good job explaining how this is hard to square with Johnson’s long history of saying and writing offensive things about foreigners.
- Johnson refused to say that he would back May to stay as Tory leader in the event of a snap general election. (See 11.39am.) But he did say he did not favour a snap general election. He said:
I think most people in this country feel they have had quite enough elections. I certainly do ... A snap election is not the right way through.
- He called for local mayor and councils to be given more power over local spending. He proposed:
taking council tax, business rates stamp duty, land tax and the annual tax on enveloped dwellings, bundling them together giving them to local mayors and politicians to spend so that they have clear incentives to go for growth.
Johnson is not the only Tory interested in this sort of fiscal devolution. Jake Berry, the Northern Powerhouse minister, has floated plans for a department for the north of England, possibly with the power to vary local rates of income tax.
- Johnson said the government should create free ports in the UK. Free ports are port areas where goods can come and go exempt from tariffs and taxes. He said:
There are now 135 countries in the world that have such free ports with all their power to attract the growth of all kind and it is absurd that Britain will be forbidden by this deal from doing the same.
-
He claimed that EU migration had helped to depress wages and he said there was some evidence that “a tightening of the labour market since the [referendum] vote is actually contributing to a rise in take home pay”.
Updated
This is from the Independent’s Tom Peck.
To be fair to the guy, he did always say he was going to "lie in front of a bulldozer."
— Tom Peck (@tompeck) January 18, 2019
And now he has, for forty straight minutes. pic.twitter.com/07mcrTDJDH
More from Tom Brake, the Lib Dem Brexit spokesman, on Boris Johnson.
More shameless lies from @BorisJohnson, classic. The Leave campaign couldn’t be trusted in 2016 and can’t be trusted now. https://t.co/mpvK9MgOC7
— Tom Brake MP (@thomasbrake) January 18, 2019
Theresa May will be meeting with “a large number” of cabinet ministers in Downing Street today, a No 10 spokeswoman said. The meetings will be both with individual ministers and in groups throughout the day, the spokeswoman added, but there will not be a “cabinet gathering as such”. As the Press Association reports, the spokeswoman declined to give a list of names but said that more than half of cabinet ministers would be attending. She added: “I’m sure they will discuss a wide range of issues but you can expect Brexit to be a dominant focus.”
The spokeswoman also that May had held “constructive” telephone conversations with German chancellor Angela Merkel and Dutch premier Mark Rutte yesterday.
Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European commission, is going to speak to Theresa May at some point this afternoon, the commission’s spokesman has announced. He said the call was happening at May’s request.
Here is Tom Brake, the Lib Dem Brexit spokesman, on Boris Johnson’s speech.
No one will take lessons from Boris Johnson on eroding trust in our democracy. The fact he is still peddling mistruths about money from Brexit going to our NHS is shameful. Brexit will make us poorer.
As exit day approaches, with Theresa May’s deal soundly defeated, extending Article 50 is the only responsible course of action left.
We can then hold a people’s vote with the option to remain in the EU. This could happen much sooner than has been suggested and dig the country out of the huge hole the Tories have excavated.
And here are some more examples of Boris Johnson raising Turkey as a leave campaign issue in 2016.
I am very pro-Turkish but what I certainly can’t imagine is a situation in which 77million of my fellow Turks and those of Turkish origin can come here without any checks at all. That is mad - that won’t work.
And in June he discussed the issue during a Telegraph/HuffPost debate, as HuffPost’s Ned Simons points out.
Here's Boris during a HuffPost/Tele referendum debate suggesting British public should be given referendum on any Turkish membership of the EU. And that he is 'all in favour' of Turkey joining the EU as long as the UK 'comes out'. (1hr 12mins)https://t.co/jBMWY530mw
— Ned Simons (@nedsimons) January 18, 2019
As the recent Channel 4 drama, Brexit: The Uncivil War depicted, the Vote Leave campaign decided to use alarmist messages about the prospect of Turkish migrants being able to come to the UK because they were deemed effective - even though the MPs fronting the campaign may have had their reservations about dabbling in xenophobia.
Michael Gove, who was joint leader of Vote Leave with Boris Johnson, has acknowledged as much. In an interview for a book published last year, when asked about the anti-Turkish messaging, he admitted that in retrospect he would have liked the campaign to have “a slightly different feel”.
Boris Johnson and Michael Gove also raised the prospect of the Turkish migrants being able to enter the UK freely if it remained in the EU in a second letter sent to David Cameron during the referendum campaign in 2016. They said:
The Eurozone’s economic crisis is fueling the rise in migration. Millions of people in southern Europe, particularly young people, are giving up hope of their countries escaping recession. Unsurprisingly, migrants from those countries are disproportionately coming to Britain. Given the Eurozone crisis, we can only expect this to continue for many years. If we stay, we are tying ourselves to a broken Eurozone economy while simultaneously accepting unlimited migration of people trying to escape that broken economy. The only way to restore democratic control of immigration policy is to vote to leave on 23 June.
These problems will only get worse when countries in the pipeline to join the EU become members in the near future. British taxpayers are already paying nearly £2 billion for Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey to join the EU. The European Commission recently announced an acceleration of these plans and is already extending visa-free travel to the border with Syria and Iraq. This is dangerous. The Government’s claim that Britain has a veto is meaningless if it is simultaneously trying to ‘accelerate’ this process.
This letter was published in full in the (pro-leave) Daily Telegraph on 5 June 2016. The letter mentioned earlier (see 12.20pm) was publicised on 16 June 2016.
Updated
Boris Johnson condemned after falsely claiming he did not use anti-Turkish messages in leave campaign
During the 2016 referendum campaign Vote Leave, which was jointly headed by Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, claimed that if the UK remained in the EU, and the Turkey succeeded in joining, then around 80m Turks could end up being able to move to Britain.
At one point in the campaign Johnson and Gove wrote a joint letter to David Cameron about this. They said:
Others assert that the UK has ‘a veto’ on Turkish accession. This claim is obviously artificial given the government’s commitment to Turkish accession at the earliest possible opportunity.
In the letter they urged the government to promise to veto Turkey joining the EU. And they went on:
If the government cannot give this guarantee, the public will draw the reasonable conclusion that the only way to avoid having common borders with Turkey is to Vote Leave and take back control on 23 June.
But in the Q&A today, when Channel 4 News’ Michael Crick asked Johnson about his record on immigration, and the anti-Turkish campaign in 2016, Johnson claimed he did not raise the issue. He said:
Actually, I didn’t say anything about Turkey in the referendum. I think anybody who has followed my utterances during the last 20 years will know that I’ve always been in the camp of those who defend ...
At this point Crick asked if he was disowning what he said in 2016. Johnson replied:
Since I made no remarks, I can’t disown them.
Crick tried again, prompting Johnson to say:
I didn’t make any remarks about Turkey, mate.
Crick then pointed out that Johnson led the Vote Leave campaign. Johnson replied
You do me an honour. I was happy to support leave, and I do and I did.
Johnson’s claim not to have raised Turkey as an issue in 2016 is demonstrably untrue.
In response, the anti-Brexit group Best for Britain has put out this statement from the Labour MP Virendra Sharma.
Boris puts the moron in oxymoron. He’s now trying to act the great liberal by championing migration, after shamelessly pushing anti-Turkish messages as a leader of the Vote Leave campaign.
But the government must love it when he gets up and gives these speeches. He’s a helpful clown, distracting from the government’s failures by pushing a no deal that Parliament won’t let happen.
It’s time to stop giving his ill-thought through ideas oxygen, and hand the Brexit decision back to the public through a people’s vote.
DUP denies report claiming it would be open to UK staying in customs union with EU
In the Q&A Boris Johnson was asked about a story in today’s Times (paywall) saying the the DUP “would be open to a soft Brexit that kept the whole of the UK in a customs union with Brussels”. Johnson said he had seen the story, but that he did not know what the DUP were actually saying on this and that he had concerns about the idea of the UK staying in the customs union.
Arlene Foster, the DUP leader, has just put out a statement saying the Times report is not true. She said:
The report published in the Times this morning about the DUP is inaccurate and no doubt designed to undermine efforts to get the necessary changes to the withdrawal agreement.
The prime minister is very clear on our position. We have been consistent that for us it is the backstop which needs to be dealt with.
For the future we want an agreement which returns control of our money, our laws and our borders through a UK wide free trade arrangement with the EU.
The story in the Times is an attempt to cause division. Such tactics are not new to us and as in the past will not succeed.
Johnson claims no-deal Brexit, leading to imposition of UK-EU tariffs, would not happen
Q: If parliament ruled out no deal, would you support May?
Johnson says he does not see how parliament can rule out no deal.
But he thinks there will be a deal. He says a no-deal Brexit that led to the imposition of tariffs between the EU and the UK is not going to happen.
- Johnson claims a no-deal Brexit, leading to the imposition of UK-EU tariffs, would not happen.
And that’s it. He has now finished.
I will post a summary and reaction soon.
Q: Alan Duncan says you have divided the Conservative party and are not fit to lead it?
“Me,” says Johnson with some apparent incredulity.
He says he is just trying to bring people together.
Johnson says May’s deal is in some respects worse than remaining in EU
Q: Jacob Rees-Mogg said yesterday that, forced to choose between May’s deal and staying in the EU, he would opt for May’s deal. Would you?
Johnson says that is not a choice he would want. In some ways, May’s deal is worse than staying in the EU. At least in the EU the UK would have a say over new EU rules. But not under May’s deal. That is a “real defect”.
- Johnson says May’s deal is in some respects worse than remaining in EU.
Q: If May could get this deal through with Labour votes, should she stay on?
Johnson says, if we had ham, we would have ham. He does not want to comment on hypotheticals, he says.
Updated
May says parliament has voted to leave the EU on 29 March.
That cannot be superseded except by another piece of legislation, he says. And he says that is not going to happen.
Johnson refuses to say he would back May to stay as leader if there were snap election
Q: We are in the middle of a national crisis, and you are here making a blatant leadership pitch. Why don’t you just support Theresa May?
Johnson says May’s deal will not get through the Commons. But she has a “massive opportunity”. If she goes back to Brussels, she can get rid of the backstop.
Q: Would you back May in a snap election?
Johnson says most people have had enough of elections.
Q: If there is a snap election, should May stand down?
Johnson says there is no need for as snap election. The government should be focusing on getting a better deal from the EU.
- Johnson refuses to say he would back Theresa May to stay as leader if Tories had to fight a snap election.
This is from the Mail on Sunday’s Dan Hodges.
Boris Johnson just lied. Flat out lied. In response to a question about whether he would say anything to win an election. https://t.co/bT4Gbn44wS
— (((Dan Hodges))) (@DPJHodges) January 18, 2019
Johnson says, when he was in government, he tried very hard to get it to take the Brexit approach he is now advocating.
Johnson disowns Vote Leave’s anti-Turkish campaign message
Johnson has now finished. He is taking questions.
Q: In 2015 you said you were the most pro-immigration politician in the UK. In 2016 he ran a campaign saying 80m Turks would come to the UK. You have been all over the place on immigration. Won’t you say anything to win a leadership election?
Johnson says he did not make any remarks about Turkey during the EU referendum campaign.
Q: You ran the Vote Leave campaign. It was their theme.
Johnson says the questioner, Michael Crick from Channel 4 News, is doing him too much honour.
He says he has always supported immigration, but believes it must be controlled.
- Johnson disowns Vote Leave’s anti-Turkish campaign message.
Johnson says he wants to see more social cohesion.
He is not a nationalist, if nationalism means being opposed to foreigners, he says. He is cosmopolitan. His ancestors came from many places, he says.
But he says he does believe in the importance of place. He recalls the Olympics, and how people felt allegiance to the same team.
He says, if we can harness that sense of teamwork, we can increase national self-confidence.
That feeling of autonomy, being in charge of your own life, is ultimately what Brexit is all about, he says.
And that autonomy can be used innovate in business.
He says the UK should be the best place in the world “to turn a whacky idea into a world beater”.
He says the JCB itself is an example; it is a glorified tractor, with a back hoe and a front loader.
Johnson segues into crime, saying the curent mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is not doing as good a job “as the previous guy” (Johnson himself.)
He calls for more spending on health. And he calls for spending decisions to be devolved to local mayors.
He conceded this will cost money.
Johnson says Brexit could lead to higher pay, as well as cheaper food and cheaper clothes.
But immigration has not been the only factor holding pay down, he says.
He says the government has to do more to improve productivity.
There is too much of a gap between London and the regions, he says. People wanted this issue addressed.
Johnson is now talking about the reasons why people voted for Brexit.
He is quoting the passage on pay briefed overnight. (See 9.56am.)
Johnson says, if the UK holds its nerve, it can deliever not a pseudo Brexit, or a fake Brexit, but the Brexit people voted for.
And that would forestall all the years of uncertainty that May’s deal would generate.
Johnson claims that extending article 50 would be a mistake, because nothing would do more to erode trust in politics.
And he criticises plans to allow MPs to block a no-deal Brexit.
The UK should insist on only paying half the £39bn due to the EU when the new trade deal is settled, he says.
And he says he would be “utterly amazed” if the UK could not get a deal on the terms he is proposing.
Johnson claims EU will be 'flexible' if UK tries to get it to remove backstop
Johnson says trying to “heave” MPs from one side of the debate to another is a mistake.
And the idea that customs union membership would be a solution is a mistake, he says.
He says the UK needs to instead focus on getting a better deal from the EU.
The UK has not even tried to get rid of the backstop, he says.
But he says he does not believe it is true to say there is no chance of getting it removed from the deal.
Now is the time for us to go back to Brussels ... and demand real change to that backstop. And this time we must mean it.
He claims that the EU will be “flexible”. If you follow the EU, you will see that it is only in the last few days and weeks that they make concessions.
Johnson says it would be a mistake to stay bound by EU rules.
What would happen if the EU decided to regulate to ban some new innovation that British firms wanted to introduce.
The EU would be able to take these decisions without the UK having a say.
He says it makes him “furious” that the government could even contemplate this. It would be a “betrayal”, he says.
Johnson talks about driving a JCB, or a “custard collossus”, as he calls it.
He says they can move anything out of the way, but it goes wrong if you accidentally put it in reverse gear, he says.
And he says the same thing applies with Brexit. The government is taking the wrong approach, he says. He says it should not be trying to get Theresa May’s deal through parliament with Labour support.
- Johnson says May should not be trying to get her deal through Commons with Labour support.
Boris Johnson's speech
Boris Johnson is about to deliver his speech at the JCB factory in Staffordshire.
Boris Johnson is about to give a speech in front of a big digger. One suspects people will make jokes about holes and digging. pic.twitter.com/bZ1ys7alyM
— Carl Dinnen (@carldinnen) January 18, 2019
You are read all the Guardian politics stories here. And all our Brexit ones are here. Obviously there’s an overlap.
And here are some of the more interesting Brexit stories in the other papers.
Britain has failed to finalise most trade deals needed to replace the EU’s 40 existing agreements with leading global economies and will not be close to doing so when Brexit occurs on March 29, according to an internal Whitehall memorandum.
The memo, compiled by civil servants as part of contingency planning for the UK crashing out of the EU without a formal Brussels divorce agreement, warned that most of the deals would lapse without a transition period that keeps Britain under the EU umbrella once Brexit occurs.
“Almost none of them are ready to go now and none will be ready to go by March,” said one government official who has seen the internal analysis of the Department of International Trade’s progress.
Britain was on general election alert last night after Whitehall chiefs were ordered to draw up contingency plans for a snap poll.
Amid the fragile situation in Westminster, Britain’s top civil servant told Government departmental heads to be ready in case an election is needed to break the Brexitdeadlock.
Cabinet Secretary Sir Mark Sedwill met senior mandarins this week to discuss preparations in case Theresa May decides to go to the country.
John Bercow is set to become the first Speaker in 230 years to have his peerage blocked after ministers moved to punish him for “bias” during Brexit debates, The Times has learnt.
Commons Speakers are usually automatically offered a seat in the House of Lords after approval by No 10 but relations between Mr Bercow and the government have broken down ...
A cabinet source said: “It’s a good job that peerage nominations are in our gift — I’m sure we’ll be thinking carefully about which individuals we would choose to elevate to the House of Lords. I can’t imagine we would look favourably on those who’ve cheated centuries of procedure” ...
Retiring Speakers usually resign as an MP at the same time, triggering a by-election. A motion is traditionally then passed by the Commons asking the Queen to “confer some signal mark of Her Royal favour upon” the outgoing Speaker for “eminent services during the important period in which he presided with such distinguished ability and dignity”.
However, the idea that the “signal mark” must be a peerage is merely a convention.
Britain can extend its EU membership beyond the summer of 2019 without taking part in European elections or undermining the European Parliament, lawyers have advised the assembly.
Although contentious, the opinion from the European Parliament’s legal service potentially addresses a significant obstacle to Britain asking to delay Brexit beyond July 2, the inauguration date of the new assembly following the elections due in May.
“The possibility for the European Parliament to be validly constituted following the 2019 elections would not be affected by a potential failure by the UK to organise elections,” the paper states, according to a copy leaked to the Financial Times.
Without elections, the UK’s existing MEPs would remain until the new parliament was put together on July 2. In the new assembly, Britain would not have any seats. The other member states would have the same number of MEPs as now, with the chamber being reorganised only once Britain had left the EU.
And this is not a story, but it is worth noting anyway. The Islington Tribune, Jeremy Cobyn’s local paper, has a wraparound advert urging him to back a second referendum.
.@jeremycorbyn I have supported you and fought for you. Today, young Labour activists,members and supporters are telling you to fight for us. Fight against any 2nd rate Tory Brexit, fight for a public vote. Please sign and share: https://t.co/qIsthxitZC pic.twitter.com/xdNwFbaYDS
— Cathleen (@cathleenc_) January 18, 2019
This is from Penny Mordaunt, the Brexiter international development secretary.
They might have judged that:
— Penny Mordaunt MP (@PennyMordaunt) January 18, 2019
-the upsides of leaving outweigh the downsides of staying/No Deal disruption
-it’s only when #nodealisbetter than a bad deal” is believed by the EU that we’ll maximise our chance of a deal
-not honouring the result of the referendum would be appalling https://t.co/hjZuoA81Vz
Allie Renison, head of Europe and trade policy at the Institute of Directors, says Mordaunt seems to be implying that a no-deal Brexit would be better than what Theresa May is offering.
Unpicking this tweet, struck by the clear insinuation from a Cabinet member that the PM's deal is worse than no-deal (also, "maximise our chance of a deal" - dont we currently have one?) given the Govt line is the opposite https://t.co/gzqhD5neYl
— Allie Renison (@AllieRenison) January 18, 2019
Boris Johnson not fit to be next Tory leader, says his former Foreign Office deputy Alan Duncan
The Boris Johnson speech is inevitably being seen as a contribution towards his longstanding aspiration to become the next party leader. But Sir Alan Duncan, who served as his deputy when Johnson was foreign secretary and who is still in government, has taken the unusual step of going public this morning to say his former boss is not fit to replace Theresa May.
Boris - You are not equipped to unite the Party which you have so recklessly divided. Please think less about yourself and instead focus only on solving the historic crisis we now face which you have done so much to create. @bbclaurak #backthePMtheclockisticking
— Sir Alan Duncan MP (@AlanDuncanMP) January 18, 2019
Boris Johnson to claim controlling immigration after Brexit could help increase pay
According to a preview of his speech in the Times (paywall), Boris Johnson, the Brexiter former foreign secretary, will say that he wants the people of Britain to have a pay rise and that he thinks immigration controls after Brexit will help. He will say:
Yes Brexit was about democracy . . . but that vote was also triggered by a feeling that in some way the people of this country have been drifting too far apart and in areas where we need to come together.
We all know about boardroom pay and the huge expansion in the last 25 years of the gap between the remuneration of FTSE 100 CEOs and the average workers in their firms. We know one of the ways big corporations have held wages down is that they have had access to unlimited pools of labour from other countries.
Now I am a free market capitalist and a passionate believer in the benefits of migration but there must be a balance and if an influx of labour is being used not only to prevent investment in capital equipment but also in the skills and prospects of young people, then we need to think carefully about how we control immigration. If we want the people of Britain to have a pay rise, as I do, then we can’t expect to do it by simply controlling immigration, we have to address all the causes of the productivity gap that has so massively expanded.
He will also call for more investment in “great public services and safer streets [presumably that means the police], better hospitals, better transport links and better housing”.
Any Johnson speech is normally a ‘cancel all leave’ occasion for factchecking outfits, and today’s will probably be no exception. It is worth pointing out that when the migration advisory committee published its report on the impact of EEA migration (pdf), in September last year, it concluded that any impact EU migration may have had on the wages of British workers was minimal.
This is from the foreword from the committee’s chair, Prof Alan Manning.
While we do think that EEA migration has had impacts, many of them seem to be small in magnitude when set against other changes. The fall in the value of the pound after the referendum vote to leave the EU probably raised prices by 1.7% - this is almost certainly a larger impact than the effect on wages and employment opportunities of residents from all the EEA migration since 2004, although over a different time period.
This is the conclusion to the section in the report about the impact of EU migration on wages.
Taken altogether the existing evidence and the analysis we presented here suggests that immigration is not a major determinant of the wage growth experienced by existing residents. There is some suggestion that the impact on lower skilled groups may be more negative than for higher-skilled groups, but again these estimates are imprecise and subject to uncertainty.
And, for anyone interested in the technicalities, this is how the report tried to quantify that impact.
[Earlier research] found that a 1 per cent increase in the immigrant-native working age population ratio led to a 0.5 per cent decrease in wages in the 1st decile [ie, the poorest 10%], and a 0.6 per cent and 0.4 per cent increase in wages at the median and 9th decile respectively over the period 1997 to 2005. The sizes of the estimates are sensitive to the choice of instrument, but the pattern across the wage distribution remains.
Our replication of these results yielded very similar estimates ...
The new updated results show the same pattern of effects across the UK-born wage distribution as in the original study, with negative impacts at the bottom of the distribution and positive impacts at the top. In terms of magnitude, the estimates for all immigrants are similar to those from the original paper. These suggest that for a 1 percentage point increase in the EU-born working age population ratio there is an associated 0.8 per cent decrease in UK-born wages at the 5th percentile [ie, the poorest 5%], a 0.7 per cent fall at the 10th percentile, a 0.2 per cent reduction at the 25th percentile, a 0.2 per cent rise at the 50th percentile, 0.3 per cent increase at the 75th percentile and a 0.7 per cent and 0.5 percent increase at the 90th and 95th percentiles respectively.
The Tory Brexiter Jacob Rees-Mogg is going to host a regular Friday evening talkshow on LBC, the radio station has announced this morning. The first programme will go out tonight at 6pm.
Merkel's probable successor and other leading Germans urge UK to change its mind over Brexit
Britain is due to leave the EU on 29 March, but it is not too late to think again, according to some of the most powerful figures in Germany. They have signed a letter to the Times saying they want Britain to stay (paywall). It is affectionate and even rather moving (as well as being authentically drafted by a foreigner - there’s an odd reference to “going to the pub after work hours to drink an ale”.)
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has not signed it, but the name at the top of the letter is Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer - who has taken over from Merkel as head of the Christian Democratic Union and who is favourite to succeed her as Germany’s leader when Merkel steps down.
Other signatories include: Andrea Nahles, leader of the Social Democrats; Annalena Baerbock and Robert Habeck, leaders of the Green party; Dieter Kempf, president of the Federation of German Industries; Thomas Enders, head of Airbus: and Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler.
Here is the letter in full (paywall).
Sir, Without your great nation, this continent would not be what it is today: a community defined by freedom and prosperity. After the horrors of the second world war, Britain did not give up on us. It has welcomed Germany back as a sovereign nation and a European power. This we, as Germans, have not forgotten and we are grateful.
Because we realise that the freedom we enjoy as Europeans today has in many ways been built and defended by the British people, we want Britons to know that we respect their choice. And should Britain wish to leave the European Union for good, it will always have friends in Germany and Europe. But Britons should equally know that we believe that no choice is irreversible. Our door will always remain open: Europe is home.
Britain has become part of who we are as Europeans. And therefore we would miss Britain. We would miss the legendary British black humour and going to the pub after work hours to drink an ale. We would miss tea with milk and driving on the left-hand side of the road. And we would miss seeing the panto at Christmas. But more than anything else, we would miss the British people — our friends across the Channel. We would miss Britain as part of the European Union, especially in these troubled times. Therefore Britons should know: from the bottom of our hearts, we want them to stay.
The House of Commons is not sitting today and the Brexit news factory may be having a relatively quiet day. The main event will probably turn out to be a speech by Boris Johnson, the Brexiter former foreign secretary. But we are not expecting him to declare that he has read the letter in the Times and changed his mind.
Here is the agenda for the day.
10.30am: Jeremy Wright, the culture secretary, gives a speech on the value of culture.
11am: Boris Johnson, the former foreign secretary, gives a speech in Staffordshire on Britain after Brexit.
As usual, I will also 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, at around 4pm.
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.
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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.
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