George Osborne has accused Boris Johnson of playing “political games” over Britain’s future membership of the EU, while admitting the London mayor has ambitions to rise through government.
The chancellor criticised his Conservative colleague for claiming that Britain should model itself on Canada, which has negotiated free trade with the EU but does not accept freedom of movement.
“Let’s take the Canadian deal. It took seven years to negotiate, there are tariffs on everything from cars to beef, and three-quarters of our economy is in services and they don’t have a services deal,” Osborne told the BBC’s Andrew Marr.
“I don’t want us to be Canada. I want us to be Great Britain. In the end this is not some political game. This is the biggest decision facing this country for 50 years. And the people that are going to be affected by that decision are not you and me – we’ll be long gone from the political stage – it will be the car worker in Sunderland, the hill farmer in Wales, the bank call centre worker in Bournemouth. Their future depends on an open and engaged Britain.”
The comments come as bitterness between Conservatives on either side of the referendum debate heighten – with both Osborne and Johnson nervous about what the impact may be on their own hopes to lead their party.
Asked about the memoirs of former the Lib Dem minister David Laws, who claimed Osborne and David Cameron had discussed Johnson’s leadership hopes, he said: “I don’t think it is the greatest revelation in human history to discover that Boris Johnson is interested in a job in government.”
Pushed on whether he thought Johnson wanted to be prime minister, Osborne said: “You’d have to ask him.”
He also talked about his own position in the party, insisting he wanted to take “big radical reforming steps” despite obstacles in Westminster including his own backbenches. The chancellor recently lost a battle to liberalise Sunday trading laws when the SNP sided with Tory rebels.
“We’ve got a small majority. So do we win every vote? No we don’t,” he said. Osborne argued that an option was to “shut up shop and do nothing”. But he added: “That is not me as a politician. If people want a politician who is just going to sit here and blather away and do nothing they can get someone else.”
The chancellor said he was determined to stick to the promises of the Conservative manifesto, including raising the 40p tax threshold. But changes would be difficult as he also admitted that worsening economic factors meant the government would have to save 50p in every £100 by 2020.
