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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Matthew Weaver, Ben Quinn and Kevin Rawlinson

Theresa May describes 'great regret' as she arrives for last Brussels summit – as it happened

Closing summary

We’re going to close down this live blog now. Thanks for reading and commenting. Here’s a summary of the day’s events:

And, if you’d like to read more, my colleagues Julian Borger and Rowena Mason have the full story on John Bercow’s vow to stay on:

Updated

John Bercow plans to stay in his post as Speaker of the House of Commons, despite previous expectations he was about to leave, my colleagues Julian Borger and Rowena Mason report.

In so doing, the Speaker risks provoking the fury of hardline Eurosceptics who believe he wants to thwart a no-deal Brexit.

Bercow told the Guardian it was not “sensible to vacate the chair” while there were major issues before parliament. And, amid growing indications that frontrunners for the Conservative leadership are willing to depart the EU without a deal, he warned candidates not to try to force such an outcome without the permission of MPs.

The former Labour home secretary, Charles Clarke, has called on Labour to reinstate Alastair Campbell and said he also voted Liberal Democrat in the European elections.

I was not aware that Alastair had voted Liberal Democrat in the European election until I heard him say so on television on Sunday evening.

His expulsion from Labour party membership is a disgrace and only compounds Labour’s current political difficulties.

I also voted Liberal Democrat. This was a one-off decision because of the hopeless incoherence of Labour’s position, particularly that of Jeremy Corbyn, on Brexit.

I have been a Labour party member for 47 years and have never before voted anything but Labour. I was chair of the Labour party in 2001-2.

I have consistently argued against those who, often in understandable despair at the Labour leadership’s abandonment of Labour’s fundamental values, have either resigned from the Labour party or joined another party. And I shall be voting for Labour’s excellent MP for Cambridge, Daniel Zeichner, in the next general election, whenever it comes.

Labour should immediately withdraw its expulsion of Alastair.

The elections of two pro-remain candidates to Northern Ireland’s three European Parliament seats is a message that must not be ignored in London, the Irish Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, says.

What I think is really significant, and I hope this has been noticed in Britain, is the result of the European elections in Northern Ireland, where for 40 years there have been two unionists and one nationalist.

That is no longer the case. There is one unionist, one Alliance Party MEP and one nationalist.

So, two out of the three of the MEPs elected in Northern Ireland supporting the European Union and supporting the backstop and I hope that hasn’t been missed as a fact by the British government and the wider British people.

Two out of three support Northern Ireland remaining in the European Union, two out of three support the backstop, I have heard that message - I hope the British government and British people have heard that message too, because it has been heard here in Brussels.

Sinn Féin’s Martina Anderson and the cross-community Alliance Party’s Naomi Long – who both support remain – were each elected. The DUP’s Diane Dodds, a Brexiter and a critic of the backstop, was the other candidate returned.

Varadkar was speaking at a European Council meeting of EU leaders in Brussels. He also addressed his concerns about the Conservative party leadership contest.

I think there is a growing risk of no deal. As I said a few days ago, there is the possibility that the new British prime minister may try to repudiate the withdrawal agreement.

There is also the possibility, of course, that there may be a new British government that might follow a different course; a more European course.

I can’t predict either of those things. But what I can say is the European Union and Ireland will stand firm in our position that there can’t be a hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland and we need a legal treaty guarantee of that.

Second broadcaster announces Tory leadership debate

Sky News will host a live head-to-head debate as part of the Conservative leadership contest, the broadcaster says. Unlike the BBC’s planned offering, only the two final candidates will be invited to take part.

It will be held before an audience of Tory voters and broadcast across Sky’s TV and digital platforms, as well as being made available to other media outlets. Sky News’ Kay Burley will host.

Updated

The BBC has announced plans to hold high-profile debates involving Tory leadership candidates without consulting with some of the candidates.

The BBC’s decision to unilaterally announce its own broadcasting plans – including a hustings in mid-June and a head-to-head debate between the two final candidates – puts the pressure on individual Tory candidates to take part. But some leadership campaign teams told the Guardian they were unaware of the plans until a press release was issued on Tuesday afternoon and complained it was an attempt to bounce them into taking part.

The decision to unilaterally announce the format ensures the broadcaster can avoid the excruciating, lengthy, and ultimately pointless debate over the format of the Brexit television debate that never happened between Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn at the end of last year.

Given the potentially make-or-break nature of the Tory leadership debate – and the fact that the winner of the contest will almost certainly become prime minister – the broadcasts could shape the future of British politics, and of the Brexit debate.

The format, which will see all the remaining contenders take part in a hustings after two rounds of voting by Tory MPs, could be chaotic if a large number of candidates remain involved. It could also be damaging for Boris Johnson, whose status as frontrunner means he is likely to come under attack from all sides.

Other broadcasters, including ITV and Sky, are also planning their own leadership debates.

Harriet Harman is another of the prominent Labour figure to back Alastair Campbell after his expulsion from the party.

Here, she highlights that Labour’s former director of governance and legal, Mike Creighton, believes that neither voting for another party, nor announcing such after the fact, represents a breach of Labour’s rules.

Updated

Alastair Campbell has been speaking outside his home in the last hour about the move to expel him from the Labour party, where he indicated that he wouldn’t be going quietly.

“I don’t believe I voted against the Labour party. I believe I voted in the best interests of what the Labour Party should be doing,” he said.

Campbell said it was “particularly sad and disappointing” that the move came on a day when he said that the party seemed to be moving towards taking up a sensible and coherent position on Brexit.

He added that there are people in Jeremy Corbyn’s offices in senior positions who had recommended voting against the Labour party.

Corbyn himself, Campbell continued, has in the past “for reasons best known to himself” congratulated George Galloway for defeating a Labour candidate.

Presumably, he was referring to this tweet:

“I am not going to leave the party just because some random email comes in,” added Campbell.

We’ve also been contacted by readers suggesting that other Labour figures should be expelled for different reasons. One reader cited a piece written by Kate Hoey on the BrexitCentral website under the headline: “We should acknowledge the Brexit Party’s success and include them in the negotiations.”

Updated

The fallout is continuing from Labour’s decision to expel Alastair Campbell, the former communications chief to Tony Blair, after he said that he voted for the Liberal Democrats in the European elections.

Support for Campbell has been coming from figures including Charlie Falconer, a former Lord Chancellor in Tony Blair’s government, and Fiona MacTaggart, a former Labour minister who was an MP for Slough.

The former defence minister, Bob Ainsworth, has also come out to say that he voted for the Green Party during the European Elections.

Ainsworth told the BBC: “I didn’t intend to make this public but now Alistair has been expelled for doing the same I feel obliged to do so.”

BBC announces head-to-head debates in Tory leadership race

The BBC has announced details of TV debates for the Conservative leadership contest.

One of the debates will be moderated by Newsnigh’s Emily Maitlis in the middle of June with all of the candidates (Is there a stage large enough ?)

Fiona Bruce will host a Question Time special with the final two. while the same two candidates will also be invited to take part in one-on-one interviews with Andrew Neil.

Fran Unsworth, Director BBC News and Current Affairs,said:

The decision being made by Conservative Party members will profoundly affect us all, so it feels right that BBC audiences get a chance to see the candidates debate with each other, and that we scrutinise the various policy proposals they will be standing on.

Our plans include bringing the final two candidates in front of the same Question Time audience on the same night to be quizzed by the public, as although the final say will fall to Conservative party members, it’s firmly in the public interest for audiences to question and hear from the next potential Prime Minister.

Updated

Other EU leaders who are arriving in Brussels are also giving their reaction to questions about what a new Tory leader might mean for the negotiations on Brexit between the UK and the EU.

https://twitter.com/tconnellyRTE/status/1133389238945406976

As Theresa May arrived in Brussels, Franco-German tensions over who will run the EU’s institutions were played out in public.

The Guardian’s Jennifer Rankin reports that Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron are divided over the claim of Manfred Weber, the candidate nominated as European commission president by the German chancellor’s political group, the European People’s party (EPP).

“I support Manfred Weber,” Merkel told reporters on her way into the summit, adding that she hoped for a decision by the 28 EU leaders before July when the newly elected European parliament is due to sit. “I will appeal this evening for us to show an ability to act.”

The French president, whose La République En Marche (La Rem) gained 22 seats during last week’s elections, and joins an enlarged and emboldened liberal group in parliament, offered a thinly veiled critique of the German MEP who has never held a government position.

Macron insisted that the replacements for Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk, as presidents of the commission and council, required “experience and credibility to enable them to carry out these missions”.

Bercow: MPs will get chance to block No Deal under new Tory leader

John Bercow, the Speaker of the House of Commons, has warned Conservative leadership candidates that they will not be able to force through a no-deal Brexit without parliament’s approval.

Speaking in Washington DC, he gave a clear sign that the speaker would make sure parliament has an opportunity to stop the UK leaving without a deal if MPs believe it should be halted.

The idea that parliament is going to be evacuated for the centre stage of debate on Brexit is simply unimaginable ... The idea the House won’t have its say is for the birds.

He highlighted the fact that, while leaving the EU without a deal is the legal default, there is a “difference between a legal default position and what the interplay of different political forces in parliament will facilitate”.

Three of the candidates – Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab and Esther McVey – have suggested they could be willing to try to take the UK out of the EU without a deal on 31 October, regardless of parliament’s clear view in the past that this should not happen.

Bercow is being hosted by the Brookings Institute for an event billed as “a discussion of Parliament’s role in politics and policy at a pivotal time for one of the United States’ closest allies”.

Updated

May lingered long enough to answer a few questions, one of which was whether or not she worried about the direction of the UK after the European elections.

Her reply was that the results had been disappointing “for my party” and that some very good candidates had failed to get elected and some very good MEPs had failed to keep their seats.

The Labour Party also saw “significant losses,” said May, who added: “I think what it shows is the importance of actually delivering on Brexit.”

I think the best way of doing that is with a deal but it will be for my successor and parliament to find a way forward to get a consensus and I hope that those election results will focus parliament on the need to deliver Brexit.”

She as gone before the last shouted question - “Are you going to miss Brussels Prime Minister? - but I have a feeling most people will guess what the honest answer to that might have been.

The Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, has been among those talking in the meantime about what is likely to happen after May is replaced. Here’s Politico’s Chief Brussels Correspondent:

Updated

May: I regret I haven't been able to deliver Brexit

Theresa May has been speaking at a summit of EU leaders in Brussels, where she said that she hopes that the European election results will focus parliament on the need to deliver brexit.

“ I have been to something like 15 council meetings or more and have been working hard to very hard,” the prime minister told journalists outside the summit.”

“It is a matter of great regret to me that I haven’t been able to deliver Brexit but that matter of course is for my successor. They will have to find a way of addressing very strongly held views on all sides.”

May is attending the summit where EU leaders are to consider candidates for the Commission’s most important jobs in the wake of parliamentary elections.

Looking and sounding fairly relaxed (demob happy even?), the prime minister said that the UK “would continue to play a constructive role” during the extension which it has been given to its membership of the EU.

Updated

Here’s a summary of what’s happened today:

We’re pausing the blog for now, but we’ll resume if and when there are important developments.

Updated

Rory Stewart has gone from Kew Gardens to a fish stall on Lewisham market. No one wants to talk to him about Brexit in Dari, or any other language, he claims in his latest video selfie.

Jeremy Corbyn has refused to answer questions about the EHRC investigation into alleged antisemitism in the Labour party. As is often the case, Corbyn declined to talk to reporters outside his North London home.

Bradford Labour MP, Naz Shah.
Bradford Labour MP, Naz Shah. Photograph: Sarah Lee/The Guardian

Naz Shah, shadow equalities minister, said the Muslim Council of Britain’s letter about alleged Conservative Islamphobia “highlights the deep-rooted nature” of the problem in the party.

She said:

“The countless evidenced examples and failure to swiftly deal with the problems shows us how the problem is not just about a few members sharing hateful views, but about institutionalised Islamophobia that exists right at the top and trickles all the way down.

“Only a few weeks ago, the Conservative party ignored calls from large sections of the Muslim community to adopt the APPG definition of Islamophobia, and instead decided it should be down to two experts to draw up a definition for British Muslims. Those experts should instead start to draw up the terms of reference for an inquiry into Islamophobia in the Conservative party.”

Michael Gove has confirmed that if elected as leader and prime minister he would give free citizenship to all EU citizens living in the UK, as the Guardian reported.

The Tory leadership campaign isn’t getting any nicer.

The MP Nadine Dorries, who is backing Boris Johnson, has accused Rory Stewart of running a Stop Boris campaign on behalf of Michael Gove.

The Conservative party has yet to respond to that call by the Muslim Council of Britain for an EHRC investigation into Islamophobia in the party.

Dominic Raab has launched a slick new video to promote his pitch to be the next prime minister.

No bagpipes in the background, unlike Sajid Javid’s video pitch.

And very different from Rory Stewart’s video selfies.

Former chancellor George Osborne has argued for a second referendum as way of stopping Conservatives losing seats to the LibDems.

In a letter published in the Evening Standard, which Osborne edits, he said:m:

“If I were a Tory MP in most of the marginal seats facing the Lib Dems, I’d know backing a no-deal Brexit could finish me off locally. Unless the Tories were to replace these losses to the Lib Dems with big gains from Labour, which looks unlikely, that is the end of their Commons majority. But here’s a contrarian thought: perhaps a future Tory PM could make the bold, generous offer of a referendum on Brexit to win grudging Lib Dem support for their government. That could now be the only way, looking at the parliamentary maths, that the Tories could stay in office. And paradoxically, a Tory leader might find it easier to promise a referendum than Jeremy Corbyn.”

Osborne’s paper backed the LibDems in the European elections.

Here’s a copy of the letter sent by Muslim Council of Britain to the EHRC calling for an investigation into alleged Islamophobia in the Conservative Party.

Updated

There is mounting speculation that Tory deputy chairman, James Cleverly, is about to put his name forward as the 11th candidate in the leadership race.

In the wake of the Euro election drubbing, Cleverly said the party needed to look and sound different.

One of the architects of Scottish Labour’s disastrous European election campaign, Neil Findlay, has announced he has quit the party’s front bench at Holyrood and is stepping down as an MSP at the next Scottish parliament election in 2021.

Findlay is the first casualty of the bitter row which has erupted inside Scottish Labour after the party suffered its worst vote since 1910 in last week’s European election, losing both its MEPs after polling less than 10% of the vote.

A combative Corbynite who played a key role in the election of Richard Leonard as Scottish leader in 2017, Findlay was the party’s European election coordinator but has been thought to have become increasingly detached from frontline politics in recent months.

However Leonard announced on Monday evening he now believed Scottish Labour should support an automatic second referendum on Brexit after a deal was finalised and suggested that he would vote remain, regardless of the deal. Findlay is thought to be implacably opposed to both positions.

Findlay announced his resignation from the front bench 20 minutes before Leonard chaired what is expected to be an angry meeting of Scottish Labour MSPs at Holyrood this lunchtime.

Leonard is now facing pressure to consider his own future. Ian Murray, the centrist Labour MP for Edinburgh South, and a leading figure in the people’s vote campaign, told BBC Radio Scotland on Tuesday morning Leonard needed to consider his position after the party’s worst election result in over a century.

Murray told Good Morning Scotland Leonard needed to decide whether he was “in the best position to take forward the Scottish Labour party”.

Update: Here’s Findlay resignation letter:

Updated

In his letter to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the Muslim Council of Britain’s secretary-general, Harun Khan, said he believed there is “sufficient evidence” to suggest there is a “prima facie case to answer of systemic unlawful acts” by the party.

He claimed there is a “tolerance for Islamophobia at the highest levels” of the party, and an “atmosphere of hostility” towards Muslim members.

Khan said around 150 representatives and members of the party have “engaged in Islamophobia”, and accused those responsible for handling complaints of demonstrating a “callous attitude” - and claimed the party has “denied” there is a problem.

“Any one of these charges should be sufficient to indicate a serious problem,” he wrote to EHRC chief David Isaac.

“Taken together, this has led to there being a situation where members of the party, and prospective members from a Muslim background specifically, have felt and publicly stated that there is an institutional problem of Islamophobia, where racism against Muslims is not dealt with other than where there is a media spotlight on the issue.”

He added:

“Despite the escalation in the number of cases of Islamophobia, there appears to have been no change in the approach taken.

“The party has thus far failed to sufficiently engage with members of the party who have raised these concerns privately and then publicly (from Baroness Warsi and Lord Sheikh to the Conservative Muslim Forum), or Muslim community groups such as the Muslim Council of Britain.

“Given this lack of willingness to take any opportunity to tackle this problem once and for all, we are hoping that the EHRC will be able to launch a formal investigation into this presumed breach of the Equality Act, and identify ways to ensure to rectify this serious issue within the governing party of this country.”


Criticism of the Conservative hierarchy’s response has been led by former Tory chairwoman Baroness Warsi, who has called for an independent inquiry into “institutional” Islamophobia in the party.

It came as the EHRC announced that it had launched a formal investigation into the Labour Party following allegations of anti-Semitism.

An EHRC spokeswoman said: “We have received complaints regarding the Conservative Party and are considering them in line with our usual processes. As part of our standard process, we have written to the Conservative Party to ask for information in order to help assess the complaints.”

The Muslim Council of Britain has insisted it was entirely coincidental that it called for an EHRC investigation into Islamophobia in the Conservative party on the day that the equalities watchdog launched a separate investigation into claims of antisemitism in the Labour party.

The council’s head of media monitoring Miqdaad Versi said:

We are an apolitical body, and our evidence was collated a while ago. We released it today (trailed with a few journalists yesterday and others this morning before anyone knew about the antisemitism launch) because we wanted to wait until after the European elections to avoid any accusation of playing politics. It is worth noting that our big splash a year ago, was similarly released after the local elections for the same reason.

The idea that we could put together such a collation of evidence, just to deflect attention from another type of racism, is outrageous (and also not sensible practically given coverage), and it speaks more to those who wish to ignore the serious issue of Islamophobia in the Conservative Party.

Labour MPs continue to accuse the leadership of double standards over the swift expulsion of Alastair Campbell.

Updated

Muslim Council calls for EHRC inquiry into Tory Islamophobia

Meanwhile, the Muslim Council of Britain says it has filed a complaint with the Equality and Human Rights Commission over Islamophobia within the Conservative Party today.

It says it has repeatedly called for an independent inquiry into Islamophobia within the Conservative Party, but says those calls have been largely ignored.

Harun Rashid Khan, the council’s secretary general, said:

“It is a sad day for us to have brought this complaint to the doors of the EHRC, but the concerns of Muslims at large about Islamophobia within the Conservative Party have fallen on deaf ears.”

“We have taken this step after an unprecedented number of cases have been brought to our attention, suggesting a culture within the Conservative Party where Islamophobia is not only widespread, but institutional. We now request the EHRC to look at all the evidence and investigate this matter with great urgency.”

Miqdaad Versi, the council’s head of media monitoring, said:

“It is regrettable that the Conservatives have refused to take our concerns seriously or that of their own Conservative peers. Furthermore, the current Conservative-led government has also decided to reject a definition of Islamophobia as accepted by the MCB and key Muslim stakeholders, which leads us to question, what message do the Conservatives want to send to Muslim communities?”

“As the leadership race ensues, will any of the candidates prioritise dealing with the sheer scale of Islamophobia that has consumed the Conservative Party?”

Labour has defended its decision to expel Alastair Campbell.

A spokesman said “support for another political party or candidate is incompatible with Party membership”.

Updated

Margaret Hodge, aLabour MP and fierce critic of Jeremy Corbyn has this:

Labour MP Neil Coyle makes a similar point:

Luciana Berger, who left the Labour Party to join the Independent Group over antisemitism, points out that the threshold EHRC investigation is “extremely high”.

Updated

Alastair Campbell expelled from Labour party

Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s former communications director, has been expelled from the Labour party for voting Liberal Democrat in the European elections, he has said.

Campbell said on Twitter:

Read the full story here:

Updated

Summary

Here’s a summary of what’s happened so far today:

Labour said it would “cooperate fully” with the EHRC, and rejected “any suggestion that the party does not handle antisemitism complaints fairly and robustly”.

A party spokeswoman said:

“Labour is fully committed to the support, defence and celebration of the Jewish community and is implacably opposed to anti-Semitism in any form.

“We reject any suggestion that the Party does not handle antisemitism complaints fairly and robustly, or that the Party has acted unlawfully, and we will continue to cooperate fully with the EHRC.

“We support the efforts of the EHRC to draw attention to the obligations all political parties have under the Equality Act. But its ability to do so has been undermined by a 70% budget cut since 2010.

“Labour is the party of equality and in government we will strengthen the powers and functions of the commission.

“There has been a deeply worrying rise in antisemitism in the UK and across Europe. We are taking action to root it out of our party by strengthening our rules and procedures.

“But the issue can only be properly dealt with by all political parties working together to protect the interests of the Jewish community and to combat racism in politics, the media and in society more broadly.

“That includes the need for the Conservatives and other parties taking action to deal with racism in their own ranks.”

There’s more on the EHRC investigation here:

EHRC launches investigation into Labour antisemitism claims

The Equality and Human Rights Commission said it has launched a formal
investigation into whether the Labour Party “unlawfully discriminated against, harassed or victimised people because they are Jewish”.

It said:

We are pleased that The Labour Party has committed to co-operate fully with this investigation.

We contacted Labour after receiving a number of complaints about allegations of antisemitism in the Party.

We have carefully considered the response we received from the Party and have now opened a formal investigation under section 20 of the Equality Act 2006 to further examine the concerns.

The investigation will seek to determine:

    • whether unlawful acts have been committed by the Party and/or its employees and/or its agents
    • whether the Party has responded to complaints of unlawful acts in a lawful, efficient and effective manner

The full terms of reference are available on our investigation page.

Once we have concluded our investigation we will publish a report of our findings, which may include recommendations.

In March the equality watchdog said it believed Labour may have “unlawfully discriminated against people because of their ethnicity and religious beliefs” when it announced the first step of a statutory inquiry into the party’s handling of antisemitism complaints.

At the time it said: “Having received a number of complaints regarding antisemitism in the Labour party, we believe Labour may have unlawfully discriminated against people because of their ethnicity and religious beliefs.

“Our concerns are sufficient for us to consider using our statutory enforcement powers. As set out in our enforcement policy, we are now engaging with the Labour party to give them an opportunity to respond.”

Updated

Stewart is heading to Leave-backing Wigan on Wednesday.

Here’s what he might find:

Stewart’s around-Britain videos are getting a mixed reaction from the commentariat.

Rory Stewart is the only candidate who can speak the Afghan language Dari.

The International Development Secretary tweeted a clip of himself meeting a voter in Barking, east London.

“Practising my now - rather rusty - Dari,” he said.

Stewart, who has so far secured the backing of only two Tory MPs, lived in Afghanistan for several years as chairman of a human development organisation.

Channel 4 News journalist Fatima Manji questioned whether his language skills would get him the support he needed to become Tory leader.

Stewart has since moved on to Kew Gardens.

Updated

Jesse Norman consulting on leadership bid

Jesse Norman
Jesse Norman Photograph: Graeme Robertson/The Guardian

The crowded field for Tory leadership is threatening to get even busier.

Treasury minister, Jesse Norman, emails to say he is considering a run. He said: “Now is the time for moderate, decent people to speak up. Let us start the long process of reconstruction.”

He added:

“It is incumbent upon all politicians—Ministers or backbenchers, across political divides—to step up and deliver a sane and workable Brexit for our country. But it is no less important, now more than ever, that all the candidates for the leadership should be able to set out not just their own policy ideas, beliefs and experience, but the deeper principles and purpose that underlie them.

“Whatever one’s politics, we need the candidates to use the public platform, the hustings, the debates, the soapbox and interviews not to bring each other down but to build mutual understanding and trust and love, to find and renew a sense of common purpose, for the longer term.”

Updated

An online campaign putting pressure on Conservative MPs to back Boris Johnson as leader of the party is being run by Paul Staines, the founder of the Guido Fawkes blog.

The campaign attracted attention amid ongoing questions over the funding and backing of online campaign groups, especially following the Guardian’s revelations that employees of Sir Lynton Crosby were running influence campaigns for a hard Brexit.

Boris on the Ballot, which launched this weekend, is designed to encourage members of the public to write to their local Tory MP and encourage them to nominate Johnson for leader. The former foreign secretary’s supporters fear Tory MPs could stop Johnson making the final shortlist of two leadership candidates which are put to party members for a vote.

Staines confirmed he is running the campaign group – which is also collecting contact details on potential backers – through the Irish-registered company CampaignAction Ltd, registered with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office.

“There’s no intention of covering my tracks. I’m the sole director and sole shareholder,” said Staines, who said he had not asked for permission from Johnson’s team before launching the campaign. He said he had acted because he did not think the official campaign would “get their act together” in time.

The Guido Fawkes blog is running a rival Tory leadership tally based on which candidates Tory MPs claim they intend to back (it is not always easy to tell).

Guido says Raab and Gove are the front runners with 19 MPs each, and Johnson is on third with 17. And while Conservative Home claims 29 MPs have backed Hunt, Guido claims only 13 have done so. It also claims Malthouse has already picked up two backers.

Jess Phillips, Labour MP, at home in Moseley, Birmingham
Jess Phillips, Labour MP, at home in Moseley, Birmingham Photograph: Andrew Fox/The Guardian

The backstory of Labour MP Jess Phillips is to be turned into a TV Drama by the makers of Happy Valley and Queer as Folk, according to PA.

The Labour politician has spoken out over the hundreds of rape threats she has received on Twitter. She has also revealed that she was sexually assaulted at the age of 19.

Her book is described as a “collection of empowering stories from her own life, told with honesty and hilarity”.

The drama will be made by RED Production Company - whose hits have included Happy Valley, Clocking Off, Queer As Folk, Scott & Bailey and the recent Years And Years - with executive producer Lucy Dyke, whose credits include Black Mirror and Ripper Street.

The Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley said: “They make the kind of television that truly represents people and events as they are and that was deeply important to me. The story of women in politics is complex and nuanced and intriguing, and it’s a story that needs telling.”

Ukip candidate Carl Benjamin failed in his bid to get elected to the European Parliament after saying he “wouldn’t even rape” the Labour MP. He also refused to apologise for the remarks.

Jeremy Hunt is winning the race to be Tory leader, according to a tally being run by Conservative Home.

It claims that 129 Tory MPs (more than 41% of the parliamentary party) have already backed one of the candidates. Hunt is top with the backing of 29 MPs, with Boris Johnson second with 24 backers. Close behind is Johnson’s old rival Michael Gove on 23 and Dominic Raab on 20.

Sajid Javid is the only other candidate to break into double figures with the support of 12 MPs. Andrea Leadson and Rory Stewart have only manage two backers each, and none have yet plumped Kit Malthouse.

The UK will be forced into a general election that will obliterate the Conservative party if a new leader pushes for the UK to leave the EU with no deal in October, Jeremy Hunt has said.

Having written in a Telegraph article that a no-deal Brexit would be “political suicide”, Hunt said on Tuesday he did not believe parliament would allow the UK to leave with no deal on 31 October and would force an early election.

“I’m making this argument because I want to solve the Brexit crisis we are in and I’m worried if we don’t solve it we will face a political crisis that is far bigger than our legal relationship with the EU; it could lead to the destruction of our party system and the end of my own party,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

Tony Blair has urged Jeremy Corbyn to “stop equivocating” and back a second referendum.

Speaking to Sky News he said: “The risk for Labour is that if it doesn’t put forward a set of policies that can command support in the centre as well as on the left then it can’t get to a majority. On Europe he [Corbyn] has just got to come to a clear position. Both party leaderships have made the same mistake which is to think that it is possible to sit on the fence on Europe and appeal to both sides. The European elections show that isn’t possible.”

Blair also praised Labour’s deputy leader, Tom Watson, who has been pushing for a second referendum. He said: “I think Tom Watson has shown a lot of leadership in the last year or so and I support what he is trying to do within the Labour party which is to give a broad shelter to those MPs that believe Labour wins when it wins from a centre left position.”

Asked if he was talking to Watson, Blair said: “Yes of course. I talk to a lot of Labour MPs.

The former Labour prime minister said he voted Labour in the European elections with “no enthusiasm”.

On the Conservative leadership race, Blair said: “There is no Tory leader that would be crazy enough to try and tip this country into no-deal Brexit without going back to the people.”

He added: “What Jeremy Hunt has said is absolutely right: the Conservatives would be certifiably insane to do a general election in the shadow of Brexit. This Tory leadership competition is going to a competition in Brexitness. Whoever emerges will go back to Europe, they are still trying to pitch this idea that Europe is going to allow us access into the market without abiding by the rules. They will find that Europe says no to that. Europe will not make concessions to a hardline Tory leader that they were not prepared to give to Theresa May.”

Javid ducks no deal question

Sajid Javid has ducked the question of whether he would take the UK out of the EU without a deal.

Challenged on a no-deal Brexit by reporters outside his home the home secretary said: “Brexit is clearly going to be one of the big issues that has to be addressed properly and every candidate has to come forward with a credible plan. So I will have much more to say on that in the coming days.”

His use of the words “credible plan” appears to be a swipe at some of the candidates who have called for UK to leave the EU with or without deal on 31 October.

He added:

“What the public wants to see is much more trust with their politicians. A much stronger more confident relationship and I am concerned about the future and how we do that and that’s why I think we need the right type of leadership.

“Sadly I think there are too many divides in our country today, whether someone was Leave or Remain, or whether in the north or the south, whether they are young or they are old. And I think we shouldn’t be exploiting any of these divisions. What we need to do is bring people together.”

Updated

Here’s more on Jeremy Hunt’s warning that pursuing no-deal would be catastrophic for the Tories and his call for finding a different way of getting a deal. He said:

“I’m worried that if we don’t solve it (Brexit), we will face a political crisis that is far bigger actually than our legal relationship with the EU, it could lead to the destruction of our party system and the end of my own party,” he told Today.

“I’ve always believed we should keep no deal on the table, I’ve always thought that’s the best way of getting a good deal and I’ve always thought that ultimately our economy would find a way to flourish even with the shock of no deal, but the biggest risk to Brexit now is ... a general election.”

“We must not go back to the electorate asking for their mandate until we’ve delivered what we promised we would do last time, which is to deliver Brexit, it would be absolutely catastrophic for us as a party.”

In his interview Hunt suggested he would also involve Scotland and Wales in the negotiations as well as the DUP and the ERG.

He said: “I think what we need to do is have a new negotiating team. In that team needs to to be not just the Government, but the DUP, the ERG, I think you should have someone from Scotland and Wales so that the Union side of these issues is properly thought through.”

His team has since clarified that he meant Tory representatives from these countries, according to Huff Post’s Paul Waugh

Hunt said the Labour frontbench “has shown that they aren’t prepared to do this in good faith, so I don’t think that would work”. Nigel Farage, he added, was not in parliament and did not want a deal.

Hunt added that having “proper representation” in the negotiating team from “other voices ... can then give Brussels confidence that they are talking to someone who can deliver a deal”.

The shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, has insisted there would be no contradiction between having a second referendum and respecting the result of the one in 2016, as another senior Labour MP warned the party would lose the trust of its traditional voters.

Abbott said the party was “supporting a people’s vote strongly now because it’s the right thing to do and it’s the democratic thing to do” – though she said it was uncertain that remain would win a fresh poll.

“Now at minutes to midnight on these negotiations, the Tories have plunged into their leadership contest so we get no sense out of them for a few months. We think it’s important to foreground the people’s vote,” she told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

Earlier on Tuesday, the Labour MP Lisa Nandy warned a second referendum would lead to the country voting for no deal with the EU and said it would destroy trust in Labour.

Kit Malthouse
Kit Malthouse Photograph: Mark Thomas/REX/Shutterstock

Kit Malthouse has refused to rule out seeking an extension to article 50, unlike some of hard Brexit candidates in the race.

Speaking on BBC News he stopped short of saying he would take the UK out of the EU on 31 October, as Boris Johnson, Dominic Raab, Andrea Leadsom and Esther McVey have all pledged.

Asked whether he could guarantee there would be no extension beyond 31 October, Malthouse said only: “An extension would be extremely difficult, I’ve never voted an extension in parliament.”

He added:

This debate is coming down to the question of no deal and whether the prime minister is willing to go over the line on no deal. We delude ourselves if we think no deal is entirely in our control. President Macron has said that he wouldn’t allow us to go beyond 31 October.

My primary objective is to get a deal around which we can all unite.

We need to get to 31 October ready and able to take no deal if we want to. Those people who say no deal is going to be a catastrophe are wrong, but also so are those people who say it is going to be a walk in the park.

Malthouse said he had showed he could unite the party after securing the Malthouse compromise on the Irish border that was agreed by former Remainers like Nicky Morgan and Robert Buckland and Brexiters like Steve Baker.

He said:

I’m the only candidate that has proven the ability to unify MPs around a Brexit plan which could deliver us out of this jam.

That is going to be my primary appeal beyond this really compelling domestic agenda focussed around children and schools and investing in the future.

The country remains hopelessly divided still on this issue and we still have a mathematical problem in parliament. And unless the Conservative party can find a way to come together as a whole and take us over the line on 31 October, then we will remain in this jam.

Housing Minister Kit Malthouse set out his case to become Tory leader in the Sun.

He said: “This leadership campaign cannot be about the same old faces, scarred by wars that have split the Tory party over three years.

“We need to end the Brexit paralysis, and while I voted to leave the EU, I know that without unity across the UK, we cannot get a deal over the line.
“It’s time for a new generation to lead the charge into our future with boldness and vision.”

Malthouse, widely credited as the convener of both Conservative Leavers and Remainers to develop a compromise on May’s withdrawal agreement, said there was a “yearning for change”.

The 52-year-old is a former deputy mayor of London and entered the Commons in 2015 as David Cameron’s Conservatives won a majority.

His name was given to the so-called Malthouse Compromise - a proposal drawn up by backbenchers from Leave and Remain wings of the Tory Party, which would have implemented May’s withdrawal deal with the backstop replaced by alternative arrangements.

Updated

Hunt claimed that inviting the DUP and the ERG into the negotiations would give the EU confidence that whatever was agreed would be passed in the House of Commons.

He also said it was important to get the tone right in the negotiations with Brussels. He claimed that a hardline stance would prompt a hardline response from the EU.

Hunt admitted that he had not asked the DUP and the ERG whether they would be willing to join negotiations led by him.

“We can’t escape the parliamentary arithmetic,” he said.

Unlike Rory Stewart, Hunt said he would be “delighted” to serve in a government led by Boris Johnson.

Updated

Jeremy Hunt has defended his warning that pursuing no-deal would be political suicide.

He told Today that the biggest risk to the government and Brexit would be holding an election before Brexit had been delivered. “We would be very severely punished and we would risk having the most left wing prime minister in history,” Hunt said.

He insisted that the best way to secure Brexit was to renegotiate the withdrawal agreement secured by Theresa May. “We have to have a go at this”, he said.

Hunt said he would bring in the DUP and the ERG into the negotiations, but he ruled out inviting Nigel Farage into the talks as the Brexit leader has demanded.

Updated

Here’s more from Diane Abbot’s interview. She said:

The people’s vote has always been part of our policy package and as Kier Starmer put it, ‘we move through the gears’. But now at minutes to midnight on these negotiations, we think it is important to foreground the people’s vote.

If we are not going to have a general election we would support a people’s vote. There is no inherent contradiction between respecting the result of the referendum and having a people’s vote. I’ve always argued that it is perfectly possible that Leave would win again.

But we are supporting a people’s vote strongly now, because it is the right thing to do and the democratic thing to do.

Asked if Labour was only supporting another vote in certain circumstances she said: “We are clear that our ideal situation would be a general election, in the event there was a people’s vote and remain was on the ballot paper, I personally would be supporting remain. We are consulting now with Members of Parliament. This is something we are going to have to decide collectively.”

Updated

Earlier, Wigan MP Lisa Nandy warned a second referendum “would most likely result in a no-deal outcome”, adding “this could be the final breach of trust with that working-class electorate”.

She told Today:

“Obviously in constituencies like Wigan you get very mixed views, you get different views like everywhere in the country, but to most people the idea of a second referendum just seems quite absurd.

“People were asked what they think, you can see from the results that we had here, that very few people have changed their minds and if there is a shift in this area of the country I think it’s towards no-deal Brexit.”

“I think we’ve got to wake up to the seriousness not just of what we’re about to do to the Labour Party, but what we’re about to do the country because I strongly suspect that if there is a second referendum people here would come out and vote in fairly large numbers and probably vote for no deal.”

“There is a huge frustration amongst Labour voters who voted Leave in towns like mine to see leading figures from the Labour Party out calling for a second referendum before there’s been any serious attempt to implement the result of the first.”

Lisa Nandy, Labour MP for Wigan.
Lisa Nandy, Labour MP for Wigan. Photograph: Sarah Lee/The Guardian

Updated

Abbott pushes for second referendum

Shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, has pushed Jeremy Corbyn to go further on backing a second referendum.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme she said the party was “moving towards a clearer line” on a people’s vote.

“We do want a people’s vote on any deal” she told the programme. She claimed the party is now “foregrounding” what has always been Labour’s policy.

But Abbott refused to be drawn on Paul Mason’s Guardian article which called for members of Corbyn’s team to be sacked over their opposition to a second referendum.

Updated

Welcome to Politics Live as the race to become the next prime minister intensifies and recriminations from the European Parliamentary elections continue.

The foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has put himself at odds with many hard Brexit candidates in the race by warning that pursuing a no-deal exit from the EU would be committing “political suicide”.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph he claims advocating a no-deal exit would risk losing a confidence vote in Parliament and prompting a general election.

“Trying to deliver no deal through a general election is not a solution; it is political suicide,” he writes.

His column prompted this riposte from fellow leadership contender Esther McVey:

The issue of a no-deal Brexit is threatening to dominate the campaign. But the Tory MP Alberto Costa is trying raise another issue of UK citizenship for EU nationals. He has praised Michael Gove for pledging to give 3 million EU national free UK citizenship, and criticised Home Secretary Sajid Javid for failing to do so.

Meanwhile, Kit Malthouse has become the 10th Conservative MP to confirm he has joined the race to be Tory leader. The housing minister is known for brokering the Malthouse compromise as an alternative arrangement to the hated backstop on the Northern Ireland border. It is popular with Brexiters but has been rejected by European Union.

Over on Labour’s side its evolving new position on whether to hold a second referendum on whatever Brexit deal is agreed is coming under fire.

Former front bencher, Lisa Nandy, says promoting a second referendum will be seen as a “final breach of trust” in her Leave-backing constituency of Wigan.

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