Related video: On Wednesday, Johnson refused to retract Savile smear after being accused of ‘parroting fascists’
Boris Johnson admitted today Sir Keir Starmer had “nothing to do” with decisions around the prosecution of Jimmy Savile, backtracking on a smear he made against the Labour leader in the Commons this week.
The climbdown will be seen as a further blow to the PM’s position after a number of his own MPs condemned what was said, with former chief whip Julian Smith branding the remarks “false, baseless slurs”. It is thought Mr Johnson will now be urged to issue a full-scale apology.
Elsewhere, Paul Givan, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)’s first minister, is reportedly preparing to resign later today, owing to unsolved issues caused by the Northern Ireland protocol.
It comes after the party’s agriculture minister, Edwin Poots, instructed officials to halt agri-food checks of goods coming into Northern Ireland from Great Britain last night, in protest at the contested post-Brexit rules. Mairead McGuinness, the EU Commissioner for financial stability, has since described the move as an “absolute breach of international law”.
PM’s Savile smear ‘Trumpian,’ says former Tory minister
Disdain at Boris Johnson isn’t going away following the uproar around his Jimmy Savile remarks this week.
A Conservative former home secretary denounced the smear as “disgraceful” and “Trumpian”, and said she does not believe the PM can survive the current crisis at 10 Downing Street.
Amber Rudd said that Mr Johnson may even call a no-confidence vote in himself in the hope of securing another 12 months at No 10 by forcing MPs decide before they see the full report into the Partygate scandal.
She told ITV’s Peston that Mr Johnson was wrong to try to distract attention from the Partygate row by raising the 2013 apology which Keir Starmer made as director of public prosecutions for the Crown Prosecution Service’s failure to prosecute paedophile Savile.
Our political editor Andrew Woodcock reports:
Government ‘bystanders to crumbling Brexit deal,’ says Labour
Let’s hear Labour’s position now, after the party accused Boris Johnson’s government of acting as “bystanders” while their Brexit deal falls apart.
Shadow Northern Ireland secretary Peter Kyle told the Commons: “In the last week, both the foreign and Northern Ireland secretaries said the Irish Sea border checks are a matter for the Northern Ireland Executive.
“The protocol was signed into international law by the UK government, and now they are bystanders as their deal falls apart – pathetically claiming it’s all someone else’s responsibility.”
For clarity, he put posited: “Just think of the implications: is the message that Wales’ Senedd or the Scottish parliament can break international law too and the government will have nothing to say about it?”
Mr Kyle condemned the last days as “another piece of vandalism committed against our union by a reckless government, too busy partying to notice what’s going on in the real world”.
Tory MP calls on govt to back its own Brexit agreement
The fallout in Northern Ireland has sparked criticism of the government’s ability to back its own Brexit agreement.
Conservative former Northern Ireland secretary Julian Smith warned the UK “cannot be a country that agrees an agreement and then doesn’t stand behind it”.
He told environment secretary George Eustice today that while he supports the government’s negotiations with the EU on improving the protocol, “the British government has to back this letter of 1 April and support those civil servants in Northern Ireland doing the checks”.
Mr Eustice swiftly repeated claims that suggest the government does not want to get involved: “We’re not at the position yet of having to consider any kind of direction in the way that he suggests,” he said.
“Of course, in the first instance we would all agree that it would be preferable here if the Northern Ireland Executive could reach a resolution to this issue on its own terms and find an ability to discuss it.”
Watch: Stormont minister orders halt to Brexit checks at Northern Ireland ports
UK government distances itself from NI flouting protocol
More on the Brexit fallout in Northern now. George Eustice has said it is “entirely unnecessary at this stage” for the UK government to intervene in the nation’s stand against the post-Brexit protocol.
It comes after the DUP’s agriculture minister, Edwin Poots, instructed officials to halt agri-food checks of goods coming into Northern Ireland from Great Britain last night.
Claiming the checks were still taking place, Mr Eustice told MPs today: “The checks are actually continuing, there is no change at the moment. Yes, a direction has been issued, officials in Daera (Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs) are taking their own legal advice as accounting officers on elements related to that.
“What we very much hope is that in the first instance the implementation of this can indeed be delivered in its right and proper place through the Northern Ireland Executive.”
He added the issue was a “devolved matter” and responsibility for it, therefore, falls to the Daera under the Stormont executive.
BREAKING: PM backs down on smear linking Starmer to Jimmy Savile
Boris Johnson has backed down on his smear linking Keir Starmer and Jimmy Savile, admitting the Labour leader had “nothing to do” with the case.
Our political editor Andrew Woodcock reports:
Labour Shadow Chancellor accuses Sunak of giving ‘with one hand now and taking all back later’
Givan’s resignation ‘gross betrayal’ of Northern Irish families, says SDLP leader
The anticipated resignation of Paul Givan as first minister is a “gross betrayal” of Northern Ireland, the SDLP leader has said.
Colum Eastwood MP said: “The actions of the DUP leadership represent a gross betrayal of people in Northern Ireland.
“Whatever community you’re from, whatever your background or beliefs, no-one benefits from this cynical, and totally predictable, electioneering stunt.
“Resigning from government when people are struggling to provide for their families, heat their homes and deal with the cost of living tells you all you need to know about the DUP – for them the party will always come first and ordinary people come last.
“People deserve better than a choice between bad government or no government.
“That has been the cycle of the last 15 years and it has delivered nothing but failure. It is time to break that cycle and offer people a different choice.”
Sunak ‘most incompetent Chancellor I have ever seen’, says Labour MP
Rishi Sunak is “the most incompetent Chancellor I have ever seen”, a veteran Labour MP told the Commons.
Barry Sheerman, who has been MP for Huddersfield since 1979, said: “Can I tell him that someone who has been in this House since 1979, he is the most incompetent Chancellor I have ever seen.
“When children in my constituency go to bed with no food in their tummies, with no heating in their homes, what does he really think is the honourable position of a Chancellor who has just allowed one of his policies directly to be taken in fraud… £4.3 billion of fraud under his watch?
“Any other Chancellor that I have known would have come to the House today to resign.”
Opinion: Tory MPs have had enough of Boris Johnson’s political soap opera
Downing Street is banking on the public getting tired of Partygate now. It’s true, the media caravan is starting to move on. It felt refreshing yesterday to escape Westminster and focus on tackling inequality – or “levelling up” in government parlance – in Stockton-on-Tees, writes Cathy Newman.
But despite the fatigue among both political and media classes, and the appetite for debating serious concerns about Russia’s antics or the cost of energy, Downing Street can’t switch off the soap until the star of the show is written out of the plot.
