Boris Johnson reportedly hit out at suggestions that supporting Rishi Sunak’s Brexit deal would help the UK’s relations with the White House, saying: “F*** the Americans!”
Mr Sunak’s new deal with the European Union seems to be within touching distance and could be announced in the coming week. However Mr Johnson has said that Mr Sunak should instead press ahead with the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, drawn up when he was prime minister.
In a private confrontation in the House of Commons with former lord chancellor Sir Robert Buckland, Mr Johnson reportedly let his feelings about Mr Sunak’s deal be known in a foul-mouthed comment. According to The Sunday Times, Sir Robert was trying to lobby Mr Johnson to back the deal and was arguing that it was crucial to cementing better relations with US president Joe Biden.
Mr Johnson allegedly replied: “F*** the Americans!” Mr Johnson’s team told The Sunday Times that he would not use this type of language, but added that he had made comments about the White House.
A source told the paper: “This was a jocular conversation in the chamber that someone evidently misunderstood.”
Mr Sunak has called on critics to “recognise that [the deal] is not about me, this is not about third parties or anyone else… It’s about the people and communities of Northern Ireland. It’s about what’s best for them and that’s what everyone should have in the uppermost of their minds”.
It comes as the prime minister is understood to have convinced prominent pro-Brexit MPs of the merits of his deal with Brussels.
One senior Brexiteer praised the proposed agreement between London and Brussels as “very good”, although he warned that parts of the way it had been handled risked “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory” after a row over King Charles’s cancelled meeting with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen.
Mr Sunak does not have to offer MPs a vote on the deal and has carefully avoided publicly committing to one. But members of the European Research Group of Eurosceptic Tory MP have told The Independent they are prepared to force a showdown vote in parliament.
But Mr Sunak was positive about his plans on Saturday, saying: “There’s unfinished business on Brexit and I want to get the job done.”
