UK Politics

The architect of Boris Johnson’s EU trade deal is to declare in a keynote speech that “Brexit is working”.But in a stark contradiction to Mr Johnson’s claim to have “got Brexit done”, David Frost will say that “Brexit is not complete yet”, in part because of the continuing row with Brussels over the Irish border.Despite estimates from the government’s own Office for Budget Responsibility that the long-term impact of EU withdrawal could lower UK GDP by 4 per cent, Lord Frost will insist that suggestions that Brexit has harmed the economy have come only from people with “axes to grind”.And – despite UK threats to break international law by breaching the Northern Ireland protocol he helped to broker – the former Brexit negotiator will accuse Brussels of behaving in a “confrontational” way, and urge the EU to cooperate with Britain as “a trusted partner”.Lord Frost’s comments will come in a speech to the UK in a Changing Europe think tank to mark the sixth anniversary of the 2016 EU referendum on Thursday.Polls in recent years have consistently shown that a majority of Britons believe it was a mistake to vote to leave the EU – most recently by a margin of 49 per cent to 37 per cent.Concerns have been stoked by the intractable dispute over the Irish border, increased red tape for UK exporters, snarl-ups at Channel ports, the return of mobile phone roaming charges, and a loss of benefits for British travellers, such as visa-free passport queues.But Lord Frost will insist: “Brexit is working. We have no cause for regrets about the decision the country has taken.“The solutions to the remaining problems are not to be found in going backwards, but in completing the process and following through on its logic.”His comments come a day after a Resolution Foundation report found that Mr Johnson’s trade deal has made the UK less competitive, with productivity forecast to fall by 1.3 per cent by the end of the decade as a result, and real pay set to be £470 lower per worker than it would have been had Britain stayed in the EU.But Lord Frost will say: “The view that Brexit is hitting us from an economic and trade perspective is generated by those with an axe to grind, and cannot be supported by any objective analysis of the figures.“The UK has grown at much the same pace as other G7 countries since the referendum, and, as the Office for National Statistics points out, our goods exports to the EU are at the highest level ever.”In a swipe at the slow progress made by No 10 in delivering the benefits of Brexit, Lord Frost will say that EU withdrawal was not an end in itself but a “necessary gateway to a project of national renewal”, adding: “The government needs to get on with defining and implementing that project.”And he will say that if the EU wants a stronger relationship with the UK, it must adjust its behaviour over Northern Ireland.“Does the EU want Brexit to work?” he will ask. “Can it rise above the current frictions and work with the UK as a trusted partner, or will it continue to hassle and lecture us?”He will add that a “new entente cordiale” could be built between the UK and its European neighbours, but it will depend on the EU being “more open to change the protocol” and agreeing to “mutual de-escalation on various border and visa issues”.He will continue: “That still seems a possible way forward to me – but it takes two. Our destiny is in our hands. We can, and I hope will, succeed, whatever the EU does – it will just be more difficult for all concerned if the EU insists on being difficult and confrontational rather than collaborative.“It would be much better to put the history behind us – on both sides – and concentrate on making this new relationship work. There is absolutely no reason why that can’t happen. It just takes vision – it just takes will.” More

The UK drinks industry has responded with alarm to a proposal from Jacob Rees-Mogg that post-Brexit deregulation could include allowing sparkling wine to be sold in plastic bottles.The Brexit opportunities minister identified a rule requiring fizz to be sold in glass bottles as one of the Brussels regulations which could be expunged from UK law following EU withdrawal.But the Wine and Spirits Trade Association warned that any change must not jettison health and safety requirements, with the high pressure created by bubbles during fermentation making plastic an improbable and expensive choice of container.“The WSTA – and the world-leading UK wine industry – are very keen to make the most of any post-Brexit opportunities to help the industry recover and grow. This includes removing unnecessary and costly red tape,” chief executive Miles Beale told The Independent. “But not at the expense of basic health and safety.“Sparkling wine contains roughly the same pressure as the tyre of a large van. The English sparkling wine PDO (protected designation of origin) requires bottle fermentation, like Champagne does, which requires a container that could safely withstand that sort of pressure for long periods in a cellar or on shelves.Other formats for some sparkling wines are possible, but plastic bottles would not be the first choice.”Mr Beale said that the adaptation of bottling lines and retooling to accommodate different types of packaging, such as plastic, would impose “significant” costs. And there would be “significant environmental concerns” about switching from recyclable and reusable glass to plastic.“All in all, this proposal is unlikely to be economically viable in the relatively small volumes we are talking about – or sustainable,” he said.Mr Rees-Mogg’s comment came as Labour denounced his new Brexit dashboard as a “gimmick”, which will be updated every three months to show how many of the 2,400 pieces of EU legislation still in place in the UK have been removed.The Cabinet Office minister said the dashboard would ensure the public can “join us on this journey to amend, repeal or replace” retained EU law in a bid to cut at least £1bn of business costs from “EU red tape”.Giving examples of the kind of red tape he wants to sweep away, he said: “Did you know you can’t sell sparkling wine in a plastic bottle? You may think drinking sparkling wine out of a plastic bottle is dreadful, but if you want to, why should there be a law stopping you?”The WTSA is currently campaigning against planned changes to alcohol duties hailed by Boris Johnson as a benefit of Brexit, but regarded by the industry as damagingly complex.Labour’s Stephen Doughty described Mr Rees-Mogg’s dashboard as “a vanity project”.“It’s quite extraordinary that on the day that inflation tops 9 per cent, [while] the cost of energy is soaring, families [are] facing massive pressures wondering how they will put food on the table, [and] prices [are] rising at the fastest rate of increase for 40 years, the government’s offer today to the British people is a digital filing cabinet of existing legislation, which the gentleman describes, in his own words, as marginal,” said the shadow foreign minister.Mr Rees-Mogg later acknowledged that many of the 2,400 rules were of limited significance in themselves.But he told reporters: “It’s going to be lots and lots of little things. But these little things add up into something that is fundamental and revolutionary.“Each and every one of them is something which is easy for people to pooh-pooh and say ‘What’s the point of this effort? The mountain heaved and brought forth a miserable mouse.’ But this is bringing forth elephants cumulatively.”Mr Rees-Mogg recently appealed to readers of a tabloid newspaper for suggestions of which EU regulations to slash.As well as fizz in plastic bottles, he today suggested that changes could be made to end limits on the power of vacuum cleaners, scrap mandatory training update courses for HGV drivers or abolish rules which require B&B hotels to register as package tour operators if they provide vouchers to dine in local restaurants.He rejected suggestions that a bonfire of rules would turn the UK into a “Wild West” unregulated zone, and insisted that his drive was “not about lowering standards”.Despite a string of reports – including from the government’s own Office for Budget Responsibility – suggesting that Brexit has cut UK GDP, Mr Rees-Mogg refused to give any estimate of how much benefit or damage it was doing to the economy, saying it was impossible to know how Britain would have fared if it had stayed.He told MPs: “With inflation running high we need to search everywhere and under every stone and sofa cushion for supply-side reforms that make products and services cheaper, make things easier for business and ultimately grow the economy and cut the cost of living.” More

Labour’s Angela Rayner has demanded No 10’s chief of staff declare any meetings ministers may have held where scrapping a cap on bankers’ bonuses has been discussed.It comes after the government faced intense criticism and accusations of hypocrisy this week over plans to cut controls on City bosses’ pay while calling for wage restraint in the public sector.In a letter to Cabinet Office minister Stephen Barclay, Labour’s deputy leader questioned the government’s “priorities” and said the plans were of “huge concern”.Her letter follows a report in the Financial Times in June 2021 that suggested the issue of a cap on bankers’ bonuses was raised by an international bank chief executive at a “virtual” financial services roundtable the same month.At the time, chancellor Rishi Sunak, who attended the meeting alongside Boris Johnson, was said to be resisting pressure to ditch the cap — a measure introduced after the 2008 financial crash which limits bonuses to the size of a banker’s salary.In today’s letter, Ms Rayner called on Mr Barclay to immediately release the minutes of the meeting with banking executives, and demanded to know whether any further meetings had occurred where the issue was discussed.Labour’s deputy leader also requested to know whether the issue has ever been brought up by a Conservative party donor.Ms Rayner also highlighted a leaked letter detailing government plans to alter rules on director and non-executive director pay, which sparked outrage among opposition parties and unions.She said: ”It appears this Government’s “new approach” is to prioritise increasing banker’s bonuses rather than helping working people.“The hypocrisy of removing restrictions for bankers while the public sector face a prolonged period of below-inflation pay rises is clear. It is an indication of where this government’s priorities lie. “A government spokesperson said: “Claims that the government is planning to ease restrictions on bankers’ pay are untrue. Ministerial meetings with external organisations are declared in line with the government’s transparency agenda.“We are exploring whether there are any unnecessary restrictions on paying non-executive directors in shares instead, as we set out at the end of last month. This could ensure they are fully invested in the success of the company they run, helping to protect and generate jobs, growth and investment.“This is about how non-executive directors are paid, not how much. And the proposal has nothing to do with paying bankers more, or the bankers’ bonus cap. This remains in place and there are no plans to remove it.”Responding to Ms Rayner’s letter, a Conservative source said: “Angela Rayner should stop trying to position herself for Labour leadership by wasting time writing pointless letters about false accusations. If Labour had done their research, they would know that the government has never proposed any changes to bankers’ bonuses.“They should spend less time playing politics and misleading the public and more time doing their research.“Labour should also get their own house in order on transparency – they continue to break a Leveson Inquiry pledge to publish which senior media figures they are meeting with.” More

An MP suspended by the Conservatives over allegations of sexual harassment and cocaine use is facing a fresh Commons inquiry.David Warburton was disciplined by his party and is already being investigated by parliament’s Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme (ICGS), it is understood.Now the MP for Somerton and Frome is also the subject of a probe the parliamentary standards commissioner into whether he broke the MPs’ code of conduct on three counts.They are “paid advocacy”, failure to declare an interest, and over rules concerning the declaration of “gifts, benefits and hospitality”.Kathryn Stone, the Commissioner, does not have the role of investigating the original allegations made against Mr Warburton, in April.He has brushed off calls to resign – which would plunge the Tory party into another perilous West Country by-election – but has stayed away from parliament, it is believed.The Sunday Times published a photo of Mr Warburton sitting next to what was alleged to be lines of cocaine, at the home of a younger woman he had met through politics it was claimed.It was also reported that he lobbied the Financial Conduct Authority on behalf of a Russian financier who had given him a near-£150,000 loan for a holiday rental property.Warburton insisted at the time that he had “enormous amounts of defence, but unfortunately the way things work means that doesn’t come out first”.In April, transport secretary Grant Shapps said, of Mr Warburton’s conduct: “Obviously, any allegations like this need to be taken extremely carefully, but all the facts will need to be brought out as well.”They emerged as Westminster was engulfed in a torrent of allegations of misogyny, bullying and other bad behaviour, triggering calls for major changes.They have left Boris Johnson braced for two likely by-election defeats this week, which would renew Conservative pressure for him to quitIn Wakefield, Imran Ahmad Khan was forced to resign after being found guilty of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy at a party in 2008.And Neil Parish, an MP for 12 years, quit in Tiverton and Honiton after admitting to watching pornography in the Commons chamber, having been witnessed by two female colleagues. More

Boris Johnson and Prince Charles are preparing for talks with Commonwealth leaders on trade, climate change and the future of the association at a crucial summit in Rwanda this week.The prime minister is set to make the economic case for remaining part of the 54-member club, as leading Republican figures in both Australia and Jamaica discuss cutting ties with the monarchy.The Prince of Wales will represent the Queen, head of the group made up of mostly former territories of the British Empire, when prime ministers and presidents gather for the first time since 2018.But the visit of the prince and the PM has been overshadowed by a recent report in The Times which claims Charles branded Mr Johnson’s policy to send asylum seekers to Rwanda as “appalling”.The newspaper said a source had heard Charles express opposition to the policy several times in private, and that he was “more than disappointed” by the deportation plan.No 10 and Clarence House have played down the row, with Mr Johnson hoping to avoid further controversy on the “offshoring” plan when he arrives in Rwanda on Wednesday night for several days of talks.But the UK plan to send migrants on one-way flight to Rwanda for offshore “processing” of asylum claims has sparked controversy among other Commonwealth countries.The president the Democratic Republic of the Congo Felix Tshisekedi has urged Mr Johnson to use any leverage gained from the deal to pressure Paul Kagame’s government to cease funding attacks by militants in eastern Congo.Highlighting his wish to focus on economic ties at the summit, Mr Johnson wrote earlier that membership has “immense practical value for trade” – calling it the “Commonwealth advantage”.Discussion about the future of ties to the monarchy has grown in Australia and Jamaica since Barbados chose to become a Republic last year, though the Caribbean island opted to remain a Commonwealth member.Prince Charles, who arrived in Rwanda on Tuesday, hailed the potential of the Commonwealth to make a difference on issues like climate change.“Taking shared responsibility to solve problems like these means the Commonwealth has the potential to make a profound difference in the lives of its citizens – and, in so doing, to be an unparalleled force for good in our world,” he said.Charles last represented the Queen at the event in Sri Lanka in 2013 – a move that was interpreted as preparation for his future role as monarch – and in 2018 he was appointed the monarch’s designated successor as head of the Commonwealth.The prince and Duchess of Cornwall lamented the atrocities committed during the Rwandan genocide as the toured the Kigali Genocide Memorial and were shown the personal testimonies of families.The couple read intently the comments about the youngsters murdered during the 1994 genocide, and Charles reacted by saying: “Terrible, happens all too often.” More

Boris Johnson fails to deny he offered Carrie Symonds top jobJacob Rees-Mogg has been accused of unveiling a Brexit “gimmick” – a quarterly dashboard of reformed EU laws – which will “do nothing to address the real challenges that the public face today”.The Brexit opportunities minister sought to claim the new digital publication would usher in a “British-style revolution”, pointing to regulations on vacuum cleaners as he spoke of the need to “ultimately grow the economy and cut the cost of living”.Labour frontbencher Stephen Doughty called it “quite extraordinary” for the government to introduce what “simply appears to be a vanity project” on the day that inflation topped a 40-year high of 9.1 per cent.Earlier at PMQs, Boris Johnson failed to deny he offered his then-lover Carrie Symonds a top job while foreign secretary, ducking the question when challenged in the Commons.Shortly afterwards, justice secretary Dominic Raab proposed a new Bill of Rights which will allow the government to ignore interim rulings from a European court and potentially make it easier to deport foreign offenders.Show latest update

1655907864Stanley Johnson calls for parliament ban on ‘agreeable’ Chinese ambassador to be liftedBoris Johnson’s father has called on the UK parliament to lift a ban on the Chinese ambassador ahead of his own visit to China to retrace the steps of Marco Polo, our political correspondent Adam Forrest reports.Stanley Johnson is planning a summer trip to Xinjiang province, home to the Uighur minority persecuted by Beijing, for a TV programme on the famous explorer.China’s ambassador to Britain Zheng Zeguan was banned from the parliamentary estate last year – a move which sparked retaliatory sanctions on nine Britons, including senior Conservative MPs.In an interview with the South China Morning Post, Mr Johnson Snr described Mr Zheng as a “very agreeable, capable and intelligent man” following talks with him about his travel plans for television.The 81-year-old added: “I would very much hope that by the time parliament returns [after the summer break], these bans will no longer be in place.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 15:241655907191Government claims Rishi Sunak’s £1.9bn subsidy for fossil fuels is ‘not technically a subsidy’The government has claimed Rishi Sunak’s new £1.9 billion tax break for fossil fuel companies is not technically a subsidy and so compatible with its climate plan, our policy correspondent Jon Stone reports.Green groups lambasted ministers for playing “semantics” with the planet over the new incentives to invest and oil and gas production – announced just months after the UK’s own climate summit promised to put an end to them.The chancellor’s doubled the rate of tax relief for oil and gas projects in his Budget, a measure that is expected to cost taxpayers nearly £2 billion and produce 899 million tons of extra CO2.But responding to criticism of the measure from green groups, Treasury minister Helen Whately claimed that the policy was compatible with the UK’s international commitment, because of a technicality.Andy Gregory22 June 2022 15:131655906291Labour dismisses Rees Mogg’s Brexit dashboard ‘gimmick’Responding to Jacob Rees-Mogg’s new Brexit dashboard (see post below), Labour has warned that gimmicks do nothing to address the “real challenges” that the public face today.Shadow foreign office minister Stephen Doughty told MPs the Brexit opportunities’ minister’s new quarterly list of reformed of EU laws “simply appears to be a vanity project”. “It’s quite extraordinary that on the day that inflation tops 9 per cent, the cost of energy is soaring, families facing massive pressures wondering how they will put food on the table, prices rising at the fastest rate of increase for 40 years, the government’s offer today to the British people is a digital filing cabinet of existing legislation, which the gentleman describes, in his own words, as marginal,” he said.“And while the government plans to cut 20 per cent of civil servants, the minister for so-called government efficiency is running his own make-work scheme in the Cabinet Office, creating tasks for them to satisfy his own obsessions.”He added: “For all the government’s talk about changes we can make outside the EU, they still refuse to make the one concrete change that the Labour Party has been demanding for months with the overwhelming support of the British people as promised by the prime minister himself, which is the removal of VAT on home energy bills.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 14:581655905513Rees-Mogg touts ‘revolution’ with new government dashboardJacob Rees-Mogg has claimed that a new dashboard showing how many EU laws have been reformed will usher in a “British-style revolution”.“With inflation running high we need to search everywhere and under every stone and sofa cushion for supply side reforms that make products and services cheaper, make things easier for business and ultimately grow the economy and cut the cost of living,” the Brexit opportunities minister told MPs.“This dashboard therefore is the supply side reformers’ El Dorado and naturally I am pointing to the treasure trove of opportunity this publication represents. It highlights unnecessary and disproportionate EU regulations on consumer goods such as those regulating the power of vacuum cleaners, why should that trouble Her Majesty’s Government?”Mr Rees-Mogg added: “We will continue working with departments to cut at least a billion pounds of business costs from EU red tape, to ensure greater freedoms and productivity.“Ensuring we have the right regulation is crucial, excessive and unnecessary regulations which burden business or distort market outcomes, reduce productivity, pushing up prices and negatively affecting everyone’s cost of living.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 14:451655904671Government to create public dashboard showing EU law reforms, Rees-Mogg saysA dashboard will be made available to the public to show on a quarterly basis how much EU law has been reformed, Jacob Rees-Mogg has announced.In a Commons statement, the minister for Brexit opportunities and government efficiency said: “As we maximise the benefits of Brexit and transform the UK into the most sensibly regulated economy in the world we must reform the EU law we have retained on our statute book.“Only through reform of this retained EU law will we finally be able to untangle ourselves of nearly 50 years of EU membership.”He went on: “I am pleased to announce that today we publish an authoritative catalogue of over 2,400 pieces of legislation spanning over 300 individual policy areas.“This catalogue will be available on gov.uk through an interactive dashboard. It will be updated on a quarterly basis so that the public can count down retained EU law as the government reforms it.”He added: “The publication of this dashboard offers the public a real opportunity. Everything on it we can now change.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 14:311655903881Julian Assange extradition part of government’s ‘increasingly totalitarian bent’, his wife warnsAs Dominic Raab speaks in the Commons on reducing the power of European human rights legislation in the UK, Julian Assange’s wife Stella Morris has warned that Priti Patel’s decision to send the Wikileaks founder to the US to face espionage charges is part of the government’s “increasingly totalitarian bent”.Writing for The Independent, she condemned the home secretary for “flouting” calls from the Europe’s leading human rights organisation, doctors and journalists to stop his extradition to the US.Ms Morris, a lawyer and campaigner, said the home secretary had “flouted calls from representatives of the Council of Europe, the OSCE [Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe], almost two thousand journalists and three hundred doctors for the extradition to be halted”.She added: “Priti Patel’s decision comes amidst sweeping government reforms of an increasingly totalitarian bent – the plans to weaken the influence of the European Court of Human Rights and the decision to extradite Julian are the coup de grace.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 14:181655903283Lib Dem MP asks whether Bill of Rights is ‘unilateral repudiation’ of Belfast AgreementThe Liberal Democrats’ Northern Ireland spokesperson Alistair Carmichael has asked whether Dominic Raab’s proposed new Bill of Rights constitutes a “unilateral repudiation” of the Belfast Agreement.“Paragraph 2 of the Human Rights Charter of the Good Friday Agreement provides that the British government will complete incorporation into Northern Ireland law of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), with direct access to the courts and remedies for breach of the convention.“So will the justice secretary tell the House whether his Bill constitutes a unilateral repudiation of that, or is this something that he’s negotiated with the government of Ireland?”Mr Raab said Mr Carmichael was “wrong” because the UK will “remain a state party to the Convention”, adding that the “ECHR remains incorporated into UK law through the schedule”.Amid some disagreement from the opposite bench, the justice secretary then accused the Lib Dem MP of “chuntering from a sedentary position”, adding: “Read the bill and I’m very happy to address any other questions he’s got.”Andy Gregory22 June 2022 14:081655902374Raab’s predecessor ‘welcomes’ statement on Bill of RightsFormer justice secretary Robert Buckland has said that he “welcomes” his successor Dominic Raab’s statement on the government’s proposed Bill of Rights.Mr Buckland said that it “builds upon the work” that he and Sir Peter Gross did during the review of the Human Rights Act, adding – contrary to earlier comments in the Commons – that “Sir Peter’s balanced committee did not say that all was well with the Human Rights Act”.He added: “There were issues to be dealt with and according to our manifesto commitment to update the Act, this Bill is timely.”Mr Buckland asked whether Mr Raab agreed that “over and above domestic action that we can take to reform and improve legislation, there is a strong case for international work to be done on the same basis that we did in Brighton 10 years ago, to deal with issues such as extraterritorial jurisdiction, which is a common concern, not just of this country, but of our judges and many member states on the Council of Europe”.Andy Gregory22 June 2022 13:521655901917Who is RMT leader Mick Lynch?Away from the Commons for a moment, my colleague Joe Sommerlad has this piece on the RMT union’s general-secretary Mick Lynch, whose uncompromising interviewing style has seen him go viral multiple times since the rail strikes began this week: More