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Would-be PM Johnson's Brexit promise trumps gaffes for UK Conservatives

by Elizabeth Piper, Andrew MacAskill

 

Boris Johnson, a leadership candidate for Britain's Conservative Party, holds up packs of "Boris Bangers" during a visit to Heck Foods Ltd. headquarters, as part of his Conservative Party leadership campaign tour near Bedale, Britain July 4, 2019. Darren Staples/Pool via REUTERS

 

DARLINGTON/YORK, England (Reuters) - With a string of sausages round his neck and holding packs of “Boris bangers”, Boris Johnson extolled the virtues of new business in northern England as part of his pitch to become Britain’s next prime minister.

 

A day later, the man whose stint as foreign minister was marked by gaffes which have prompted some of his critics to question his suitability for high office couldn’t quite remember where the factory making the sausages was.

 

At a hustings on Friday in the northeastern town of Darlington, most of the Conservative members amassed to hear him and his rival, current foreign minister Jeremy Hunt, were sympathetic to the slip, laughing when he said he had been at the factory “somewhere in Yorkshire” the day before.

 

For others, it was yet another sign that the would-be prime minister, who has promised to take Britain out of the European Union “do or die” by Oct. 31, has little grasp of the detail needed to run a country going through turbulent times.

 

“He can’t even remember where he was. I can remember where I was at that time yesterday and I don’t want to be prime minister,” said William Oxley, 65, from the market town of Malton in the northern English region of Yorkshire, who is “prone” to backing Hunt.

 

“Don’t get me wrong, Boris is fabulous and there’s a huge place for Boris in British politics, but I don’t think it’s as prime minister because I think he is prone to get things wrong, I think he’s prone to over promise, I think he’s prone to speak before he thinks sometimes.”

 

Oxley’s is only one view among the tens of thousands of Conservative Party members who are now filling in their postal votes to determine who will lead their party and take over from Theresa May as prime minister on July 23.

 

Polling suggests that Johnson, a former London mayor who says only he can take Britain out of the EU and defeat main opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn at the next election, is way out in front of Hunt.

 

For another Conservative, John Pollock, at the Darlington hustings, a less-than-perfect grasp of detail is no barrier to becoming prime minister.

 

“Boris is a leader, Jeremy is a doer,” Pollock said. “Boris doesn’t need to know the detail as long as he gets the right people to do their jobs.”

 

SHORT-LIVED?

 

Both prime ministerial candidates have traveled around the country trying to drum up support among the governing party’s members.

 

The hustings - in cities and towns in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland - have seen the two trot out the same speeches, make some of the same jokes and then take questions from roomfuls of Conservatives to try to win them over.

 

Johnson has defended his gaffes and off-the-cuff remarks, saying he had apologized for some, including saying wrongly that a jailed Iranian-British aid worker had been teaching journalism in Iran, but also that other statements expressed “something that is true”.

 

At many of the hustings, the rooms appear mostly in Johnson’s favor, lapping up his main messages that he will lead Britain out of the EU, with or without a divorce deal, and that he is the best Conservative to beat off electoral threats from Labour and a new Brexit Party led by veteran euroskeptic Nigel Farage.

 

Peter Blackley, 24, a property developer and private landlord, who has more than 30 properties, said he was reluctantly backing Johnson because of those challenges.

 

“I am supporting Boris even though I think, I don’t want to use the word unhinged, but maybe unstable. I normally would want a more stable, trustworthy candidate, someone who you want to stay on for a couple of terms,” he said.

 

“Boris is a short fix just to get us through Brexit and get Corbyn out of the way,” he said in the northern city of York.

 

Many members interviewed at hustings said his red line of leaving the EU on the deadline of Oct. 31 was also theirs - if it is not delivered, he might not be prime minister for long.

 

David Driver, 59, a self-employed fund administrator who voted for the Brexit Party at an election for the European Parliament in May, said he would only vote for a Conservative Party with Johnson at its helm.

 

But Driver had a warning: If the Oct. 31 deadline passes with no Brexit “there are no two ways about it, Farage will be licking his lips and they will be toast.”

 

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2019-07-09

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[Jane Dough]

Hunt is a bit like those sausages....stuffed.

 

Rooster

[Jonnapat]

I'm thankful to be living 6,000 miles from this demoralizing fiasco.

Britain as well as the US have made real fools of themselves in recent years and have become laughing stocks to the rest of the world. 

Where have all the true leaders gone?

[Sujo]

16 minutes ago, Jonnapat said:

I'm thankful to be living 6,000 miles from this demoralizing fiasco.

Britain as well as the US have made real fools of themselves in recent years and have become laughing stocks to the rest of the world. 

Where have all the true leaders gone?

I think true leaders prefer not to be under such an intense spotlite and would rather not deal with politicians.

 

A shame that all we really get now are just media whores.

[dunroaming]

1 hour ago, Jonnapat said:

I'm thankful to be living 6,000 miles from this demoralizing fiasco.

Britain as well as the US have made real fools of themselves in recent years and have become laughing stocks to the rest of the world. 

Where have all the true leaders gone?

Certainly no real leaders in the political parties these days.  Just imbeciles that we have voted into power.

 

19 hours ago, Jane Dough said:

Hunt is a bit like those sausages....stuffed.

 

Rooster

 

The people deciding who will be the next PM are the members of the Conservative party and not the British public.  The two candidates are totally incompetent imbeciles but that doesn't appear to matter.  They are both pitching to the whims of the selected voters (Hunt putting Fox Hunting back on the table and Johnson promising tax cuts to the rich and pledging Brexit by Halloween) without addressing the real issues.

 

It is most likely that Johnson will cruise home, Hunt just doesn't drink at the right clubs or cow taw to the right people.  At the farce of a debate Hunt had the opportunity to bury the squirming non committal Johnson but couldn't even do that.  We witnessed Johnson at his most cowardly and Hunt being whiney and ineffective.

 

We just need to wait now to see how much back tracking Johnson will do once elected and how much pressure he will be put under by the other MPs.

 

[Proboscis]

20 hours ago, Jane Dough said:

Hunt is a bit like those sausages....stuffed.

Rooster

I saw this most recent interchange more like a Punch and Judy Show - Boris is Punch and Jeremy is Judy.

[Laughing Gravy]

This is about the best news yet.

 

This shower who are self serving and have proven that they are not up to the job. Hopefully once they are gone and a new team who believe in Brexit can get the job done.

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/wave-of-brexit-mandarins-leave-mkwlk78sw

Wave of Brexit mandarins leave.

The number of senior officials leaving the Brexit department has risen by more than 70 per cent in a year.

More than 100 of the most senior civil servants in the Department for Exiting the European Union (Dexeu) left in the 2018-19 financial year, government figures released to the Commons show.

The departures of 115 officials of grade seven and above, including 15 staff of the most senior grades, represent a rise of 72 per cent on the 2017-18 financial year, during which 67 left.

There is likely to be more upheaval in senior Brexit roles under Theresa May’s successor. Olly Robbins, the chief Brexit negotiator who was Dexeu’s first permanent secretary until September 2017, is expected to leave the civil service. In the 12 months covered by the statistics his successor Philip Rycroft took early retirement. He left on March 31 this year two days after the original date for Britain leaving the bloc. Senior Whitehall sources said then that the timing was “not ideal” but that the decision had been taken months earlier.

Since March it has emerged that more senior officials are expected to go. Politico reported that these include Tom Shinner, who has been in charge of domestic preparations for no-deal.

Paul Blomfield, the shadow Brexit minister, told The Times: “It’s not so much ‘yes, minister’ as ‘I quit, minister.’ Essential legislation has not passed, customs and security arrangements are not in place and the negotiations are in paralysis. Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt should drop the ridiculous rhetoric and put forward a credible plan.”

Answering the parliamentary question from Mr Blomfield that yielded the figures, Kwasi Kwarteng, a junior Brexit minister, said that Dexeu was set up by Mrs May in July 2016 as a “time-limited department . . . The increase in numbers of leavers . . . is mainly due to planned leavers moving to other government departments following the end of their pre-set loan agreement or job rotation, or have left the civil service following the end of their two-year fixed-term appointment”. Dexeu undertook “succession planning” to maintain “high standards of delivery”, Mr Kwarteng added.

A departmental source said that headcount in Dexeu had more than doubled between 2016 and 2018, affecting the number of staff leaving.

 

 

[Thingamabob]

33 minutes ago, Laughing Gravy said:

This is about the best news yet.

 

This shower who are self serving and have proven that they are not up to the job. Hopefully once they are gone and a new team who believe in Brexit can get the job done.

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/wave-of-brexit-mandarins-leave-mkwlk78sw

Wave of Brexit mandarins leave.

The number of senior officials leaving the Brexit department has risen by more than 70 per cent in a year.

More than 100 of the most senior civil servants in the Department for Exiting the European Union (Dexeu) left in the 2018-19 financial year, government figures released to the Commons show.

The departures of 115 officials of grade seven and above, including 15 staff of the most senior grades, represent a rise of 72 per cent on the 2017-18 financial year, during which 67 left.

There is likely to be more upheaval in senior Brexit roles under Theresa May’s successor. Olly Robbins, the chief Brexit negotiator who was Dexeu’s first permanent secretary until September 2017, is expected to leave the civil service. In the 12 months covered by the statistics his successor Philip Rycroft took early retirement. He left on March 31 this year two days after the original date for Britain leaving the bloc. Senior Whitehall sources said then that the timing was “not ideal” but that the decision had been taken months earlier.

Since March it has emerged that more senior officials are expected to go. Politico reported that these include Tom Shinner, who has been in charge of domestic preparations for no-deal.

Paul Blomfield, the shadow Brexit minister, told The Times: “It’s not so much ‘yes, minister’ as ‘I quit, minister.’ Essential legislation has not passed, customs and security arrangements are not in place and the negotiations are in paralysis. Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt should drop the ridiculous rhetoric and put forward a credible plan.”

Answering the parliamentary question from Mr Blomfield that yielded the figures, Kwasi Kwarteng, a junior Brexit minister, said that Dexeu was set up by Mrs May in July 2016 as a “time-limited department . . . The increase in numbers of leavers . . . is mainly due to planned leavers moving to other government departments following the end of their pre-set loan agreement or job rotation, or have left the civil service following the end of their two-year fixed-term appointment”. Dexeu undertook “succession planning” to maintain “high standards of delivery”, Mr Kwarteng added.

A departmental source said that headcount in Dexeu had more than doubled between 2016 and 2018, affecting the number of staff leaving.

 

 

Good riddance. Useless bunch. Robbins the worst of the lot.

[dunroaming]

22 minutes ago, Laughing Gravy said:

Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt should drop the ridiculous rhetoric and put forward a credible plan

That is the problem, neither of them have a credible plan.  It looks to me like Johnson will go to Brussels and try to wangle some pathetic non relevant concession that he would then bring back and claim he had re-negotiated the deal, therefore pushing through May's deal in effect.  The EU aren't going to change the core of the deal already struck and Johnson is too weak to properly negotiate anything.

 

 

[JAG]

4 hours ago, dunroaming said:

That is the problem, neither of them have a credible plan.  It looks to me like Johnson will go to Brussels and try to wangle some pathetic non relevant concession that he would then bring back and claim he had re-negotiated the deal, therefore pushing through May's deal in effect.  The EU aren't going to change the core of the deal already okstruck and Johnson is too weak to properly negotiate anything.

 

 

The problem stems from the fact that May, and the government department which is now " thinning out" so remarkably, never really made a deal, did they?

 

They effectively took terms dictated by Brussels, and attempted to push them through Parliament claiming that they had struck a deal.

 

That is what happens when your Prime Minister states one thing ("Brexit means Brexit") and then pursues a diametrically opposite policy; having created and staffed a department with care to ensure that they follow her actual rather than claimed policy !

 

If we end up with a "no deal Brexit" it will be a result of her lies and deliberate dissembling over the process. Something of a tradition amongst our senior politicians when it comes to their approach to the EU. It is perhaps Mrs May's misfortune that she became Prime Minister at the time when the British people's patience with such behaviour had run out, and yet believed that she could get away with it again.

 

Bitten on the bum...

Edited July 10, 2019 by JAG

[Baerboxer]

9 hours ago, Jonnapat said:

I'm thankful to be living 6,000 miles from this demoralizing fiasco.

Britain as well as the US have made real fools of themselves in recent years and have become laughing stocks to the rest of the world. 

Where have all the true leaders gone?

 

To be fair the EU haven't done themselves much of a favor with their recent choices - a German who cheated in her PhD and whose department is under investigation for fraud and dodgy defense contracts; a French woman convicted of serious financial negligence; a Spaniard done for insider trading and leading the oppression of Catalan separatists and a failed French speaking Belgian PM. 

 

Hard pressed to find good leaders - Xi certainly strong, Vlad probably not as good as he thinks he is. In democracies, well, er, none spring to mind. Although the Irish PM seems decent enough.

[Baerboxer]

30 minutes ago, JAG said:

The problem stems from the fact that May, and the government department which is now " thinning out" so remarkably, never really made a deal, did they?

 

They effectively took terms dictated by Brussels, and attempted to push them through Parliament claiming that they had struck a deal.

 

That is what happens when your Prime Minister states one thing ("Brexit means Brexit") and then pursues a diametrically opposite policy; having created and staffed a department with care to ensure that they follow her actual rather than claimed policy !

 

If we end up with a "no deal Brexit" it will be a result of her lies and deliberate dissembling over the process. Something of a tradition amongst our senior politicians when it comes to their approach to the EU. It is perhaps Mrs May's misfortune that she became Prime Minister at the time when the British people's patience with such behaviour had run out, and yet believed that she could get away with it again.

 

Bitten on the bum...

 

Indeed. And just imagine where the UK would be had the deceitful May managed to wangle her little ploy to use the Royal Prerogative so any deal could be passed by her cabinet. 

 

All along she was being very devious and deceitful, right from the start. Explains why they picked such a talentless team of negotiators and negotiated so badly. She accepted their "deal" straight the way and was simply trying to find a way to push it through. Using the RP - not allowed; Called a snap election to increase her mandate - failed and lost her majority; tried to bully it through parliament - failed 3 times!

 

History won't treat her well, and deservedly so.

[dunroaming]

15 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

 

Indeed. And just imagine where the UK would be had the deceitful May managed to wangle her little ploy to use the Royal Prerogative so any deal could be passed by her cabinet. 

 

All along she was being very devious and deceitful, right from the start. Explains why they picked such a talentless team of negotiators and negotiated so badly. She accepted their "deal" straight the way and was simply trying to find a way to push it through. Using the RP - not allowed; Called a snap election to increase her mandate - failed and lost her majority; tried to bully it through parliament - failed 3 times!

 

History won't treat her well, and deservedly so.

May certainly made a complete pig's ear of her premiership.  The incompetent Davis was useless, even for a dedicated Brexiteer and Raab was just a pathetic waste of time.  So now you end up with Johnson.  Who, in their right mind, expects better from him?