BORIS Johnson has fired another broadside at Theresa May's Brexit plans, branding them unworkable and calling on fellow Tory MPs to "chuck Chequers".
The former Foreign Secretary - who walked out of the Cabinet days after signing up to the package at the Prime Minister's country residence - said Mrs May's blueprint would leave the UK in "vassalage, satrapy, colony status" to the EU.
His comments came as the PM prepares to travel to Salzburg for a bilateral with her Austrian counterpart to sell her Chequers Plan. Today, Dominic Raab, the Brexit Secretary, is back in Brussels for more talks with Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator, while Sajid Javid, the Home Secretary, is in Portugal for more high-level talks to discuss pan-European security after Britain leaves the EU.
- READ MORE: Scottish Government's Brexit Bill 'perfectly practical,' insists Lord Advocate James Wolffe
Mr Johnson’s latest intervention also came as website Buzzfeed reported that former Trump adviser Steve Bannon made contact with him during a recent trip to London. A spokesman for the London MP refused to comment on the report.
Mr Bannon, who is reportedly planning to set up an office in Brussels to bring Donald Trump's brand of right-wing populism to Europe, repeatedly praised Mr Johnson during interviews in the UK last week.
But he also talked up jailed far-right activist Tommy Robinson as "the backbone of this country" in a bust-up with a reporter on LBC radio.
In his first public comment about Brexit since his resignation speech to the House of Commons last week, Mr Johnson said Mrs May's plan for free trade in goods under a common rulebook with the EU "can't and won't work".
Writing in The Spectator magazine, he said: "You can't leave an organisation and still be bound by its rules. But that is what the Chequers white paper means.
"It is vassalage, satrapy, colony status for the UK. For the first time in a thousand years our laws will be made overseas, enforced by a foreign court. It can't and won't work. Chuck Chequers."
- Theresa May: public should be reassured and comforted by Government stockpiling in case of no-deal Brexit
Mr Johnson also defended the decision, made jointly with Home Secretary Sajid Javid, not to seek assurances from the US that two British jihadis would not face the death penalty.
He said Britain would have been happy to assist in the use of a drone to kill Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh if they had been located while still operating as Islamic State fighters.
"Would the British state, in these circumstances, have connived in straightforward extrajudicial killing? Too damn right we would," wrote the former Secretary of State.
He pointed out that a drone strike was used to kill Mohammed Emwazi, another suspected member of the so-called "Beatles" cell responsible for the torture and murder of Western hostages.
- READ MORE: Scottish Government's Brexit Bill 'perfectly practical,' insists Lord Advocate James Wolffe
"Of course, we legally justify these drone strike assassinations as preventative: to stop future acts of terror in Syria. But that scarcely masks the reality that killing them is also retributive; payback for the filmed executions of innocent people," argued Mr Johnson.
"So why do we support these extrajudicial killings, with no due process, and panic at what might happen in American court?" he asked.
The former Cabinet minister warned that if they were not extradited for trial in the US, Kotey and Elsheikh could be "simply set loose, like so many other jihadis, to roam the streets of London again".
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel