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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
Politics
Kate Lyons, Kevin Rawlinson , Andrew Sparrow and Frances Perraudin

Boris Johnson to table motion for election after failed vote – as it happened

We’re going to call it a night. Thanks so much for following along all the twists and turns of today’s news.

I’ll be back in about three hours with a fresh blog. Rest up, see you then!

Updated

Closing summary

Still scratching your head about what happened today? Or arriving at this blog from a non-UK timezone and need some catching up?

I’ve written a very basic explainer of what happened today, addressing questions like:

What just happened?

Boris Johnson has just lost a very significant vote in parliament, which has allowed MPs to seize control of the parliamentary timetable. It paves the way to introduce a bill that is designed to block a no-deal Brexit by forcing the prime minister to request an extension if he cannot strike a reworked divorce agreement with the rest of the EU.

Johnson threatened his MPs ahead of Tuesday that they should vote with him or face the penalty of having the “whip” withdrawn. Despite this threat, Johnson lost the vote. The rebel MPs and opposition parties won by 328 to 301.

What does it mean to ‘withdraw the whip’?

An arcane and slightly disturbing expression, in political-speak “withdrawing the whip” from someone effectively means booting them out of the party, without them immediately losing their seat.

An MP who has the whip withdrawn sits as an independent, but can be brought back into the party fold if it decides to restore the whip. Having the whip withdrawn is one of the most serious disciplinary actions that can be taken against an MP by a party. In this case it may mean they are barred from standing for the Tories in the next election.

What happens next?

Boris Johnson has announced he will ask parliament to allow a snap general election, which would be held on 15 October. The date of 14 October had been floated, but was deemed inappropriate as it is the Jewish holiday Sukkot.

Johnson has said that even if the rebels’ vote passes on Wednesday he will never request an extension beyond 31 October from the EU, and “the people of this country will have to choose” in an election. However, the prime minister needs a two-thirds majority to secure an early general election under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. Which means Labour can block it – and Jeremy Corbyn quickly made clear his party would not vote for an election unless and until the anti-no-deal bill has passed.

There is talk that if things reach a stalemate, it could result in a motion of no confidence in Johnson, but the prospects of that remain unclear.

How the papers covered it

Taking votes for best slouching Jacob Rees-Mogg tweet.

Sam Coates of Sky News has shared a Whatsapp message forwarded to him from the administrator of a Whatsapp group for Conservative MPs, asking those who have had the whip removed to remove themselves from the group.

Stella Creasy, Labour MP for Walthamstow, who seems to be having a lot of fun on Twitter tonight, has shared the tweet, saying that such a move is “#basic”. Brutal.

Good evening, this is Kate Lyons returning to the helm of this blog that I kicked off in the wee hours this morning and what a day it’s been in between.

As the dust settles and everyone tries to work out where we go from here, some MPs – many of whom are facing a future, or at least a present, outside the Conservative party – are trying to see the light side. Including Ed Vaizey, who has delivered one of the night’s great tweets.

People are also thoroughly enjoying this picture of Theresa May thoroughly enjoying her drive home, with not a hint of smugness or schadenfreude on her completely loyal face.

As British readers absorb the latest ructions in Westminster – whether the ousting of Tory grandees or Jacob Rees-Mogg’s apparently laid-back approach to Commons debates – we would like to hear from readers outside the UK about how their media view the latest developments.

Please send any front pages, comment pieces and editorial approaches that you feel are of note to G_J_Russell.

The argument that Boris Johnson is genuinely trying to strike a deal with the EU is “absurd”, according to the former Conservative minister, Ken Clarke, who has told Newsnight:

He’s obviously not trying to get a deal. I’m sure he’d prefer one if he thought he could get one past his right-wing supporters but he’s dug himself in. He assumes he’s going to get no deal because he can’t get the right wing of the Conservative party, many of them now stuck in his cabinet, to agree to it.

Referring to the state of the party, Clarke added:

It’s been taken over by a rather knockabout sort of character, who’s got this bizarre crash-it-through philosophy ... a cabinet which is the most right-wing cabinet any Conservative party has ever produced.

They’re not in control of events. The prime minister comes and talks total rubbish to us and is planning to hold a quick election and get out, blaming Parliament and Europe for the shambles.

I have to decide whether to vote Conservative if Boris Johnson is still the leader. That’s my next problem. I am a conservative, of course I am ... but this leader, I don’t recognise this. It’s the Brexit party, rebadged.

Updated

More reaction from MPs to tonight’s vote is coming in. The former Tory minister, David Gauke, voted against the government

The chairman of the Conservative party, James Cleverly, tweeted:

Richard Burgon, Labour’s shadow justice secretary, has told the BBC’s Newsnight programme:

We want a general election as soon as possible, as soon as it is legally bolted down that Boris Johnson can’t use any tricks or ruses to lead people to believe there is going to be a general election before we have left with a no-deal Brexit but then change his tune and leave with a no-deal Brexit.

And Joanna Cherry, the Scottish National Party MP, made similar comments on the same programme:

We want a general election as soon as possible once this bill goes through. We don’t fear a general election. We are not necessarily going to let Boris Johnson have it on his terms. We are anxious that this legislation we have worked so hard, cross party to back, goes through first to prevent a no-deal Brexit.”

Theresa May, whose premiership was wrecked by Brexit, has been photographed leaving Parliament after her successor, Boris Johnson, suffered defeat in his very first Commons vote.

The former prime minister, Theresa May, leaves the Houses of the Parliament after Boris Johnson’s defeat
The former prime minister, Theresa May, leaves the Houses of the Parliament after Boris Johnson’s defeat Photograph: Henry Nicholls/Reuters

Rory Stewart, initially appeared to confirm he would not stand as an MP at any upcoming general election after rebelling against the government tonight. Speaking at the GQ Men of the Year Awards in London, he said:

Politics is at an all-time low at the moment all over the world and it is great you continue to take an interest in it. We have a lot of work to do to regain anybody’s trust.

But I want to finish by saying this is a pretty special evening in many ways because, when I voted against the government this evening, I heard that my whip has been removed.

It’s likely tomorrow that there’s going to be an election and I’m not going to be able to stand as the member of Parliament because Boris [Johnson] has decided he doesn’t want me in the party.

I am very proud to take the award as politician of the year on the evening which I cease to be a politician.

However, Stewart later clarified that he had been joking about leaving politics:

Guto Bebb also voted against the government and is now believed to have had the whip withdrawn. He told the BBC:

It is frankly rather hypocritical of a prime minister who constantly voted against the previous Conservative prime minister in taking this action against people who voted against him.

None of this would have happened if it wasn’t for the way in which No 10 and the prime minister have handled this whole issue.

That decision to prorogue parliament on the advice of Dominic Cummings has misfired spectacularly.

Another of those to rebel was Anne Milton, who wrote to her constituents to explain her decision:

Updated

The mayor of London and avowed remain supporter, Sadiq Khan, has described tonight’s vote as a “first step towards stopping Boris Johnson’s no-deal Brexit”.

However, we are not over the line yet. It is now absolutely vital that this Bill is passed by both Houses, and that Boris Johnson ensures it receives Royal assent and then agrees to abide by it.

Those of us who agree that Brexit is a total disaster for the future of London and our country simply must keep the pressure up this week.

Sir Nicholas Soames, the Tory former minister, has told Newsnight that he will stand down at the next election. Soames, 71, whose grandfather was Winston Churchill, is losing the whip because he voted against the government tonight.

That’s all from me tonight. My colleague Kevin Rawlinson is now taking over.

This is from a source close to the rebel Tories.

Tonight’s decisive result is the first step in a process to avert an undemocratic and damaging no deal. No 10 have responded by removing the whip from two former chancellors, a former lord chancellor and Winston Churchill’s grandson. What has has happened to the Conservative party?

Mark Spencer, the chief whip, has been ringing the Tory rebels telling them they are having the whip withdrawn, we’ve been told. Philip Hammond, the former chancellor, has already had the call. As of now, he is technically no longer a Conservative MP.

And here is the full text of what Jeremy Corbyn said in the chamber after the vote.

I welcome tonight’s vote. We live in a parliamentary democracy, we do not have a presidency but a prime minister.

Prime ministers govern with the consent of the House of Commons, representing the people in whom the sovereignty rests.

There is no consent in this house to leave the European Union without a deal. There is no majority for no deal in the country.

As I have said before: if the prime minister has confidence in his Brexit policy - when he has one he can put forward - he should put it before the people in a public vote.

And so, he wants to table a motion for a general election, fine get the bill through first in order to take no-deal off the table.

Full text of Boris Johnson's statement

Here is the full text of Boris Johnson’s statement after the result was announced.

Let there be no doubt about the consequences of this vote tonight.

It means that parliament is on the brink of wrecking any deal we might be able to strike in Brussels.

Because tomorrow’s bill would hand control of the negotiations to the EU.

And that would mean more dither, more delay, more confusion.

And it would mean that the EU themselves would be able decide how long to keep this country in the EU.

And since I refuse to go along with that plan we are going to have to make a choice. I don’t want an election. The public don’t want an election. But if the House votes for this bill tomorrow, the public will have to choose who goes to Brussels on October 17 to sort this out and take this country forward.

Everyone will know if the Rt Hon Gentleman is the prime minister, he will go to Brussels, he will beg for an extension, you will accept whatever Brussels demands and we’ll have years more arguments over Brexit.

And by contrast, everyone will know that if I am prime minister, I will go to Brussels, I will go for a deal and get a deal but if they won’t do a deal we will leave anyway on 31 October.

The people of this country will have to choose.

The leader of the Opposition has been begging for an election for two years.

I don’t want an election but if MPs vote tomorrow to stop the negotiations and to compel another pointless delay of Brexit, potentially for years, then that will be the only way to resolve this.

I can confirm that tonight we will are tabling a motion under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.

Andrea Leadsom, the business secretary, was wrong when she said earlier that the Tory rebels would be given a second chance before they had the whip removed (see 10.29pm), the BBC’s Vicki Young reports.

Here is the list of MPs who did not vote in the division. As is normal, the Speaker, his three deputies and the seven Sinn Fein MPs (who have not taken their seats) did not vote. The other MPs who did not vote were Sir Kevin Barron and Derek Twigg (both Labour) and four independents (Kelvin Hopkins, John Woodcock, Jared O’Mara and Chris Williamson).

It is impossible to tell from the division lists whether an MP did not vote because they wanted to abstain, or whether there was another reason, like illness, for their non-appearance.

Here is the list of MPs who voted against the motion. There were 286 Tories voting this way, and all 10 DUP MPs voted against. The other votes came from two Labour MPs, Kate Hoey and John Mann, and three independents (Ian Austin and Ivan Lewis, who are both ex-Labour, and Charlie Elphicke, who is ex-Tory).

The 21 Tory MPs who voted with opposition for bill to rule out no deal

You can find the division lists here.

Here are the 21 Tory MPs who voted with the opposition.

Tory MPs who voted with opposition
Tory MPs who voted with opposition Photograph: Parliament TV

Updated

Andrea Leadsom, the business secretary, has signalled that the Tory rebels will not have the whip removed immediately. In an interview with BBC, she said that she hoped that the MPs who voted against the government would “reconsider overnight” and decide to vote with the government to defeat the bill tomorrow. Asked if they would lose the whip immediately, she said they wouldn’t. They would get a second chance, she said.

UPDATE: Leadsom was freelancing, or just plain wrong. Party sources have made it clear that all rebels are losing the whip. See 10.48pm.

Updated

Anna Soubry rises as leader of the Independent Group for Change. Some MPs jeer, because they do not see this as a proper party. Soubry says she will not be shouted down by a man.

She says the rumour is that all the rebels will have the whip withdrawn. Is that correct?

Bercow says they are not having a debate now.

Jo Swinson, the Lib Dem leader, says MPs must act responsibly. She says she backs the idea of an election, but not before MPs have removed the risk of the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal.

Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Wesminster, says Johnson has a 100% record when it comes to losing votes in the Commons.

He says Johnson should respect the vote. He says the “fantasy” that there is a deal to come from the government is “nonsense”.

Let us have an election. But let us have an election that respects the democracy of this house.

  • Blackford says SNP also wants Benn bill passed before general election called.

Updated

Corbyn says Labour will not back early election motion unless bill ruling out no-deal passed first

Jeremy Corbyn says if Johnson wants an election, he must get the bill passed first.

Updated

Boris Johnson says he is tabling motion for general election because he will not accept Benn bill

Boris Johnson says he will refuse to go along with this bill.

He does not want an election.

But if MPs vote for this bill tomorrow, the public will have to choose who goes to Brussels on 17 October.

He says if Jeremy Corbyn goes, he will do what the EU wants.

If Johnson himself goes, he will get a deal, he says.

He says if MPs vote for a pointless delay to Brexit tomorrow, he will seek to hold an election. Tonight he is tabling a motion under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.

MPs back move to allow bill to block no-deal Brexit by majority of 27

MPs have backed the motion to allow a debate on a bill tomorrow that would prevent a no-deal Brexit on 31 October by 328 votes to 301 - a majority of 27.

John Bercow has sent the serjeant-at-arms to investigate the delay in the aye lobby.

From Labour’s Alex Sobel

From the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope

From my colleague Jessica Elgot

From Nick Macpherson, a former permanent secretary at the Treasury

From Labour’s Luke Pollard

These are from ITV’s Robert Peston.

Nick Brown, the Labour chief whip, moves a motion that the question be now put. MPs back the call by acclamation.

John Bercow, the Speaker, moves to the main vote. He has just called the division, and voting has started.

We should get the result in about 15 minutes.

From Sky’s Sam Coates

Back in the debate Bob Neill, a Tory who voted remain in 2016, says he has rebelled over Brexit. He wants the UK to leave the EU with a deal. But he thinks this motion will make it harder for the PM to get a deal at the EU summit in October. He urges MPs to reject the motion.

Here are some pictures from the protests outside the Houses of Parliament.

Anti-Brexit protesters outside the Houses of Parliament.
Anti-Brexit protesters outside the Houses of Parliament. Photograph: Penelope Barritt/REX/Shutterstock
Anti-Brexit protesters outside the Houses of Parliament.
Anti-Brexit protesters outside the Houses of Parliament. Photograph: Penelope Barritt/REX/Shutterstock
Police outside the Houses of Parliament.
Police outside the Houses of Parliament. Photograph: Penelope Barritt/REX/Shutterstock

A spokesman for the Irish government said it had been briefed on Tuesday evening on the latest Brexit negotiations between the European Union and the United Kingdom.

As PA Media reports, the spokesman said Ireland “noted the increasing risk of a no-deal Brexit on 31 October”. In a statement issued to the media, the Irish government said it had agreed that no-deal Brexit planning would continue to get “top priority” across all government department and agencies.

Updated

This is from the SNP MP Gavin Newlands on Jacob Rees-Mogg.

From the Sunday Times’ Tim Shipman

If the rebellion is that size, it is hard to see how the government could win.

Updated

The Lib Dem Brexit spokesman Tom Brake says he has asked colleagues in the European parliament if there is any evidence that the UK is putting forward alternative plans for the backstop. He says he has been told that there has been “total radio silence” from the UK with regard to the Brexit negotiation. He urges MPs to support the motion.

The Tory MP Bob Seely says he is against this motion because it provides an opportunity for another extension. He says he wants a deal. But he also thinks the country needs to bring this matter to a conclusion.

Back in the debate the Green MP Caroline Lucas criticises the “feral, out of control executive”.

And she also criticises Jacob Rees-Mogg’s body language. (See 9.23pm.) She says his stance shows his contempt for parliament. “Sit up,” some MPs shout.

These are from the BBC’s Iain Watson.

MPs are not supposed to take photographs of each other in the chamber, but you can see why Labour’s Anna Turley could not resist this shot.

MPs sometimes lean back like that in the chamber because there are speakers embedded in those benches at the top, and if they are having difficulty hearing the debate, having your ear to the cushion can help. Obviously, Turley has an alternative explanation for Rees-Mogg’s posture ...

Antoinette Sandbach, one of the Tory rebels, is speaking now. She says if Boris Johnson is allowed to shut down parliament to reduce the chances of MPs stopping a no-deal Brexit, there will be nothing to stop another prime minister doing this again.

Labour’s Gordon Marsden says there is no evidence, “not a sniff”, that the government has presented Brexit plans to the EU.

He says Boris Johnson is a “petulant man-child unable to get his way with this house” and that is why he wants to shut down parliament. That is why MPs must vote for this motion, he says.

In the debate Sir Bernard Jenkin, the Tory Brexiter, is speaking now.

He says this situation partly reflects various constitutional changes.

One is the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. This has strengthened the position of the PM, as was intended when it was passed by the coalition. But this means the Commons can now wound a PM without bringing them down.

And the other factor is the increased use of referendums. That has created a problem of competing legitimacies, he says. It is not clear what is most legitimate, he says – the representative or the direct mandate?

Updated

This is from Antonello Guerrera, a corespondent for the Italian paper, La Repubblica.

This sounds like a reference to a briefing similar to the one reported by RTE’s Tony Connelly earlier. (See 5.51pm.)

Dominic Grieve, a Tory rebel and the former attorney general, says he does not know what the “will of the people” means now. He says it is not clear what the public want. That is why he thinks there must be a referendum, he says.

He says he is alarmed by the way people who make this argument are now accused of being traitors.

And he says he was surprised when Jacob Rees-Mogg argued that passing the Benn bill could interrupt the great set pieces that follow the Queen’s speech. (See 7.40pm.) Grieve says, as a Conservative, he likes the set pieces that follow the Queen’s speech. But his constituents know that averting the damage a no-deal Brexit would cause is more important.

He also criticises Rees-Mogg for the way he criticised Oliver Letwin. (See 7.38pm.) He says Letwin spent more months in high office than the number of days Rees-Mogg has spent in his.

Updated

Anna Soubry, the former Tory MP who is now leader of the Independent Group for Change, urges MPs to back the motion. She says it is not just about the future of the country, it is about self-respect too. She says MPs need to be able to look themselves in the mirror, and tell their grandchildren they have done the right thing.

Updated

Liam Fox, the former international trade secretary, is speaking now.

He says MPs must honour the result of the referendum.

He says this motion would turn the UK into supplicants in relation to the EU.

He says MPs would create a “coalition of chaos” if they back this plan.

And he says a senior French minister told him that it was important for the UK to honour the referendum result. He told Fox that France’s current political problems, which saw the collapse of the traditional parties, started when the French government failed to honour the spirit of the French vote against the European constitution.

In the Commons Nick Boles, the former Tory who now sits as an independent, is speaking. He recalls the day he woke up in hospital in 2017, where he was being treated for cancer, and got ready to go to the Commons to vote for article 50 to be triggered. His blood cell count was low, and there was a high chance of infection, he says. But he was driven to the Commons to vote because he believed the referendum vote should be respected.

He says he has voted for a Brexit deal. But what he will not do is accept a no-deal Brexit.

He says taking this stand lost him the support of his local Tory association, and led to him leaving the party. But he has no regrets. He has put what is right for the country ahead of his self-interest. How many members of the cabinet can say the same?

He says he is the only MP in parliament sitting as an independent progressive conservative. But he urges other MPs to join him so that they can provide a new force in parliament.

At the moment, I am the only independent progressive Conservative in parliament.

To those brave souls on the Conservative benches who face expulsion from the party for voting for the motion today, I say this: your country needs you.

Do what you know to be right.

Join me on these benches and, together, let us build a new force in British politics and a true home in parliament for those who believe in one nation.

Updated

Thornberry says Labour will not vote for general election until bill ruling out no-deal Brexit becomes law

Emily Thornberry, the shadow foreign secretary, has just told Sky News that Labour is desperate to hold a general election. But, asked if Labour would support a vote for a general election tomorrow, she says the party might abstain, or vote against. She says the party wants to see the bill ruling out a no-deal Brexit on 31 October passed first.

Under the Letwin plan, the bill could become law on Monday.

No 10 has been saying that, if the government loses the vote tonight, Boris Johnson will push for a vote on an early election tomorrow. But without Labour’s support he will not get the two-thirds majority required under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act for the vote to be operable.

Updated

Clarke says the obvious compromise is a soft Brexit, that would keep the economic relationship with the EU (ie single market membership).

He says people say this amounts to disrespecting the referendum result.

But he says he has voted for Brexit three times. He voted for a deal that Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, now derides.

Updated

Back in the Commons Ken Clarke, the Tory former chancellor who is now the father of the house (the longest-serving MP) is speaking.

He says parliament has voted against no deal. But Boris Johnson has put himself into the situation where he has to have no deal.

If parliament allows itself to be sidelined, the impact this would have on what future governments might do would be “horrendous”.

  • Clarke says allowing Johnson to implement a no-deal Brexit against the wishes of parliament would set a “horrendous” precedent for the future.

He mocks Jacob Rees-Mogg for what he said about a WTO Brexit being acceptable. (See 9.25pm.) He says no doubt the North Koreans thrive on such a regime. The only other countries trading just on WTO terms are Algeria and Serbia, he says. He says he admires Rees-Mogg’s ability to keep a straight face when he was making this argument.

Ken Clarke
Ken Clarke Photograph: Parliament TV

Updated

Jared O’Mara has postponed his plan to resign from the Commons, PA Media reports. The Sheffield Hallam MP, 37, announced his decision in July to step down after a series of problems which saw him suspended from the parliamentary Labour party and then resign from the party. MPs cannot simply resign. If they want to leave the Commons they have to apply to be appointed to one of two ancients stewardships, PA reports. A Treasury spokesman said:

Jared O’Mara remains an MP after writing to the chancellor asking to postpone his appointment to an office of the Crown.

Updated

New ERG chair Steve Baker says Tories should have pact with Brexit party in event of early election

Turning away from the debate for a moment, Steve Baker, the new chair of the European Research Group, has given an interesting briefing to journalists. During the leadership election Boris Johnson ruled out an election pact with the Brexit party. But Baker, after a meeting of the ERG where he took over as chair from Jacob Rees-Mogg, said the Tories would need to reach an arrangement with Nigel Farage’s party to win a general election before Brexit. Baker said:

What’s very clear to me is if we have an election before we have left the European Union, and the Brexit party think that we are heading in a direction which does not deliver our independence from the EU, then they will stand candidates virtually everywhere.

And the result will be as per Peterborough and in Wales - they will result in a Lib/Lab Remain coalition and we will lose Brexit, and that’s why I’ve said we need to have some sort of accommodation with them but we are not quite at that bridge yet.

Steve Baker
Steve Baker Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images

Updated

Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, is speaking now. He accuses Boris Johnson of acting like a dictator. And he says the Conservative party is now acting like a cult.

Rees-Mogg says the public gave MPs an instruction.

He says if the bill passes tomorrow, MPs will either have to accept the backstop, accept endless Brexit delays or revoke article 50 altogether.

He says today’s motion is “the most unconstitutional use of this house since the days of Charles Stewart Parnell, when he tried to bung up parliament”.

He quotes AV Dicey, the Victorian jurist, saying that political conventions are there to ensure that the will of the people gets enacted.

Parliament should accept the will of the nation, he says.

The approach taken today is the most unconstitutional use of this house since the days of Charles Stewart Parnell when he tried to bung up parliament.

Usurping the executive’s right is unconstitutional, the use of emergency debates to do so is unconstitutional and the bill itself is yet more unconstitutional

Sovereignty comes from the people to parliament, it does not come to parliament out of a void. If parliament tries to challenge the people, this stretches the elastic of our constitution near to breaking point.

We should recognise that the people are our masters and show us to be their lieges and servants, not to place ourselves in the position of their overlords. As we come to vote today, I hope all members will contemplate the current constitutional confusion and consider the chaos this concatenation of circumstances could create.

Rees-Mogg ends by urging MPs to “consider the chaos this concatenation of circumstances could create”.

Updated

Rees-Mogg says the bill involves a deliberate attempt to allow an extension long enough to allow a second piece of legislation, or to allow Brexit to be revoked.

He says this procedure could be used again to have a further Brexit delay.

This would create a marionette government, he says.

Updated

Rees-Mogg says the bill will not deliver certainty on Brexit. It is nothing but “legislative legerdemain”, he says.

Hilary Benn, the Labour chair of the Brexit committee, and the principal sponsor of the bill to be debated tomorrow if this motion passes, asks how he can say there is anything wrong with this procedure given that the Speaker has approved it.

Rees-Mogg says there is a difference between irregular and improper. This procedure might not be improper, but it is irregular, he says.

Here is the Labour MP Liz Kendall on Jacob Rees-Mogg’s performance.

Rees-Mogg says parliamentary rules (the ones he has accuses John Bercow of subverting) are there to protect people from tyranny. He says there is a tried and tested means of removing an unpopular government - a confidence vote. But Labour has not tabled one, because it is afraid of losing, he claims.

It is not, however, for parliament to undertake the role and functions of the executive.

Constitutional convention is that executive power is exercised by Her Majesty’s government which has the democratic mandate to govern.

That mandate is derived from the British people and represented through this House.

When we look at this constitution we are protected by our rules and our orders and by our conventions ...

It is those rules, those laws, those conventions that protect us from the winds of tyranny.

Updated

Protesters chanting “stop the coup” have begun marching past the Houses of Parliament, the Press Association is reporting. Purple, red and green smoke was released at the front of the column of demonstrators who are blocking the road from Parliament Square leading up to College Green in Westminster.

A demonstrator holds up a smoke bomb during a protest outside the Houses of Parliament in central London.
A demonstrator holds up a smoke bomb during a protest outside the Houses of Parliament in central London. Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

Rees-Mogg turns to the detail of the bill.

He says the provisions that would allow another similar bill to be debated on day two of the next session of parliament, if this one does not pass the Lords, would interrupt the Queen’s speech.

The SNP’s David Linden asks for an assurance that, if the bill passes the Commons and the Lords, the government will not try to stop it getting royal assent.

Rees-Mogg says the government will follow the law.

The law will be followed. This country is a country that follows the rule of law and its Government assiduously follows constitutional conventions, unlike some other members of this house.

Updated

Rees-Mogg accuses Letwin of “stunning arrogance”. He says Letwin has misunderstood parliament. Its authority comes from the people, he argues (which is why he says it should not be challenging the referendum result).

John Bercow, the Speaker, intervenes. He says he is satisfied that his judgment is correct. Although SO24 motions are normally in neutral terms, he says the SO24 procedure has been used for what he would call more “evaluative motions”. He cites a debate on 18 March 2013 (a debate on plans for a royal charter on press conduct) and a debate on 11 December 2018 (a debate on Theresa May shelving the “meaningful vote”). Both of these took place under SO24.

Bercow says all he is doing is allowing parliament to debate an important issue.

He insists that he will not be thrown off course, and he ends his peroration on this by quoting Boris Johnson, saying he will carry on “do or die”.

I have taken advice of a professional kind and I’m entirely satisfied that the judgment I have made is consistent with that advice.

My attitude is simply to seek to facilitate the house ...

I have sought to exercise my judgment in discharging my responsibility to facilitate the House of Commons, to facilitate the legislature. I have done it, I am doing it and I will do it to the best of my ability without fear or favour - to coin a phrase, come what may, do or die.

Updated

Rees-Mogg turns to the point about the Speaker’s decision to allow this debate.

He says he is not challenging John Bercow’s impartiality. But impartiality is not the same as infallibility, he says.

Jacob Rees-Mogg
Jacob Rees-Mogg Photograph: Parliament TV

Dominic Grieve, a Tory rebel, intervenes. He says Rees-Mogg talked about the need for parliament to scrutinise the executive. Yet the government is proroguing parliament for longer than needed. He says the government has also not always been honest, as when it said Operation Yellowhammer was a document produced by the old government. And the government has not been honest about the reasons for prorogation, he says. When these issues are considered together, you can see why people do not trust the government, Grieve says.

Rees-Mogg says Grieve is wrong. He says the decision to prorogue was routine.

Updated

Ken Clarke, the Tory pro-European, intervenes. He challenges Rees-Mogg’s claim that it would be acceptable for the UK to have to follow WTO rules. That would involve high tariffs. And it would require a hard border in Ireland. He says he cannot see why Rees-Mogg thinks that would not damage the economy.

Rees-Mogg says he is surprised Clarke is surprised by what he said. He has been making the case for WTO rules for some time, he says.

Updated

Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the Commons, is speaking for the government.

He says people voted to leave the EU. MPs must respect that decision.

He says today’s procedure is constitutionally irregular.

(He is referring to the fact that John Bercow, the Speaker, is allowing an SO24 emergency debate to pass a motion giving MPs control of the order paper tomorrow. In the past they have always been used for neutral motions with no practical effect. Earlier this year Bercow indicated that he was willing to allow the procedure to be used more creatively than it was in the past.)

He says this motion risks subverting parliament’s role in scrutinising the executive.

Updated

Corbyn says he understands that MPs have some concerns about the Benn bill being debated tomorrow - that it is seen as trying to reverse Brexit.

But that is not the case, he says.

He says this bill is just about providing “vital breathing space” to allow MPs to find a way through this mess.

He says if MPs do not back this motion, they may not get another chance.

Whether people voted leave or remain, they did not vote to shut down democracy.

He says he urges MPs to do what they think is right for their constituencies.

Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Corbyn Photograph: Parliament TV

As the debate goes on I will be updating some earlier posts to include direct quotes from MPs where the original post just featured reported speech. To get the updates to appear, you may need to refresh the page.

Corbyn says it is wrong to say that blocking a no-deal Brexit will hold up momentum towards a Brexit deal - because there is no momentum towards such a deal.

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn is now speaking for Labour.

He says this is the last chance MPs will have to stop a no-deal Brexit.

He says he understands that the mood is volatile. But if MPs want to stop a no-deal Brexit, they have to act now. He says MPs have faced bullying from their own side. But he says he has some words of encouragement: standing by your principles does not always damage your career prospects, he says.

(Corbyn is talking about himself, he says. He became Labour leader in 2015, when no one would have predicted that even six months earlier, after a lifetime of principled opposition to many things done by governments of both parties.)

Updated

Letwin says the motion today is just about allowing time for MPs to debate the bill tomorrow designed to stop a no-deal Brexit by 31 October.

He says it will be hard for the government to get a deal by 31 January – the deadline for an extension set out in the Benn bill.

But he says there is no chance of the government getting a deal by 31 October.

It’s to provide the government with the time to seek to solve this problem and to enable parliament to help to resolve an issue which has proved very difficult.

I don’t say it’s easy to do by 31 January, but I’m sure that it will not be done by 31 October. We are between a rock and a hard place, and in this instance the hard place is better than the rock. It is as simple as that. It’s decision time

If honourable members across the house want to prevent a no-deal exit on 31 October they will have the opportunity to do so if, but only if, they vote for this motion this evening. I hope they will do so.

Updated

Letwin says he has proposed his plan because of four facts.

First, the government has not come up with a plan for a Brexit deal, he says.

Over the last six weeks the government has not produced a single indication of any viable proposal to replace the backstop by any alternative likely to prove acceptable to the EU.

The likelihood of the government reaching a deal at the council meeting on October 17 and 18 on the terms the government itself has set is accordingly slight.

Second, he says this week is the last chance MPs will have to block a no deal Brexit.

Third, he says the government has said it is willing to go ahead with no-deal.

And, fourth, he says a no-deal would be a serious threat to the country.

He says Boris Johnson is like someone standing on one side of a canyon shouting to people on the other side that, if they do not do as he says, he will jump off.

Oliver Letwin
Oliver Letwin Photograph: Parliament TV

Updated

MPs debate move to allow bill to prevent no-deal Brexit on 31 October

MPs are now starting the SO24 debate.

Sir Oliver Letwin, the former Cabinet Office minister, is moving the motion that he has tabled. See 12.24pm for an explanation of what it says.

George Osborne, the Evening Standard editor and former Tory chancellor, says Nicholas Soames is following in the footsteps of his grandfather.

But Churchill never was deselected by the Tories. He did, however, do a Phillip Lee and join the Liberals before the first world war.

Updated

Chris Philp is now proposing his 10-minute rule bill on clean air. It probably won’t take a full 10 minutes.

Bone rises to make a point of order. He complains that Letwin did not follow the right procedure. Bercow tells him that Letwin did lodge his application properly.

Letwin does not use his full three minutes. It is more like 30 seconds.

He says this is an urgent matter, and MPs should debate it.

Bercow says it is a proper matter for an emergency debate. He asks if Letwin has the support of the house for MPs.

Some MPs shout “no”, but more than 40 MPs stand up to indicate their assent (the procedure required) and so Bercow allows the debate.

He says Peter Bone was the MP shouting no. And he says more than 40 MPs were standing up.

Bercow says the debate will start after the forthcoming 10-minute rule bill, and that will last for three hours, or finish at 10pm if it is still going on then.

Updated

Application for emergency debate on bill to stop no-deal Brexit

John Bercow, the Speaker, says he will now take the application for the SO24 debate.

That means Sir Oliver Letwin gets three minutes to make a speech explaining why MPs must debate this.

From my colleague Jessica Elgot

This is from Rory Stewart, the former international development secretary.

And it has attracted this response from Sir Nicholas Soames, who has confirmed that he will be voting with the rebels. This means, of course, that Boris Johnson will end up effectively deselecting Winston Churchill’s grandson.

Updated

From HuffPost’s Paul Waugh

Here is the official Downing Street text of Boris Johnson’s G7 statement. I normally write “full text” here, but this is not the full text because there several passages where what the civil service call “political content” (party political material – mostly anti Labour) has been removed.

But journalists have been sent the entire text. It will appear on Hansard online later but, for the record, here is Johnson’s peroration – where he claimed the Benn bill should be seen as “Jeremy Corbyn’s surrender bill”. Johnson said:

Yesterday a bill was published – a bill that the leader of the opposition has spent all summer working on.

This is not a bill in any normal sense of the word. It is without precedent in our history – it is a bill that, if passed, would force me to go to Brussels and beg an extension. It would force me to accept any terms offered. It would destroy any chance of negotiations or a new deal. And indeed it would enable our friends in Brussels to dictate the terms of the negotiation, that is what it does.

There is only one way to describe this bill – it is Jeremy Corbyn’s surrender bill. It means running up the white flag.

I want to make clear to everybody in this house – there are no circumstances in which I will ever accept anything like it.

I will never surrender the control of the negotiations in the way the leader of the opposition is demanding.

We promised the people we would get Brexit done. We promised to respect the result of the referendum and we must do so now.

Enough is enough. This country wants this done. They want the referendum respected. We are negotiating a deal and though I am confident of getting a deal we will leave on 31 October in all circumstances. There will be no further pointless delay.

This house has never before voted to force the prime minister to surrender such a crucial decision to the discretion of our friends and neighbours overseas.

What is this bill would mean is that unless we agree to the terms of our friends and partners they would be able to keep us in the EU for as long as they want and on their terms. I urge therefore this house to reject this bill tonight so that we can get the right deal for our country, deliver Brexit and take the whole country forward.

Boris Johnson in the House of Commons earlier.
Boris Johnson in the House of Commons earlier. Photograph: -/AFP/Getty Images

Updated

Steve Baker, a leading Tory Brexiter, has confirmed that he has replaced Jacob Rees-Mogg as chair of the European Research Group, which represents those Tories most in favour of a harder Brexit. Baker was chair before being made a Brexit minister in 2017.

Updated

From ITV’s Robert Peston

In the Commons the Michael Gove statement is now over and MPs are now on the Gavin Williamson education spending statement. At this pace, there is a good chance that they will get going on the SO24 motion and the no-deal Brexit debate by around 6.30pm, which would mean the voting would start at around 9.30pm.

Lords to debate motion that would prevent pro-Brexit peers delaying Benn bill debate beyond Friday

If the SO24 motion gets passed by the Commons later, MPs will get the chance to pass all stages of the Benn bill tomorrow. It will then go to the House of Lords.

Normally there are no time limits on debates in the Lords. Peers do not use programme motions, which are used in the Commons to curtail debates so that bills complete all their stages by a particular time. This led to fears that pro-Brexit peers might filibuster the bill, so that it fails to clear the Lords before prorogation. But Angela Smith, the Labour leader in the Lords, has tabled a motion to be debated tomorrow that would ensure that all stages of the Benn bill must be completed by 5pm on Friday.

There had been talk of peers sitting over the weekend to deal with the bill, but this motion would kill off that prospect. The Benn bill would then go back to the Commons on Monday, when MPs would debate any Lords amendment.

The Smith motion has the support of the Lib Dems, which means it is very likely to get through because there is no Conservative majority in the Lords.

Commenting on her plan, Smith said:

Should MPs agree to the proposed bill, it would be completely unacceptable for the government to try and use its peers to scupper that legislation. In fact, it would go against a key constitutional principle of the primacy of the elected House of Commons – the House of Lords does not block laws agreed by MPs.

My business motion invites peers to debate and discuss the bill in an orderly way, including an additional sitting this Friday, to allow full consideration of the proposals before next week’s scheduled prorogation of parliament.

Updated

These are from Tony Connelly, RTE’s Europe editor.

The most striking quote is in the final tweet. This is what an EU source told Connelly about the UK’s plan for an alternative to the backstop:

Nothing has been put on the table, not even a proper sketch or hint of a plan. We’re waiting. But for the moment there is zilch.

A government spokesman has said that it is not just Tory MPs who vote with the opposition on the SO24 motion this evening, enabling the bill designed to rule out a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, who will lose the Tory whip, meaning they should be prevented from standing for the party at the general election; those who abstain will lose the whip too, the spokesman said. He explained:

The prime minister would not expect people who have voted to take power away from this government and to hand it to the opposition, to be a Conservative candidate or a Conservative MP.

Boris Johnson is to visit Dublin to meet Leo Varadkar on Monday, the Irish government has confirmed.

A spokesman said that while Brexit would be on the agenda, the talks would not amount to negotiations on the backstop.

“We don’t negotiate bilaterally,” a spokesman said. “The government has consistently stressed that negotiations on Brexit take place between the UK and the EU27, for which Michel Barnier speaks.”

The meeting comes weeks after Johnson was accused of snubbing the taoiseach by not including him in the first round of phone calls to foreign premiers after he became prime minister.

In his response to Trickett, Gove criticised Labour for backing the SO24 motion. Referring to Geoffrey Howe’s quote in the speech he gave after he resigned from Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet, Gove says people sometime talk about the team captain breaking someone’s bat before they go out to face the bowling. Gove says that Labour’s approach would be so damaging to the government’s strategy that it would amount to “blowing up the whole pavilion”.

Responding to Gove for Labour, Jon Trickett, the shadow Cabinet Office minister, says the government should publish the Operation Yellowhammer document so that people can see how damaging the government thinks a no-deal Brexit would be.

Yesterday a story in the Financial Times (paywall) said that Gove had been planning to publish the document today, but that he had dropped the idea because it was too negative. Here is an extract from George Parker’s story.

Mr Gove, minister for no-deal planning, had been expected to publish extracts of the document on Tuesday as part of his efforts to prepare the UK for the possibility of Brexit taking place without an agreement on 31 October.

Government officials worked throughout the weekend overhauling the Operation Yellowhammer document, and Mr Gove had hoped to use the work to prove that he had a grip on potential no-deal problems.

But, on Monday, Mr Gove and fellow cabinet ministers decided to abandon Tuesday’s publication of the document. “The meeting didn’t go well,” said one person close to the meeting. “The whole thing was seen as far too pessimistic about no deal.”

Updated

Gove concludes by saying a no-deal Brexit would pose undoubted risks and real challenges for the UK. But he says there would also be opportunities.

Michael Gove's statement on no-deal preparations

Michael Gove is now making a Commons statement about planning for a no-deal Brexit.

He says a no-deal Brexit would present difficulties, but he says people can prepare for them. He says the Operation Yellowhammer plan sets out a “reasonable worst-case scenario” for what might happen. It is not a prediction, he says.

He says today the government is announcing an extra £20m of spending to ensure that traffic can flow freely in Kent in the event of a no-deal Brexit.

He urges EU states to reciprocate the assurances that the UK has given for EU nationals living in the UK in the event of no deal.

Updated

Boris Johnson’s statement is now over. Unusually, John Bercow wrapped it up while some MPs still wanted to ask questions. That means we are running slightly ahead of the timetable I anticipated earlier. (See 2.30pm.)

Updated

Here are some comments from journalists on how Boris Johnson is performing in this statement.

From my colleague Jonathan Freedland

From Sky’s Lewis Goodall

From the Mail on Sunday’s Dan Hodges

From my colleague Peter Walker

From my colleague John Crace

Johnson says he expects the final deal to be agreed at the EU summit starting on Thursday 17 October.

Jeremy Lefroy, a Conservative, asks if MPs will be able to pass all the required legislation between that summit and 31 October.

Johnson says that is what the government is planning. He offers to ensure Lefroy gets a briefing on how this would happen.

Johnson says Tory Brexiters would face deselection if they refused to back any deal he agreed

The Conservative Huw Merriman says if the Tories are going to remove the whip from MPs who rebel tonight, will Johnson also remove the whip from any MPs who do not back any deal he does bring back to the Commons.

(Some of the hardline Brexiters in the European Research Group say, even with the removal of the backstop, they would still find the Brexit deal unacceptable.)

Johnson confirms this would happen. “What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,” he says.

Updated

Labour’s Alison McGovern asks Johnson if he has seen the comment from Gavin Barwell, Theresa May’s former chief of staff, about the Brexit negotiation being a sham. If it is not a sham, will Johnson publish his backstop plans?

McGovern is referring to this tweet.

Johnson says he thinks he has said enough on this. He says voting for the SO24 motion tonight will harm the chances of the government getting a deal.

Labour’s Liz Kendall asks if Johnson will abide by the law if parliament passes legislation requiring him to request an article 50 extension.

Johnson says he will obey the law. But he says this provision would be a mistake.

Labour’s Jess Phillips says she has joined one of the legal challenges to the prorogation case because she does not want MPs not to have the chance to debate the domestic violence bill. Is it true senior civil servants refused to sign witness statements for this case?

Johnson says the proper processes were gone through. Domestic violence will receive proper consideration in the Queen’s speech, he says.

Updated

Steve Brine, a Conservative, tells Johnson that it is wrong to say that all MPs opposed to no deal are opposed to Brexit. Does Johnson accept that?

Johnson dodges the question, but says people used to say the EU would not alter the backstop. Now it is accepting it could change.

Updated

Labour’s Barry Sheerman says his daughter used to work as a special adviser for a Labour minister. Will Johnson condemn the way Sonia Khan was sacked by Dominic Cummings as a special adviser?

Johnson says he will not comment on personnel matters.

Updated

Anna Soubry, the Independent Group for Change leader, also asks about the Telegraph story, and asks if it is true that Johnson rang the Telegraph editor to complain about it.

Johnson again refuses to comment on the story. But he says he has not had any conversation today with any journalist about this matter.

David Gauke, the former justice secretary and a Tory rebel, asks Johnson to confirm two claims in the Daily Telegraph story today (paywall).

One was that David Frost, his Europe adviser, told a cabinet committee in August “of the decision to ‘run down the clock’ [in the Brexit talks] and keep up the appearance of activity, which he said was ‘important for both process and domestic handling reasons’.”

The other claim was that Geoffrey Cox, the attorney general, said at a subsequent cabinet committee meeting that it was a “complete fantasy” to think the EU would drop the backstop.

Johnson says he cannot comment on leaks.

Here is video of Phillip Lee crossing the floor in the Commons.

Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader at Westminster, asks Johnson to agree that a no-deal Brexit would be catastrophic.

Johnson says he does not agree. He says there will be “bumps on the road”, but the UK is a great country and it can get this down.

The alternative plan, backed by Jeremy Corbyn, would force the UK to accept whatever is offered by the EU, he says.

Johnson insists he will 'obey the law' if bill designed to block no-deal Brexit gets passed

Labour’s Angela Eagle asks if Johnson will obey any law passed by parliament on a no-deal Brexit. Johnson says the government will, of course, uphold the constitution and “obey the law”.

However, he said earlier he would not accept what was being proposed in the legislation. (See 3.50pm.)

Updated

Responding to the DUP’s Nigel Dodds, Johnson says he believes they can get rid of the backstop. “How?” MPs shout. Johnson says the shouting shows MPs do not want to get rid of it.

Hilary Benn, the Labour chair of the Commons Brexit committee, says it is not just Angela Merkel saying the UK has not put forward any plans. The Irish deputy PM, Simon Coveney, said recently the UK had not put forward any plans. He asks Johnson to confirm the Daily Telegraph report saying Geoffrey Cox, the attorney general, told him the government was heading for no deal.

He is an extract from the Telegraph’s story (paywall).

At a follow-up meeting on 1 August to discuss what the strategy would mean in practice, Mr Johnson insisted again the entire backstop must go, but he was confronted by Geoffrey Cox, the attorney general, who argued for potential compromises on the backstop that might be negotiable with the EU, – such as a time-limit or a unilateral exit clause – but the options were ruled out by the prime minister.

Sources say Mr Cox told Mr Johnson it was a “complete fantasy” to think the EU would drop the backstop, before quickly professing his loyalty – and issuing a clear warning. “I will stand with you but you should know this is the path to no deal,” he told him.

Johnson ignores the question about Cox, but says that MPs who vote for the SO24 motion tonight will be undermining the chances of a deal.

Updated

Philip Hammond, the Tory former chancellor, says Angela Merkel said on Friday that, nine days into the 30 days set aside for a new deal, she had yet to see any new proposals from the UK. Will Johnson publish any ideas he has?

Johnson says the UK will be able to get a deal within 30 days. But he says that cannot happen while parliament is threatening to block no deal. He says the first thing EU leaders ask is, ‘Will this get through parliament?”

Updated

Jo Swinson, the Lib Dem leader, welcomes Phillip Lee to her party and says doctors like Lee tell her Brexit will harm the NHS.

Johnson says this government has hired 700 more doctors.

The SNP leader at Westminster, Ian Blackford, says Johnson may claim not to want an election. But the SNP do want one, he says.

Full statement from Phillip Lee explaining his defection to Lib Dems

Here is the full statement from Phillip Lee explaining his defection to the Lib Dems.

After a great deal of thought, I have reached the conclusion that it is not possible to serve my constituents’ and country’s best interests as a Conservative member of parliament.

Over 27 years ago I joined the Conservative & Unionist party led by Sir John Major. Since 2010, I have had the privilege of representing the Bracknell constituency. The party I joined in 1992 is not the party I am leaving today.

This Conservative government is aggressively pursuing a damaging Brexit in unprincipled ways. It is putting lives and livelihoods at risk unnecessarily and it is wantonly endangering the integrity of the United Kingdom. More widely, it is undermining our country’s economy, democracy and role in the world. It is using political manipulation, bullying and lies. And it is doing these things in a deliberate and considered way. It has gone so far beyond reckless as to cease to be conservative.

I am dismayed at what the Conservative party has become, the role that it has played in feeding division and populism, in squandering a hard-won reputation for sound stewardship, and the blinkered direction in which it has set our country. Those are not my values. I will not implicitly condone these things by being party to them.

Make no mistake: this is a time of reckoning. The challenges that our world and country face are real – but not insurmountable. We need to root how we address them in evidence and reality. Critically, we need to recognise that we will not solve climate change, counter extremism, or address our housing, health and social care needs alone. We must work with others.

The opportunities to leave a better legacy are also significant. As a united country, we need to mobilise all our innovation, creativity, power and talent – not bury it under a Brexit that does not have the British people’s informed consent. As a society, we need to rediscover the liberal and democratic traditions that made our country great. We should be guided by the values of justice, liberty and community. We must recognise our responsibilities to our people and planet: we are stewards of our country’s and our world’s limited resources.

Each generation needs to define democracy for itself and so we each have a part in shaping what we want our politics and our country to stand for. Each of us must stand and be counted.

That is why today I am joining Jo Swinson and the Liberal Democrats. I believe the Liberal Democrats are best placed to build the unifying and inspiring political force needed to heal our divisions, unleash our talents, equip us to take the opportunities and overcome the challenges that we face as a society - and leave our country and our world in a better place for the next generations.

Updated

Ken Clarke says Johnson's strategy is to ensure EU gets as much blame as possible for no-deal Brexit

Ken Clarke, the Tory pro-European, says Johnson’s strategy is obvious. He wants to set impossible conditions, attach as much blame as possible to the EU for the failure to get a deal, and then hold an election as quickly as possible, before the disadvantages of no deal become apparent. Is that correct? And can he confirm that, if the UK leaves the EU without a deal, it will be much harder to get new deals. And any new deal with the EU will not replicate the advantages of the single market that Conservative governments helped to create.

Johnson says he has long been a fan of Clarke’s. He was the only member of the 2001 intake to vote for Clarke in the Tory leadership contest that year, he says. He says the best way to get a deal is to vote down the motion tonight.

Johnson is responding to Corbyn.

He says Corbyn was, and still is, a Bennite. (Tony, not Hilary, Johnson means.) He says Corbyn is supporting protests on the streets.

Updated

Corbyn says Johnson's government has 'no mandate, no morals and no majority'

Corbyn ended by saying that Boris Johnson’s government had “no mandate, no morals and, as of today, no majority”.

Corbyn condemns Johnson for using ‘surrender bill’ jibe, saying UK not at war with EU

Jeremy Corbyn is responding now.

He says Boris Johnson claims to be making progress. But EU leaders say that is not the case.

He says the Conservative party’s in-house journal, the Daily Telegraph, reports today that the government views its renegotiation as a sham. (See 11.57am.)

He asks Johnson to say when the government will publish its internal planning document about the consequences of a no-deal Brexit.

Some Tories are putting their careers ahead of the national interest, he says. He refers to the leadership candidates who ruled out proroguing parliament, but who have now accepted that as an option.

And they are even refusing to commit to obeying laws passed by parliament. Can Johnson confirm he will obey any new law?

Corbyn says the attack on democracy is unconstitutional. He condemns the rhetoric used by Johnson when he referred to a surrender bill.

We are not surrendering because we are not at war with Europe. They are our partners.

  • Corbyn condemns Johnson for using ‘surrender bill’ jibe, saying UK is not at war with EU.

Updated

Johnson ends by urging MPs to reject the bill.

John Bercow, the Speaker, points out that there is no vote on a bill tonight. There will just be a vote on a mechanism to allow the vote to go ahead.

(He seems to be acknowledging that he will accept the request for the SO24 debate.)

Johnson says never before has the Commons forced a PM to accept a bill like this.

It would allow the EU to keep the UK in the EU on its own terms.

Updated

Boris Johnson dismisses anti no deal legislation as 'Jeremy Corbyn's surrender bill'

Johnson says the UK will be ready for a no-deal Brexit.

But he wants to return from the EU summit with a deal, he says.

However, one thing would jeopardise the chances of this - MPs passing the bill to rule out no deal, and to force the UK to “beg” for a delay.

He says Jeremy Corbyn has spent all summer working on this bill.

It is a bill without precedent, he says. It would force him to go to Brussels and beg for an extension, and it would force him to accept the terms offered, he says.

He says this is “Jeremy Corbyn’s surrender bill”. It means “running up the white flag”.

There are no circumstances in which I will every accept anything like it.

Johnson says that practical alternatives to the backstop are available.

He confirms that he will meet Leo Varadkar, the Irish taoiseach, in Dublin on Monday.

It is not true to say that the government is not making progress towards a deal, he says.

In the Commons Boris Johnson is still making his statement. He says he thinks over the last few weeks the chances of a Brexit deal have risen.

  • Boris Johnson claims chances of Brexit deal have risen.

UPDATED: Originally this post said Johnson did not allude to Phillip Lee’s defection. But I’ve taken that line out, because Johnson briefly referred to it, saying he wished Lee all the best.

Updated

Here is the Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson on Phillip Lee’s defection.

I am delighted to welcome Phillip to the Liberal Democrats at this crucial time.

He brings almost 10 years of parliamentary experience and decades of professional expertise. He shares our commitment to prevent a disastrous no-deal Brexit, and to stop Brexit altogether.

The Liberal Democrats are growing. Phillip follows both Chuka Umunna MP and Sarah Wollaston MP in bravely crossing the floor to join us.

Today, we also welcome Jane Dodds MP to parliament, following her recent victory in Brecon and Radnorshire. And these representatives join over 30,000 new members, who have joined the Liberal Democrats since our best ever results in the European elections in May.

Updated

Tory MP Phillip Lee defects to Lib Dems

The Tory Phillip Lee has just issued this statement about his defection to the Lib Dems.

Over 27 years ago I joined the Conservative & Unionist party led by Sir John Major. Since 2010 I have had the privilege of representing the Bracknell Constituency. The party I joined in 1992 is not the party I am leaving today.

This Conservative government is aggressively pursuing a damaging Brexit in unprincipled ways. It is putting lives and livelihoods at risk unnecessarily and it is wantonly endangering the integrity of the United Kingdom. More widely, it is undermining our country’s economy, democracy and role in the world. It is using political manipulation, bullying and lies. And it is doing these things in a deliberate and considered way.

That is why today I am joining Jo Swinson and the Liberal Democrats. I believe the Liberal Democrats are best placed to build the unifying and inspiring political force needed to heal our divisions, unleash our talents, equip us to take the opportunities and overcome the challenges that we face as a society - and leave our country and our world in a better place for the next generations.

This means that Boris Johnson has lost his majority.

Updated

It looks as if the Tory MP Phillip Lee has defected to the Lib Dems. This is from Politics.co.uk’s Ian Dunt.

Updated

Boris Johnson's Commons G7 statement

Boris Johnson starts by saying that today is the 80th anniversary of Britain’s entry into world war two. He says MPs know that this country still stands for democracy and the rule of law. That prompts jeering from Labour, in the light of Johnson’s decision to prorogue parliament to limit the amount of time available to MPs seeking to block a no-deal Brexit.

He says he made the case for free trade at the G7 summit.

He says the UK is on the verge of taking back control of its trade policy by taking its own seat at the WTO. He says he wants to do a comprehensive trade deal with the US. He says he and President Trump have agreed that the NHS will not be on the table for that deal.

Updated

In the Commons the new Lib Dem MP for Brecon and Radnorshire, Jane Dodds, is just taking her seat.

The supreme court has confirmed a provisional date of Tuesday 17 September for any appeal hearing in the multiple legal challenges against the prime minister’s decision to prorogue parliament.

Judicial review cases have been launched separately in the lower courts in Edinburgh, Belfast and London alleging that the planned suspension of parliamentary business is illegal.

If any appeals are made against the rulings of the court of session and high courts in the three cases they would be joined together for a combined hearing at the supreme court in London. It would be the first time the UK’s highest court has sat for an emergency application outside its normal legal terms.

Many justices are understood to be away on holiday. The supreme court does not normally start hearing cases until after the formal opening of the new legal year at the beginning of October.

The article 50 Brexit case heard by the supreme court in 2016 involved 11 justices hearing the high-profile case. A similar, odd number - to avoid the danger of a draw - could sit on 17 September.

Updated

Tory rebel Alistair Burt to stand down as MP at next election

Alistair Burt, the former Foreign Office minister and one of the Tories committed to voting with the opposition tonight on the motion enabling the Benn bill to block a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, has announced that he will stand down at the next election.

As ITV’s Emma Hutchinson reports, Burt, 64, says he is leaving earlier than planned because he does not support Boris Johnson’s Brexit policy. Under Johnson’s plan to deselect MPs who rebel tonight, he would probably have been forced out anyway.

(Other Tory rebels are taking a different approach. This morning Philip Hammond said he might even go to court to ensure he can stand again as a Conservative party candidate. See 8.15am.)

Alistair Burt
Alistair Burt Photograph: James Drew Turner/The Guardian

Updated

Dominic Cummings, the PM’s de facto chief of staff, also got involved at the meeting where Boris Johnson hoped to win over some rebel Tories this morning, HuffPost’s Paul Waugh reports. It sounds as though his intervention was not particularly helpful.

Dominic Cummings.
Dominic Cummings. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images

Corbyn says he thinks MPs can block no-deal and also hold early election

And here is the statement that Jeremy Corbyn issued after his meeting with other opposition leaders this morning about whether to vote for an election and stopping a no-deal Brexit. (See 1.31pm and 2.35pm.)

Following a productive meeting of cross-party MPs this morning, we are united in our opposition to Boris Johnson’s plans for a no-deal.

We are confident that the legislative route we have adopted has every chance of being successful, and we are working on ways in which we can prevent Boris Johnson manipulating an election to force a no-deal Brexit.

Labour wants to prevent a no-deal Brexit, and to have a general election, so we can end austerity and invest in our communities. I am confident we can have both, and we’ve been in discussions about a way to achieve this. We will continue to work across parliament towards this goal and will have further meetings to this end in coming days.

And this is from my colleague Heather Stewart.

Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Corbyn Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Updated

From my colleague Lisa O’Carroll

HuffPost’s Paul Waugh has more on Boris Johnson’s meeting with Philip Hammond and other rebels. (See 12.55pm.)

From my colleague Jessica Elgot

Ian Blackford, the SNP leader at Westminster, issued this statement after his meeting with Jeremy Corbyn and other opposition leaders at Westminster this morning. (See 1.31pm.) Blackford said:

Today’s cross-party meeting was another vital and productive step in working together to prevent this rogue Tory government from inflicting lasting harm with its extreme Brexit plans.

The SNP’s priority is to stop a catastrophic no-deal and that is why we have co-sponsored the cross-party bill designed to take that outcome off the table – an outcome parliament has already previously rejected. We will explore every avenue and parliamentary process open to us to stop that. However, while the SNP are ready and eager for a general election, Boris Johnson must not be allowed to use an election to force through no-deal.

While the SNP has been at the forefront in standing up for Scotland’s interests in Westminster, the 13 Scottish Tory MPs have been notably absent. With time running out – and with every vote pivotal – I urge the group of Scottish Tory MPs to work with us in safeguarding Scotland’s economic and social interests.

Updated

Agenda for the afternoon

Here is the timetable for events in the Commons this afternoon. After the first two entries, all the timings are provisional, for reasons explained below.

2.30pm: Dominic Raab takes Foreign Office questions.

3.30pm: Boris Johnson gives a statement on the G7. Commons statements normally run for about an hour, but John Bercow, the Speaker, likes to call all MPs who want to ask a question, and he regularly lets questions to the PM run for two hours or more. But assuming they wrap up after two hours, that takes us to ...

5.30pm?: Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, gives a statement on no-deal Brexit preparations.

6.30pm?: Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, gives a statement on education funding.

7.30pm?: Chris Philp moves a motion under the 10-minute rule for a bill on clean air. (Although called a 10-minute rule bill, the debate can last up to 20 minute, although normally these speeches last about five minutes.)

7.35pm?: Sir Oliver Letwin submits a request for an SO24 (standing order 24) emergency debate on a no-deal Brexit. After a very short speech, Bercow will either allow or disallow the debate. No one expects him to say no.

7.40pm?: MPs begin the debate on the SO24 motion. It can run for up to three hours, or until 10pm - whichever comes first.

10pm?: MPs vote on the motion.

Pro- and anti-Brexit campaigners have been congregating outside the Houses of Parliament ahead of this evening’s vote. Here are some pictures from the protests.

Anti-Brexit supporters sit in the road opposite the Houses of Parliament in London.
Anti-Brexit supporters sit in the road opposite the Houses of Parliament in London. Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP
Pro and anti-Brexit protesters.
Pro- and anti-Brexit protesters. Photograph: Amer Ghazzal/Rex/Shutterstock
A mix of remain and leave supporters wave flags waving flags outside the Houses of Parliament.
Remain and leave supporters wave flags outside the Houses of Parliament. Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP
Anti-Brexit protesters in Westminster.
Anti-Brexit protesters in Westminster. Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

Updated

This is from ITV’s Joe Pike.

Two Labour MPs, Jess Phillips and Alex Sobel, have formally joined the high court challenge being launched by Gina Miller in London on Thursday against the prime minister’s decision to prorogue parliament.

Lawyers for the pair have lodged a claim with the court alleging that closing down parliament is an abuse of power and breaches the MPs’ right to freedom of expression under article 10 of the European convention on human rights.

David Greene, senior partner at the law firm Edwin Coe who is representing them, said:

The issues are of supreme constitutional importance. It is vital that those issues are fully developed in court. Our clients, who are members of parliament, seek naturally a political resolution in parliament to the question of whether the UK should leave the EU without a deal but believe that their entitlement as MPs to take a full part in that debate and decision is being unlawfully curtailed. They join the action to ensure that the voice of backbench MPs is heard in the question of whether the foundation of the proroguing of parliament is lawful.

Philips said:

When the prime minister took the decision to prorogue parliament it was a sad day for our democracy. Not only does he seek to gag parliament from its clear opposition to ‘no deal’ but he is throwing out pending legislation including the domestic violence bill. The bill is dedicated to addressing the issues faced by victims of violent crime, and those who provide the services that respond.

And Sobel said:

It is absolutely clear that the proroguing of parliament is a device to shut down the opposition to ‘no deal’. The intent of the prime minister to rob parliament of its constitutional rights is unlawful. As a member of parliament, I have been elected by the electorate to represent them but Boris Johnson now wants to take away from the electorate their rights that are part and parcel of our democracy by shutting me out of the constitutional decision making process in parliament.

Updated

More on Boris Johnson’s meeting with the Tory rebels. (See 12.55pm.) This is from ITV’s Daniel Hewitt.

Opposition parties have agreed not to back early general election until Benn bill passes, Plaid Cymru says

Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader at Westminster, was one of the opposition leaders who met Jeremy Corbyn this morning to discuss tactics this week as they seek to rule out a no-deal Brexit. She has just told Sky News that she is confident that the opposition will be able to pass the Benn bill, designed to rule out a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, by the end of this week.

More significantly perhaps, she also implied the opposition parties have agreed not to vote for an early general election until the bill has become law. She said:

We have to be very alert to the fact the the prime minister could be using an early general election as a way of bringing through a no-deal Brexit and to do what he really wants, which is to remain in power. We must be very alert to not accepting a general election on the terms of the prime minister which suits the prime minister and the prime minister alone ...

We are very aware of the way that Boris Johnson will try to play the house. We are not going to be part of his game. And our priority is to stop no-deal Brexit. And the legislation is the way to do that.

When asked if Corbyn backed this approach, she replied: “We were in agreement.”

Johnson cannot call an early election without opposition support. Under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, the easiest way to get around the rule saying the next election should not take place until 2022 (five years after the last one) would be for two-thirds of MPs to vote for an early election. That could not happen if opposition MPs voted against, or abstained.

Alternatively, under the FTPA, the government could lose a vote of no confidence, and an election would take place if no alternative government won a confidence vote within 14 days. But Johnson would not want to tell his MPs to vote against him in a confidence motion because that could lead to someone else becoming prime minister.

Those are the only two mechanisms under the FTPA that would allow an early election. Alternatively, the government could pass a new bill to amend the FTPA to allow an early election. But, given the size of Johnson’s majority (one, including the DUP), this would probably only get through the Commons with opposition support.

Liz Saville Roberts
Liz Saville Roberts Photograph: Sky News

Updated

Boris Johnson fails to win over rebels in meeting at No 10

Boris Johnson held a meeting with some of the Tory rebels this morning. Those present included David Gauke, Philip Hammond, Greg Clark, Stephen Hammond, Nicholas Soames, Antoinette Sandbach, Margot James and Anne Milton, who left Downing Street without commenting to reporters.

Left to right: Stephen Hammond, Antoinette Sandbach, Richard Benyon, Margot James and Nicholas Soames leaving No 10 after their talks with Boris Johnson.
Left to right: Stephen Hammond, Antoinette Sandbach, Richard Benyon, Margot James and Nicholas Soames leaving No 10 after their talks with Boris Johnson. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images

But there has been subsequent briefing. Here are some lines that have emerged.

From my colleague Jessica Elgot

From the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg

From the Daily Mail’s Jason Groves

From the Times’ Francis Elliott

These are from my colleague Severin Carrell, who has been covering the legal challenge in Edinburgh to the government’s decision to prorogue parliament for five weeks from next week.

No 10 says bill to block no deal 'blueprint for legislative purgatory'

Downing Street has described the Benn bill as a “blueprint for legislative purgatory”. The PM’s spokesman said it would cost “vast amounts”, with roughly £1bn a month paid to the EU for an extension, and was “very clearly in Brussels’ interests not in the British interest”. He said:

The prime minister’s mood is determined. He wants to get on with delivering on the result of the referendum and the UK leaving the EU on 31 October, ideally with a deal.

We are opposed to the bill which is being brought forward because it is about crippling negotiations and chopping the legs out from under the UK position, and making any further negotiation impossible.

Updated

Chris White, a former Tory adviser in the office of the chief whip and in the office of the leader of Commons, is impressed by the way the SO24 motion has been drafted. (See 11.49am and 12.24pm.)

What the SO24 motion allowing MPs to debate Benn bill says

Here are some of the key points from the SO24 motion. (See 11.49am.)

  • The motion would allow the opposition and rebel MPs to take charge of the Commons order paper tomorrow. But it would not necessarily stop PMQs or the spending review announcement going ahead because, under the terms of the motion, the debate on the Benn bill designed to stop a no-deal Brexit on 31 October would not have to start until 3pm. Commons business starts at 11.30m, PMQs takes place at 12pm, and normally the spending review announcement would come at around 2pm. Normally it would last more than two hours. According to BuzzFeed’s Emily Ashton, rather than accept a shortened timetable for the statement, the government might just announce it on paper.
  • Under the plan the second reading debate on the Benn bill will would take place from 3pm until the second reading vote at 5pm. There would then be another two hours for amendments to be debated, with the third reading vote at 7pm.
  • The motion ensures that, if the bill completes its passage through the Lords, the Commons has to make time for any Lords amendments to be debated, so that the bill can complete its passage through parliament.
  • The motion says that, if the Commons and Lords both pass the bill, the Commons cannot be adjourned on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday next week until the Speaker has announced it has received royal assent.
  • And it says, if the bill clears the Commons but not the Lords before parliament gets prorogued, a new version of the bill must be brought forward for debate on the second day of the new session of parliament, with the same fast-track procedures applying.

Updated

Telegraph: Cummings thinks Brexit negotiations are "a sham"

Here are some important Brexit news lines from other publications and newspapers on Tuesday.

  • Dominic Cummings considers the government’s Brexit negotiations with the EU “a sham”, according to the Telegraph’s Europe editor, Peter Foster.

In private strategy meetings, Dominic Cummings, the feared Leave campaign strategist appointed as Mr Johnson’s special political adviser, was frank, openly describing the EU negotiations as “a sham”, according to two sources.

Both EU official and diplomatic sources say they are well aware they are being “played” by Downing Street, but are equally clear that the EU will always be careful not to be blamed for no deal.

  • Both Labour and the Conservatives are set to lose seats if a general election is called, resulting in a hung parliament, according to the Huffington Post’s Paul Waugh. Regression analysis on a new polling data found that the Tories would lose nearly all of their seats in Scotland to the SNP.

... of Conservative remainers who backed the party in 2017, 47% are now intending to vote for another party. A majority of these voters will now support the Liberal Democrats with the party set to gain seven seats from the Conservatives.

The Tory party would keep only 77% of its supporters from the last election, with 18% going to the Brexit party or Ukip. The survey suggests that Jeremy Corbyn could suffer even more, with the net loss of 20 seats.

Labour would lose 22% of its 2017 remain voters, many of them former Conservatives, to the Lib Dems and 25% of its 2017 leave voters to the Brexit party, it suggests.

The EU flags of anti-Brexit activists fly as pro-Brexit activists stand with their placards and demonstrate near the Houses of Parliament in central London on 3 September.
The EU flags of anti-Brexit activists fly as pro-Brexit activists stand with their placards and demonstrate near the Houses of Parliament in central London on 3 September. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images
  • The European Union is considering using funds usually reserved for natural disasters to help member states cope with the fallout from a no-deal Brexit, according to the Telegraph’s James Crisp.

Senior EU officials will discuss using cash in its Solidarity Fund to “furnish member states with financial assistance to cover heavy charges inflicted on them in the event the United Kingdom leaves without an accord”.

The fund was set up in 2002 to support EU national and regional governments that suffered “major disasters” after a devastating flood in central Europe. It has spent around £4.5bn on some 80 “catastrophic events”.

The work and pensions secretary, Amber Rudd, has urged the prime minister not to sack conservative MPs who vote against the government on Brexit in a conversation with the Spectator’s Katy Balls.

I’m really urging the government to think very carefully about taking such a dramatic step.

I have made my views clear to the prime minister that we should not be a party that is trying to remove from our party two former chancellors, a number of ex-cabinet ministers – that the way to hold our party together and to get a deal is to bring them onside.

Updated

No 10 says Boris Johnson would not change proposed election date

These are from Sky’s Sam Coates, from the Number 10 lobby briefing.

This is a response to the suggestion that Boris Johnson might agree to an election on 14 October, and then change the date after parliament has been dissolved so that the election takes place after a no-deal Brexit has happened on 31 October. Labour’s Shami Chakrabarti raised this in her Today interview this morning. (See 10.01am.)

Full text of SO24 motion published

Here is the full text (pdf) of the motion for the SO24 (standing order 24) debate that opposition and rebel Tory MPs hope to hold later today. This sets out the procedure that would allow them to take control of the Commons order paper to pass the Benn bill designed to rule out a no-deal Brexit on 31 October.

For the debate to go ahead, John Bercow, the Speaker, has to approve an application this afternoon. But no one is expecting him to say no.

Autumn election would be 'fantastic opportunity' for Scots to demand second independence referendum, says SNP

An autumn general election would be a “fantastic opportunity” for Scots to demand a second vote on independence, the SNP’s Westminster leader has said. Speaking on BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme, Ian Blackford said:

We’re faced with the issue that the people of Scotland are expressing in opinion polls that they want that referendum on independence.

If there is a general election, there is a fantastic opportunity for the people of Scotland to send a very clear message to Westminster that we should be able to determine our own future.

Ian Blackford
Ian Blackford Photograph: Isabel Infantes/AFP/Getty Images

Here is the former Tory minister Sam Gyimah on why he will vote against the government today.

In August 21 Conservatives, including Philip Hammond, signed a letter to Boris Johnson asking for assurances that he did not want to take the UK out of the EU without a deal. The list of signatories is a good guide as to how might rebel tonight.

BuzzFeed’s Alex Wickham has been keeping a tally of how many Tories will actually vote against the government tonight. He has got 14 confirmed rebels, and another eight potential rebels who either have not decided who they will vote or won’t say.

His 14 confirmed rebels are: David Gauke, Rory Stewart, Justine Greening, Dominic Grieve, Sir Oliver Letwin, Philip Hammond, Antoinette Sandbach, Alistair Burt, Richard Harrington, Guto Bebb, Caroline Nokes, Margot James, Sam Gyimah and Sir Nicholas Soames.

My colleague Francis Perraudin has mini-profiles of the rebels here.

Updated

Dominic Cummings, wearing his distinctive gilet and jeans combination, arrived early at Downing street on Tuesday at the start of a major day for the government.

Dominic Cummings, special advisor for Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson, walks on Downing Street, in London, Britain, September 3, 2019.
Dominic Cummings walks down Downing Street. Photograph: Hannah McKay/Reuters
Dominic Cummings, special advisor to PM, arrives at No.10 Downing Street, London. Politicians in Westminster, London.
Cummings arrives at No 10. Photograph: James Veysey/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

Another Tory MP to stand down at next election

Keith Simpson, the MP for Broadland in Norfolk, has joined Justine Greening in announcing he will step down at the next general election. Simpson said on Radio Norfolk that he made the decision months ago but now feels like “the first officer to man the lifeboats on the Titanic”.

Updated

Grieve: Corbyn decides if we have a general election

Dominic Grieve has told Sky News he thinks Boris Johnson will struggle to get two-thirds of MPs to vote for a general election, which he needs under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act. The former attorney general added that if the UK crashes out of the EU after 31 October, the government will spend the following weeks desperately trying to reach an agreement with the bloc.

On a general election:

I think that it [calling an election] is entirely dependent on Jeremy Corbyn. If he [Boris Johnson] wants to have a general election, he’s got to get a two-thirds majority of the house to trigger it and really, that’s entirely in Jeremy Corbyn’s gift.

I personally have serious doubts that a general election is going to solve the issue. I think the risk is that we’re going to end up with another hung parliament and no clarity of direction at all. I would prefer this matter to be resolved in a referendum.

On the days following a no-deal Brexit:

[If we crash out of the bloc] it’s not going to be over, is it? The moment we leave the EU, every single sinew of the UK government machine will be dedicated to trying to do a deal, a trade deal with the EU from the outside. It is going to take up every week, month, day of our working lives for the next five to 10 years, and we’re going to be negotiating from a position of maximum weakness and disadvantage.

Dominic Grieve speaking in the Commons during a debate on the withdrawal agreement earlier this year.
Dominic Grieve speaking in the Commons during a debate on the withdrawal agreement earlier this year. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

Updated

Labour suggests up to three conditions needed for it to back early election

Here is more detail on what Shami Chakrabarti, the shadow attorney general, told the Today programme earlier about Labour’s stance on when it would and would not back an early general election. There has been some confusion over this because at one point yesterday Jeremy Corbyn said the party would back one under any circumstances. Then, later in the day, first the shadow Brexit minister Jenny Chapman (here), and then the shadow Northern Ireland secretary, Tony Lloyd (here), said support for an early general election was conditional.

Labour’s stance is crucial because, although No 10 is saying Boris Johnson will go for an election on 14 October if he loses the vote tonight, under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act an early election cannot happen without Labour’s support.

Chakrabarti tried to clear things up on the Today programme this morning. Some shadow ministers “freelance” when they give media interviews (ie, they push their own views as much as the official party line), but Chakrabarti had good relations with Corbyn’s office and is a reliable guide to the official line. This is what she said about when Labour would support an early election.

So to clear it up, it’s about sequencing ...

What we need to ensure is that we get this legislation locked down. And that’s quite hard, because remember, we’ve got ministers who say that they’ll ignore legislation. So that’s another thing to consider. We’ve got to get a locked-in guarantee that Britain would not crash out of the EU in an election campaign period.

We’ve also got to try as best as possible to ensure that it wouldn’t be possible for the sitting, squatting, prime minister in this period to set the general election and then change the date.

Chakrabarti said Corbyn would be meeting other opposition leaders in parliament this morning to discuss the matter further. When pressed on whether she was saying the election would have to take place after 31 October for Labour to support it (which was what Lloyd implied last night), she replied:

We certainly need to make sure that Boris Johnson can’t go in for the kind of shenanigans he’s been going in for with his chums last week, where the date is perhaps moved so that you could crash out [of the EU] by default during this period of a campaign.

Chakrabarti said Labour’s priority was preventing a no-deal Brexit, But beyond that the party wanted an election because “we live and breathe for a general”.

What does this all mean? Chakrabarti seems to be setting out up to three conditions.

1) The Benn bill, designed to prevent a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, would have to pass. That is what getting the legislation “locked down” implies. But there is no chance of that bill becoming law before Wednesday, when Johnson wants to hold a vote on an early election if he loses tonight.

2) Ministers would have to promise to obey the bill. As Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, revealed in an interview on Sunday, at the moment they are not giving those assurances. And in in his statement outside No 10 yesterday, Johnson said he would never ask the EU to delay Brexit – implying he would not be bound by the law if it passed and if, under its terms, it became obligatory to seek an article 50 extension.

3) Ministers would have to give an assurance that the date of the election would not change after MPs voted for one. Lloyd implied last night that it would be best for Labour to wait until an article 50 extension had been secured, and 31 October had passed without a no-deal Brexit, before agreeing to an election. An alternative option might be to hold an election before 31 October, knowing that if Labour won, Corbyn could then request an article 50 extension (or, in extremis, revoke article 50 – although he has never said he would do that). But yesterday there were suggestions that Johnson could agree to an election on 14 October, and then change the date once parliament was dissolved to ensure it happened after a no-deal Brexit on 31 October.

Shami Chakrabarti and Jeremy Corbyn
Shami Chakrabarti and Jeremy Corbyn. Photograph: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Updated

Lawyers for a group of 75 opposition MPs and peers will appear in court in Edinburgh this morning to urge a judge to prevent Boris Johnson from suspending parliament, bolstered by the support of Scotland’s most senior legal figure, the lord advocate, James Wolffe QC.

The case, being brought by a group of MPs led by Joanna Cherry QC and Jolyon Maugham QC, of the Good Law Project, is the first to be heard in full of three live legal actions against the prime minister, with the others in Belfast and London.

The case in Edinburgh has further significance after Aidan O’Neill QC, the lawyer acting for the MPs and peers, told the court last week he wanted Johnson to provide a sworn affidavit explaining why prorogation was necessary and legally sound. That surprise request has yet to be fully debated and tested in court.

Wolffe will formally seek permission to take part in the Edinburgh challenge this morning but even with his backing the legal team suspect the judge, Lord Doherty, will back the UK government at this stage, leading to an immediate appeal which is expected to be heard later this week.

The government lawyers insist the prime minister was acting lawfully by asking the Queen to prorogue parliament, since it is a routine procedure backed by statute; the Queen was using her royal prerogative powers as set out by the UK’s constitution.

Updated

Liam Fox backs withdrawing whip from rebel MPs

The former international trade secretary Liam Fox has been speaking to the BBC for the first time since he lost his cabinet position.

Q: What do you think of the vote to seize control of the order paper tomorrow to stop no deal?

Fox says he regards the vote as a constitutional matter and supports the government withdrawing the whip from conservative MPs who rebel on Brexit because it’s an existential issue for the government.

“It’s equivalent to voting against the government in a confidence vote,” he said.

“We want there to be a deal. No one is trying to remove the whip from colleagues. It would be their own behaviour in the House of Commons that would make that a reality. It’s their choice.”

Q: Do you think Johnson is handling negotiations better than May because of the no-deal threat?

Fox does not answer the question but insists the European Union believes the prime minister would take the UK out of the block with or without a deal, adding that he had assurances from the prime minister that negotiations were ongoing.

Liam Fox leaves Downing Street after a cabinet meeting on Monday.
Liam Fox leaves Downing Street after a cabinet meeting on Monday. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images

Now, the SNP’s Europe spokesman, Stephen Gethins.

Q: What is your attitude towards a general election?

“We’re really keen to see a general election and see the back of this dangerous and damaging Tory government,” he says, but cautions that getting no-deal Brexit off the table is the priority. Gethins says he does not trust the prime minister and wants to focus on stopping the UK crashing out the EU.

Updated

Nigel Farage, the Brexit party leader, is on the Today programme now.

He says if Boris Johnson were to promise a “clean break” in a general election, the Brexit party would support him.

But that is not what Johnson is planning. Johnson wants to “reheat” Theresa May’s deal, he says.

He says there is “no aspect” of the treaty negotiated by May that is acceptable.

(Johnson’s view is that, without the backstop, the rest of the deal would be acceptable.)

Q: If a no-deal Brexit does lead to problems like a shortage of medicine, will you own those problems?

Farage dismisses these ideas as scares. He says the people making these claims are the same people who said that leaving the exchange rate mechanism would be a disaster, or not joining the euro would be a disaster.

He says, unlike others in this debate, he has worked in trade. He accepts that there would be problems in the short-term in the event of a no-deal Brexit, but he says these problems could be overcome.

Nigel Farge speaking at a Brexit party rally in Colchester last night.
Nigel Farge speaking at a Brexit party rally in Colchester last night. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

The shadow attorney general, Shami Chakrabarti, has been on the Today programme denying that there is division in the party over whether to back an election (see 6.28am).

She said Labour would “need to get the sequencing right” before backing an election, and would first need “a locked-in guarantee that Britain would not crash out of the EU during a campaign period”.

Chakrabarti said if they could “lock things down to ensure we don’t crash out” then, of course, they would want a general election. “We are geared up for a general election and we want it as soon as possible.”

Updated

Q: What do you think of the treatment of Sonia Khan, your former special adviser who was sacked by Dominic Cummings from her job as Sajid Javid’s special adviser.

Hammond says her treatment was “shocking”. He says Khan was very professional, even though she is a Brexiter, and did not agree with him on Brexit. He says she thinks Khan would have a good case if she went to an employment tribunal.

And that’s it. The interview is over.

You can watch the highlights here:

Updated

Hammond says Johnson wrong to claim progress being made in Brexit talks

Q: Dominic Raab says the Benn bill will undermine the negotiations.

Hammond says it will certainly delay it.

But he says the government is being “disingenuous”.

Look, the government is being, frankly, disingenuous. It says on the one hand it wants to do a deal and on the other hand the backstop must be totally removed from the withdrawal agreement and we must leave on 31 October.

Hammond says says “there is no progress”. Boris Johnson was given 30 days by Angela Merkel to come up with a solution to the backstop. Twelve days later nothing has happened.

Q: Johnson says it is the fault of the rebels.

Hammond says Johnson is talking “nonsense”.

He says “no progress is being made” because “the UK government has tabled no proposals”.

There is no progress. There are no substantive negotiations going on.

No progress is being made because the UK government has tabled no proposals. I suspect the reason is that the UK government itself has concluded, as leaks have suggested, that there are no alternative arrangements that would be implementable on October 31 that would meet the EU’s red lines and therefore anything the UK government does propose is likely to be rejected as unacceptable.

He says there are no alternative arrangements for the backstop that would meet the UK’s red lines.

He says he wants to see the UK’s proposals published. He wants to see them submitted to the EU, and he wants to see the EU’s response.

He says there is not even a UK negotiating team.

Updated

Hammond says the threat to deselect rebel Tories is “rank hypocrisy” given there are eight cabinet ministers who have defied the whip in previous votes.

Hammond says he was re-adopted as a Tory candidate by his association last night. He says he does not think No 10 has the power to deselect him. There would be the fight of his life if they tried.

Asked if he would challenge such a decision in the courts, he says:

Possibly. A lot of my colleagues have come under immense pressure. Some have responded to that by saying, Enough, I’m going. That is not going to be my approach. This is my party. I have been a member of this party for 45 years.

He has been a Tory for 45 years. He says he will defend his party from incomers and entryists who are trying to turn it into a narrow sect. Some are not even Conservative party members.

I am going to defend my party against incomers, entryists, who are trying to turn it from a broad church to narrow faction.

People who are at the heart of this government, who are probably not even members of the Conservative Party, who care nothing about the future of the Conservative Party, I intend to defend my party against them.

Q: Are you talking about Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s de facto chief of staff?

Hammond says he understands that Cummings has never been a Tory member. That has not been denied.

Updated

Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, taking over from Frances Perraudin.

Philip Hammond, the former chancellor and one of the most prominent rebel Tories backing the Benn bill designed to rule out a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, is being interviewed on the Today programme now.

Justin Webb is interviewing him.

Q: What are you going to do?

Hammond says he will support the bill. It is “a very modest bill in its ambitions”, he says. It seeks to extend by three months the period before the UK leaves the EU. If the government cannot renegotiate a Brexit deal, it will give the government more time.

Q: Do you have the numbers?

“I think so,” says Hammond. He says many colleagues have been “incensed” by No 10’s tactics.

Q: So you expect around 20 Tories to vote with you?

Hammond says they think they will have enough.

  • Hammond says Tory rebels have enough support to win vote on Benn bill.

Updated

Philip Hammond reselected by local association

The former chancellor Philip Hammond is the next big Brexit name on the media rounds this morning. Last night, Runnymede and Weybridge Conservatives announced his reselection despite reported threats from No 10 that he would not be allowed to stand as a Tory candidate at a snap election if he voted against the government on Brexit this week. Would Conservative party HQ really overrule a local association?

Philip Hammond reselected by local association.

Updated

Some reaction to Raab’s comments this morning and his refusal to confirm election plans that have been briefed to journalists by his own government.

Dominic Raab: rebel bill is "deeply irresponsible"

The foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, has been speaking to broadcasters this morning. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the bill put forward by opposition and rebel Tory MPs was deeply irresponsible.

The one handbrake on getting the country moving is this lingering doubt in Brussels that Brexit could be cancelled or delayed which is why this legislation is deeply irresponsible and I think no MP that wants to deliver on Brexit and wants to get a deal should vote for it.

He said the government didn’t want an election and that a deal with the European Union was in sight. Raab said if an election were to be called it would have been forced on the country by parliament.

The prime minister is clear we don’t want an election. I don’t think the country wants an election. We cannot countenance any further delay because it stops the country from moving forward, so the real question is – whether it’s with the shenanigans in parliament and a deeply irresponsible and counter productive bill – whether we get an election forced on the country by parliament.

He was asked about briefings that a possible date for an election would be 14 October.

What we are absolutely saying right now is that we don’t want an election.

Updated

Barwell: government’s Brexit negotiations “a sham”

Gavin Barwell, Theresa May’s former chief of staff, is up and tweeting. It doesn’t make good reading for No 10. The former MP for Croydon Central has backed up reports in the Telegraph that the government’s Brexit negotiations with the EU are “a sham” and urged the prime minister to publish his Irish backstop plans.

Gavin Barwell.
Gavin Barwell. Photograph: Mark Thomas/REX/Shutterstock

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Register to vote

If you’ve got a spare five minutes this morning before the parliamentary action gets going, please remember to register to vote if you haven’t done already. Here’s the link. You might need your national insurance number handy, according to the website.

The BBC’s Samira Ahmed has a useful reminder for students about to head off to university or people with especially busy Mondays: register for a proxy vote. Again, here’s the link.

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It’s Frances Perraudin here, taking over the live blog for a few hours.

Here’s a bit more on the Justine Greening announcement. She told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that she would remain a Tory member but that the decision to stand down as an MP had been on her mind for some time. “This is not an overnight decision,” she said.

She said “communities elect people to represent them” and that she had no doubt the next MP for Putney would be pro-remain, as that was the position of the majority of her constituents.

It’s very clear to me that my concerns about the Conservative party becoming the Brexit party, in effect, have come to pass, so my decision is that if I really want to make a difference on opportunity and social mobility, I need to do that outside parliament.

She said she didn’t think the Conservative party would “offer people a sensible choice at the next election”.

Greening said:

Boris Johnson is going to offer people a general election that faces them with a choice between no deal or Jeremy Corbyn. That is a lose-lose general election for Britain and I think a far better way of resolving a path forward on Brexit is to give people a direct choice on the different options on Brexit themselves, rather than a messy general election, which I believe, yet again, will be inconclusive on a route forward on Brexit ...

I’m staggered that all these months and years, Jeremy Corbyn has been calling for a general election and it seems that my government is about to hand him that prize on a plate.

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Justine Greening to stand down at next election

Justine Greening, the MP for Putney, has just announced on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme she will not stand in the next election. She blamed “concerns about the Conservative party becoming the Brexit party” and says she can do more for social mobility outside parliament.

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Some of today’s front pages

William Hague says election is the only way to solve Brexit crisis

Former foreign secretary William Hague speaking at Chatham House in London about the EU referendum.
Former foreign secretary William Hague speaking at Chatham House in London about the EU referendum. Photograph: Dan Kitwood/PA

Press Assocation has this report:

The former Conservative party leader William Hague has called for Britain to go to the polls, saying the only way to solve the Brexit crisis is by electing a new parliament.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, Hague said the current parliament had shown itself to be unworkable, regardless of any strategies employed by Mr Johnson. He said:

We have a parliament that cannot go backwards, forwards, or agree to sit still.

It is unable to agree on the best or prepare for the worst. While we should not blame all the individuals in it, many of whom have striven to avoid this paralysis, the collective effect of this Rubik’s Cube of a House of Commons is that it cannot properly serve the country in any scenario that we can now construct.

It is the most seriously defunct parliament of modern times. There is only one solution to that. It is the one adopted in each of our serious constitutional crises of recent centuries.

In 1910, when the Lords refused to bow to the elected government; in 1831, as the arguments raged over the great reform bill; in 1784, as the Commons rebelled against the king’s choice of ministers, the argument was settled by the electorate being asked to choose a new parliament.

The right course for Boris Johnson is not to prorogue parliament but to seek to dissolve it.


Hague said he liked many things about the Johnson administration but “a long suspension of parliament as a political tactic is not … something that I can defend”.

If it is so divided and incapable, and so irreconcilable with the government – all of which it is – this parliament needs to be replaced with a new one.

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Shadow cabinet minister says Labour wants general election after Benn bill passed

There appears to be some division in the Labour ranks on the question of whether they would welcome a general election.

Speaking at a rally in Salford last night, Jeremy Corbyn said Labour was ready to “take the fight to the Tories”. He said:

I am proud to lead our party, I’m proud to take the fight to the Tories and I will be delighted when the election comes. I’m ready for it, you’re ready for it, we’re ready for it, we’ll take the message out there and above all we will win for the people of this country.

However, Labour’s shadow Northern Ireland secretary Tony Lloyd later appeared to contradict his leader, saying Labour would first push to have legislation passed blocking a no-deal Brexit, the so-called Benn bill.

“We will in fact work through the parliamentary process to make sure that this law is passed,” Lloyd told BBC Two’s Newsnight.

Obviously once we’ve guaranteed that we pass October the 31st and don’t have a no-deal Brexit, of course we want an election.

He also said Labour would not fall for a trap set by Boris Johnson.

We are not daft enough to see a tactic dictated by Prime Minister Johnson which is designed to land us with a no-deal Brexit and to fall for that.

Will we fall for Boris Johnson’s trick, no we won’t. Boris Johnson is a man who has got form for reneging on his promises.

Labour MP for Kingston upon Hull North, Diana Johnson, tweeted this morning that she “will not be supporting any attempt by the PM to force a General Election at this time of national crisis.”

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Need more of your senses engaged with Brexit news? The Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland has joined Anushka Asthana on our daily podcast Today in Focus to discuss a pivotal week ahead in British politics.

Good morning and welcome to politics live on what is shaping up to be a day of high political drama.

A coalition of cross-party MPs are expected to put forward legislation today that would force Boris Johnson to request a delay to Brexit.

The bill, which the MPs hope to push through parliament at high speed if they seize control of the Commons timetable, would require Johnson to extend departure until 31 January, unless MPs backed a deal or approved no deal.

However, Johnson issued an ultimatum to rebel MPs saying that if they were to push ahead with the bill, he would call a snap general election next month – something Jerebyn Corbyn says he is delighted about.

Johnson made the announcement in a televised address outside No 10 that was punctuated by protesters crying out “stop the coup”. He said there were “no circumstances” under which departure from the EU would not happen on 31 October.

Johnson said the backbench bill, signed by the former chancellor Philip Hammond, the ex-justice secretary David Gauke and others, would “chop the legs out” from the UK’s Brexit negotiations.

Today could be a very significant day, as the success or failure of the vote on the bill slated to be brought before parliament will have a huge impact on the shape of the weeks to come.

I’m Kate Lyons and will be at the helm of the blog for the first little while, before handing over to my colleagues. I do a lot of live-blogging and this is hands down the most lively, interactive group of readers I get the occasional privilege of blogging to, which makes things much more fun, so please get in touch – via the comments, on Twitter or via email (kate.lyons@theguardian.com) with your thoughts, questions, jokes etc.

Deep breath in, let’s go!

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