Boris Johnson faces fury in Parliament after Brexit showdown

The leaders of UK opposition parties met on Thursday to discuss a plan to stop Prime Minister Boris Johnson from taking the country out of the European Union without a deal. They will meet again on Monday.

They’ve agreed their priority was to stop a no-deal and said that any proposal to hold an election without a locked-in block of a no-deal would not get through parliament.

Labour said it wants to hold an election as soon as no-deal is blocked.

The group, which included among others Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson, SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford, Anna Soubry from the Independent Group for Change, Caroline Lucas from the Green Party and Liz Saville Roberts from Plaid Cymru.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has finally addressed the outpouring of criticism following the heated debate in Parliament on Wednesday.

Speaking to the BBC, Johnson said:

However, the PM doubled down on his use of the phrase “surrender act” to describe the law that Parliament passed to prevent the UK from crashing out of the European Union without a deal. The law requires the PM to ask for an extension to Brexit if he cannot get a new deal with the European Union.

Jess Phillips

Labour MP Jess Phillips – who hours ago asked an urgent question about political rhetoric and the safety of MPs – says a man has been arrested after calling her a “fascist” and trying to “kick the door” of her constituency office.

“I’ve only just heard about it myself but my staff had to be locked into my office while the man tried to smash the windows and kick the door,” Phillips told London radio station LBC.

“I don’t know what I can say because the man has been arrested,” she added.

Phillips has spoken frequently about abuse she has suffered as an MP. Earlier Thursday, she criticized Boris Johnson in the House of Commons after the Prime Minister dismissed concerns about lawmakers’ safety.

“We all get abuse, and I’ve had a death threat this week that literally quoted the Prime Minister and used the Prime Minister’s name and words in a death threat that was delivered to my staff,” she told Parliament.

Boris Johnson’s spokesman said the Prime Minister was “disappointed” that MPs voted against allowing the Conservative Party a recess for their conference next week.

“For many years it has been the case that Parliament has been in recess so that parties can hold their party conference,” the spokesman said, according to the PA.

The vote was the seventh consecutive defeat for Johnson in Parliament, out of seven.

“As the Prime Minister has made clear, the Conservative Party conference will go ahead as planned,” the spokesman added.

The government’s request for a recess during the Conservative Party conference has been rejected by MPs.

Lawmakers voted down the motion by 306 votes to 289, in what can clearly be read as a message to Boris Johnson after his efforts to prorogue Parliament.

MPs are voting now on a motion for a conference recess, which would enable Conservative lawmakers to attend their annual event in Manchester next week.

Normally, that request would be entirely routine – but given that Boris Johnson has no majority and has infuriated lawmakers by unlawfully trying to proroguing Parliament for five weeks, it could be awkward this time.

One former Tory MP, Nick Boles – who quit the bloc over its Brexit strategy earlier this year – has said he’s switched from abstaining to voting against the request.

Boles explained he wants Johnson to face Prime Minister’s Questions next week after his “behavior” yesterday.

It remains to be seen how many on the opposing benches will join him, but if only a chunk of MPs abstain, the motion should pass.

Boris Johnson’s sister, Rachel Johnson, has condemned the Prime Minister’s language in the House of Commons.

“My brother is using words like ‘surrender’ and ‘capitulation’ as if the people standing in the way of the blessed will of the people, as defined by the 17.4 million votes in 2016, should be hung, drawn, quartered, tarred, and feathered,” Johnson told Sky News. “I think that is highly reprehensible.”

“It was a very tasteless way of referring to the memory of a murdered MP, who was murdered by someone who said ‘Britain first,’ obviously of the far-right tendency, which is being whipped up by this sort of language.”

Rachel Johnson has been a critic of Brexit, and stood as a candidate for the pro-EU rebel bloc The Independent Group for Change at this year’s European elections.

Johnson and Trump at the UNGA on Tuesday.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s language signals “worrying echoes” of “Trumpian” rhetoric in British politics, the leader of the Liberal Democrats said during the debate on politicians’ language.

“The language that leaders use matters, because it sets the tone for public debate,” Jo Swinson said.

“And so I ask the minister whether he can give any assurance that there will be no deliberate campaign to use that kind of language to inflame, but I fear he cannot – because the repeated use of those inflammatory words by the Prime Minister yesterday was, it seemed, very obviously deliberate.”

Kevin Foster responded: “I think we all want to see an environment where everybody feels they can take part.”

“While I’ve never voted for him, seeing a group of people chanting ‘Tony Blair can f-off and die’ is something we would all condemn,” he added, on the issue of rallies of Trump supporters chanting about political opponents.

Boris Johnson should apologize to lawmakers for his language yesterday, opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has said.

“It’s extremely disappointing that the Prime Minister has not respected this House by attending here today,” Corbyn said, noting Johnson’s absence from the discussion about his rhetoric. “The Prime Minster’s language and demeanor yesterday was frankly nothing short of disgraceful.”

“Three years ago, our colleague, our member Jo Cox was murdered by a far-right activist shouting, ‘Britain first! This is for Britain,’” Corbyn added.

“The language that politicians use matters, and has real consequences.”

Corbyn said that he has written to all Labour MPs expressing his solidarity and setting out the conduct “expected of all colleagues.”

“No side of this House has a monopoly of virtue. Inappropriate language has been used by all sides,” Corbyn noted. “But we all have a duty to keep our debates political.”

“Not only should the Prime Minister comply with the law, he should come to this House and apologize for his conduct yesterday, which fell well below the standards expected by the people of this country,” Corbyn said, to cheers from his benches.

Labour MP Jess Phillips is lambasting Boris Johnson for carrying out a “strategy to divide,” and demanding he apologize for using the murder of Jo Cox as part of his Brexit pitch in Parliament.

“We all get abuse, and I’ve had a death threat this week that literally quoted the Prime Minister and used the Prime Minister’s name and words in a death threat that was delivered to my staff,” she told the House of Commons.

“What I want answers to today, is when there is a clear strategy to divide. The use of language yesterday and over the past few weeks … it has clearly been tested and work-shopped and worked up and it is entirely designed to inflame hatred and division.”

“I get it, it works. It is working,” Phillips said. “We’re all ambitious, I’m not going to pretend I’m not ambitious, but I also have a soul.”

Phillips is asking an urgent question to Boris Johnson on his use of language, but Johnson hasn’t shown up to answer it. Instead, he’s being represented by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Wales, Kevin Foster.

“It is not sincere, it is totally planned, it is completely utterly a part of a strategy designed by somebody to harm and cause hatred in our country,” she went on.

“The people opposite me know how appalling it was to describe the murder of my friend as mere humbug.”

Last night, things got very ugly in the House of Commons. 

On their first day back at work after, a bitter row broke out in Westminster about the former Labour MP, Jo Cox, who was murdered in an act of political violence in 2016. 

Paula Sherriff, one of Cox’s Labour colleagues, said to the Prime Minister that many MPs are subject to “death threats and abuse every single day,” and that those threats often come with the parroted words of the Prime Minister.

Johnson replied by saying that the assertion was “humbug”. He responded to another Labour MP by saying: “The best way to honor the memory of Jo Cox, and indeed to bring this country together, would be, I think, to get Brexit done.”

In Westminster, politics is far too often seen as a clever game where opponents set traps for one another. These traps usually have a single aim: To make the other less popular with the public.

In the context of Brexit, this has got nasty and personal. The two main parties and their leaders embody the polar opposites of each other’s values. And this has bred genuine animosity.

British politics has never been more divided and it’s easy to see the temptation of leaning into this sincere disdain when campaigning against a rival.

Many politicians claim their motivation for working in politics is to change the lives of ordinary people. But it does at times seem forgotten that what is said in Westminster is heard out in the real world.  

Earlier this year, Lyra McKee, a journalist in Northern Ireland, was murdered by a terrorist group called the New IRA while covering a sectarian clash. While no one is claiming that Brexit was the cause of this murder, it’s hard to argue that the instability of Brexit didn’t create the perfect conditions for this conflict to take place.

Since the Brexit referendum, a number of MPs have received near-constant streams of abuse on social media for their stances on Brexit. This abuse has ranged from harassment to outright threats of rape and murder. These threats often mirror the language heard in the House of Commons.

The abuse crosses the political spectrum. Earlier this year, in a bizarre new trend, right-wing politicians had milkshakes thrown over them and videos of the attacks were posted to social media. This might seem light-hearted fun, but being on the receiving end of it is doubtless terrifying. And in such a toxic atmosphere, it’s easy to see how quickly these things could escalate.

It shouldn’t be a controversial opinion, but it’s worth saying: If the friend of someone who was murdered in an overtly political attack tells you that they fear your language is creating an atmosphere that could lead to a similar attack, you should probably just listen. Even if you disagree. Especially if you are the Prime Minister. 

Here’s the moment the Speaker of the House, John Bercow, told MPs that the atmosphere in the Commons had grown “toxic,” and pleaded for more reasoned debate.

Heated scenes in the House of Commons dominated most front pages in the UK on Thursday.

The left-leaning Daily Mirror described Boris Johnson as the “man with no shame,” for his comments about Jo Cox’s murder and the safety of MPs.

The Times reflected on the atmosphere in Parliament, which it described as hitting a “boiling point” – while the Telegraph led on Johnson’s comments that the chamber must face its “day of reckoning.”

The pro-Brexit Daily Express tabloid led on the same statement.

The Guardian, meanwhile, focused on lawmakers’ outrage over Johnson’s remarks.

Several lawmakers have tweeted about the legacy of murdered Labour MP Jo Cox, and their desire for a calmer political atmosphere, in the aftermath of Boris Johnson’s comments that the best way to honor her is to “get Brexit done.”

Labour’s deputy leader Tom Watson said Cox, a rising star in the party before she was killed in a brutal attack in 2016, was a “potential Prime Minister.”

The opposition party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said the comments show Johnson is “unfit to be Prime Minister.” Corbyn added in another tweet that Johnson is “whipping up division with language that’s indistinguishable from the far right.”

Nick Boles, a former Conservative who left the party over its Brexit strategy, said he “must do better” with his own words of criticism for the government.

James Duddridge, a junior Brexit minister, is representing the government in the Commons – where lawmakers are repeatedly asking whether Boris Johnson will comply with the law that requires him to ask for a Brexit extension if he can’t secure a deal.

Duddridge has said on numerous occasions that the government will “obey the law at every stage and turn of this process.”

But he has also skirted around the question, refusing to lay out under what circumstances the government will ask for an extension, suggesting that the interpretation of the law could change, and saying the government will take “confidential” legal advice on the issue.

Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary, Keir Starmer, noted that previous iterations of the law under Theresa May’s tenure did not include such specific instructions – such as the requirement to accept an EU’s extension offer – because lawmakers felt she “could be trusted.”

“They are in the Act now because, I’m afraid to say, this is a low point in our history, across this House those assumptions no longer hold. And the answers given last night by the Prime Minister and his behavior make it less likely,” he added.

Even in 2019, with few political norms yet to be stripped away, certain scenes still have the ability to shock.

That was the case on Wednesday evening in the Commons, when a confrontational Boris Johnson provoked fury with his cavalier approach to concern over threats to MPs – and then, more extraordinarily still, when he suggested that achieving his Brexit strategy would be the best way to honor Jo Cox, who was murdered days before the 2016 referendum.

Here are the exchanges:

This is the question put to Johnson by Paula Sherriff, a Labour lawmaker, who referred to Cox’s killing and the death threats still received by MPs: “We stand here, Mr Speaker, under the shield of our departed friend. Many of us in this place are subject to death threats and abuse every single day. Let me tell the Prime Minister that they often quote his words—surrender Act, betrayal, traitor—and I, for one, am sick of it. We must moderate our language, and that has to come from the Prime Minister first, so I should be interested in hearing his opinion. He should be absolutely ashamed of himself.”

Johnson replied: “I have to say that I have never heard such humbug in all my life.”

He separately said to Tracy Brabin, the lawmaker elected in Jo Cox’s seat after her murder: “What I will say is that the best way to honour the memory of Jo Cox, and indeed to bring this country together, would be, I think, to get Brexit done. I absolutely do.”

Brabin had also asked Johnson to tone down his rhetoric on Brexit. She asked Johnson “as a human being that, going forward, will he please, please moderate his language so that we will all feel secure when we are going about our jobs?”

Some context: Labour MP Jo Cox, 41, was stabbed and shot by right wing extremist Thomas Mair outside her office in Northern England in June 2016, in an attack that shocked Britain.

The frenzied street attack happened days before Britain voted on whether to remain in the European Union. Cox was a prominent supporter of the “Remain” campaign.

Mair, a Nazi sympathizer, was sentenced to a whole life term in November 2016.

Speaker John Bercow has opened a fractious session of Parliament by calling yesterday’s scenes “toxic” and pleading for calmer scenes in the Commons today.

“I think there is a widespread sense across the House and beyond that yesterday, the House did itself no credit,” he says.

“There was an atmosphere in the chamber worse than any I’ve known in my 22 years in the House. On both sides, passions were inflamed, angry words were uttered. The culture was toxic,” he said.

“This country faces the most challenging political issue that we have grappled with in decades,” he added.

“Members must be free to express themselves about it … it ought however to be possible to disagree agreeably.”

“Yesterday that was not the majority strain, I’m sorry to say,” he went on, urging MPs to debate “as opponents, not as enemies.”

He added that there would be an urgent question later today about the political culture and language in the Commons.

The Commons will kick off with plenty of Brexit-related intrigue in just a few moments, when the first urgent question is put forward.

It asks Boris Johnson on “complying with the law” in relation to the legislation passed earlier this month that forced him to ask for a Brexit extension if he can’t strike a deal with the EU.

Then, later in the day, there’ll be a vote on whether to allow a recess for the Conservative Party’s conference. Normally that would be routine – but lawmakers furious about Johnson shutting down Parliament could use it to serve him a dollop of revenge.

And a general debate later in the afternoon also seems likely to provide some fireworks – it will focus on the “principles of democracy and the rights of the electorate.”

The British Parliament has been back in business for less than a day and already the Brexit debate has reached a new and dizzying level of bizarreness.

On Wednesday evening amid ugly scenes in the House of Commons, a combative Boris Johnson took the extraordinary step of daring Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the official opposition, to call a vote of no confidence in the government he leads.

“This Parliament must either stand aside and let this government get Brexit done, or bring a vote of confidence and finally face the day of reckoning with the voters,” he said.

Corbyn declined Johnson’s kind offer. “I thank the Prime Minister for an advance copy of his statement,” he told lawmakers. “Unfortunately, it was like his illegal shutting down of Parliament – null, of no effect, and should be quashed, in the words of the Supreme Court.”

To people looking on from the UK and around the world, it all must have looked completely topsy-turvy. Johnson says he wants an election, but can’t make it happen. The opposition claims it wants an election, but won’t make it happen. British politics is in a deeply weird place. The government and the opposition each hold the keys to giving the other what they want, but neither wants to be the one to release the lock.

Read more of Luke McGee’s analysis here.

Good morning from London.

Britain’s unending, all-consuming Brexit saga took an even nastier turn last night, as Boris Johnson returned to face a Parliament he had tried to suspend for five weeks.

The Prime Minister lambasted opposition lawmakers and attacked the ruling in the Supreme Court that found he had broken the law by shutting down the chamber. He, in turn, was harangued for his Brexit strategy and his language in the Commons, as the so-called mother of parliaments descended into fury.

And things could more heated on Thursday.

Lawmakers will likely be asked to approve a recess for the Conservative Party’s conference.

There could also be moves from opposition MPs to shore up legislation taking a no-deal Brexit off the table.

And fallout will continue after an extraordinary night in Parliament.