United Kingdom

    Conservative MPs are orchestrating against a potential leadership campaign by Boris Johnson, with several talking of resigning the whip if he were to become party leader. With Tories convinced that Theresa May’s days in No 10 are numbered, MPs are feverishly discussing who will seek to replace her, how organised the teams are and whether a general election would be necessary. Johnson is the current favourite of Brexit-backing Tory activists, who will pick the leader out of a final two candidates. However, the former London mayor would first have to clear the hurdle of convincing Conservative MPs to put him on the final list of two. One minister said she would leave the party if Johnson and his supporters, such as Jacob Rees-Mogg, took over the Conservatives. Anoth...

    Theresa May will defy John Bercow and find a way through to stage a third vote on her twice-defeated Brexit deal next week, a Cabinet minister has insisted. Stephen Barclay, the Brexit secretary, revealed the prime minister would attempt to get around the Speaker’s shock ruling that identical votes cannot be restaged after defeats by arguing she had secured changes. One option was to insist the EU agreeing an extension to Article 50 to delay Brexit day constituted a different motion, or to agree changes that satisfied the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). However, he ducked whether MPs would still retain a veto over an Article 50 extension, even if agreed by the prime minister with the EU on Thursday. International agreements are reached at council level, but obvio...

    Theresa May has urged MPs to vote as democrats and patriots as part of a desperate effort to get her twice-rejected Brexit deal approved by parliament. It comes as ministers continue efforts to win the backing of the DUP, and more Tory Brexiteers indicate they may be prepared to reluctantly vote for Mrs May's deal next week. Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, the prime minister called on politicians to look beyond the categories of Leave and Remain and resolve this question now. Having suffered another substantial parliamentary loss in the second meaningful vote on the Brexit withdrawal agreement last Tuesday, Mrs May is expected to bring the deal back to the Commons for a third time on Tuesday next week. In the aftermath of the 2017 general election, a confidence a...

    Philip Hammond is leading government talks with the Northern Irish DUP in a bid to win their support for Theresa May’s Brexit deal. With the Conservative party’s confidence and supply deal with the DUP coming up for review, the chancellor’s involvement indicates there could be a financial incentive to back the plan. It comes as Ms May’s ministers also continue their efforts to convince Conservative eurosceptics to row in behind her twice-defeated deal, ahead of a new vote on Tuesday. When the DUP agreed to prop up Ms May’s administration in the commons after the 2017 election, the party negotiated an extra £2bn in spending for Northern Ireland over 2018 and 2019. Money in the agreement, and potentially the support of the party’s 10 MPs for Ms May, is set to end in...

    The vote authorises Theresa May to ask the EU to extend Article 50 until June 30 that is, if MPs vote in favour of her Brexit deal when it is put to a vote for a third time next week. The short delay would be to allow the necessary legislation to be passed. But, if MPs once again reject the PM’s deal, May has warned a longer extension will be necessary to work out what to do instead. This would also mean the UK having to take part in the European parliament elections (and re-electing MEPs). The prospect of a lengthy 21-month delay will pile pressure on eurosceptic Tory MPs to vote for May’s deal to ensure Brexit happens this year. To extend Article 50, the Brussels has to say yes. It probably will. But EU leaders have said the UK must provide a “credible justifica...

    Theresa May’s Brexit deal suffered a major blow today when her own Attorney General issued legal advice admitting that Britain could still be locked forever into EU rules through the Irish backstop. The bombshell from the Government’s top lawyer Geoffrey Cox came just eight hours before MPs were due to stage the make-or-break Commons vote. He concluded the legal risk remains unchanged that unless the UK could prove the EU was acting in bad faith in future, there was no internationally lawful means of exiting the Protocol’s arrangements, save by agreement. His advice was a blow to Mrs May who secured three documents last night she hoped would be accepted by MPs as legally binding changes to protect the UK from being trapped indefinitely. Mr Cox said in a letter set...

    Shamima Begum has been stripped of her British citizenship. The Home Office has been asked to reconsider its decision to strip Shamima Begum of her British citizenship as a "act of mercy". On Friday, Islamic State (IS) bride Shamima Begum's three-week old son, Jarrah, died following breathing difficulties. A letter seen by Sky News sent by the family's lawyer to the Home Office this morning says: "We write specifically on behalf of Mrs Begum, Shamima Begum's mother to ask you to reconsider your previous decision dated 19 February 2019 to deprive her daughter Begum of her British citizenship... "Ms Begum requests this reconsideration, as an act of mercy, on the basis of the following new information, namely the death of her newborn son". The letter argues "it is ex...

    The father of Isil bride Shamima Begum has apologised to the British public for his daughter's decision to flee the country and join the terror group. Ahmed Ali said Ms Begum, who travelled from London to Syria aged 15 in 2015, had done wrong without realising it. He urged Home Secretary Sajid Javid to restore her citizenship so she could be to return home and face prosecution. Speaking before the death on Thursday of Ms Begum’s three-week-old baby from pneumonia Mr Ali said: She has done wrong, I apologise to everyone as her father, to the British people, I am sorry for Shamima's doing. I request to the British people, please forgive her. Ms Begum’s father pointed out that she was a child when she left Britain to join Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) i...

    A long delay to Brexit would be unacceptable to a majority of the British public, according to an exclusive poll days before critical votes in the House of Commons. Some 52 per cent of people do not want a delay to last more than six months, the survey by BMG Research for The Independent indicated. The data flies in the face of extensions advocated in Brussels, by Remainers and even some Brexiteers. They have talked about pushing back the date of the UK’s departure for a year or more something supported by fewer than one in five, according to the survey. The poll also showed that just 17 per cent actually want any extension if Theresa May’s Brexit plan is again rejected as expected this week, with the two most popular alternatives a quick new in or out referendum, ...

    Two more jihadi brides being held with their children in Syrian refugee camps have been stripped of their British citizenship, it has been reported. It comes as the row over Islamic State runaway Shamima Begum continues following the death of her three-week-old son. According to The Sunday Times, two women, who between them have five boys under the age of eight, had their UK nationality removed after marrying into a terror cell linked to the murder of western hostages. The Home Office said it did not comment on individual cases. A spokesman added: Any decisions to deprive individuals of their citizenship are based on all available evidence and not taken lightly. The paper quoted legal sources, naming the women as Reema Iqbal, 30, and her sister Zara, 28, whose pa...