Sign up here to receive the daily news briefing in your inbox every morning with exclusive insight from the BrexitCentral team Boris Johnson vows to ‘forge a new Britain’ as he launches ‘Get Brexit Done’ manifesto… The Conservatives will “get Brexit done” and “forge a new Britain”, Boris Johnson has said as he launched the party’s election manifesto. Speaking at its launch in Telford, Shropshire, the prime minister said the choice facing the country in this “closely fought” contest had “never been starker”. “Get Brexit done and we can focus our hearts and minds on the priorities of the British people,” he added. The prime minister promised to bring back the Withdrawal Agreement Bill to Parliament before 25 December. – BBC News > On BrexitCentral today: What the 2019 Conservative manifesto says about Brexit > WATCH: Boris Johnson pledges to get Brexit done at the Conservatives” manifesto launch …and promises not to extend the Brexit transition period past December 2020 in move praised by Nigel Farage Boris Johnson today vowed not to extend the Brexit transition period beyond 2020 – as the Tories committed to having trade deals in place with a slew of countries within three years. The party’s election manifesto flatly ruled out delaying the formal end of the implementation phase. The promise was a key factor in convincing Nigel Farage to stand down hundreds of his Brexit Party candidates, boosting Mr Johnson’s chances of winning a majority. But there are warnings it will be impossible to get a new EU trade deal done in time for the deadline. The manifesto also says the Conservatives will pursue an ‘ambitious’ programme of agreements outside of Europe. ‘We aim to have 80 per cent of UK trade covered by free trade agreements within the next three years, starting with the USA, Australia, New Zealand and Japan,’ the document insisted. ‘These will be negotiated in parallel with our EU deal. We will also forge stronger links with the Commonwealth, which boasts some of the world’s most dynamic economies such as India, with which we already share deep historical and cultural connections.’ On the subject of the transition period, the manifesto says: ‘We will negotiate a trade agreement next year – one that will strengthen our Union – and we will not extend the implementation period beyond December 2020.’ Mr Farage welcomed the manifesto today, saying it was full of ‘things that I have campaigned on for years’. – MailOnline Northern Ireland’s trading future is secure, Tories pledge in election manifesto Northern Ireland’s businesses will continue to enjoy unfettered access to the rest of the UK after Brexit, the Conservative Party has pledged in its manifesto. The Tories also vowed that Northern Ireland will be included in any new free trade agreements entered into by the UK with countries around the world. The manifesto also promises the party will, if it forms the next UK Government, “maintain and strengthen the integrity and smooth operation of the UK’s internal market”. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has faced considerable criticism over concerns his Brexit plans would cut Northern Ireland off from the rest of the UK by erecting bureaucratic trade barriers between businesses in Britain and Northern Ireland. He has strongly rejected the criticism. In a general election leaders’ TV debate last week, he insisted the province will leave the EU with the rest of the UK. Earlier this month he also told a gathering of Conservative Party members in Northern Ireland there would be “no forms, no checks, no barriers of any kind on goods crossing the Irish sea after Brexit”. – Belfast Telegraph Chancellor has ‘no doubt’ about securing a Brexit trade agreement despite plans to resume no-deal preparations Chancellor Sajid Javid has refused to say whether he will set aside money to prepare for the possibility that the UK fails to secure a free trade agreement (FTA) with the EU by the end of 2020. Mr Javid’s deputy Rishi Sunak effectively confirmed on Saturday that a crash-out on World Trade Organisation terms remains a possibility if the Conservatives win the 12 December election, as he revealed that the government’s no-deal preparations committee will resume meetings following the vote. The chancellor insisted he has “no doubt” that an FTA can be negotiated within 11 months of the UK’s formal withdrawal from the EU, which will take place on 31 January if Boris Johnson wins an overall majority. – Independent > WATCH: Chancellor Sajid Javid discusses Brexit with Sophy Ridge French trade minister promises ‘unique’ trade deal if the UK agrees to play fair The EU is ready to broker a “unique” trade partnership with the UK after the country leaves the bloc, but only if Britain commits to complying with EU labour and environmental standards, France’s trade minister has said. Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, the French minister responsible for commerce, told the Financial Times that both sides needed a future trading relationship that was “very close” and that the outcome of negotiations was unlikely to “resemble any other bilateral agreement, any other trade agreement” the EU has struck, given geographical proximity and historical ties. But he added that “fair play” and a level playing field on regulation “will be at the heart of our demands for the future relationship . . . We have a mutual interest to preserve this flow of goods and to avoid dumping”. Mr Lemoyne insisted that, should Britain leave the EU as planned on January 31, Paris wanted negotiations to be conducted with real ambition, given that jobs were at stake if a deep future partnership cannot be built. – FT(£) Business groups welcome Tory pledges but warn EU trade must come first Business groups welcomed Conservative pledges to reform business rates and upskill workers but warned Boris Johnson over scuppering trade relations with the EU, as the Party launched its manifesto yesterday. Embedded within a 64-page document generally scant on detail, the Tories promised to “cut the burden of tax” by reviewing business rates, specifically promising to cut rates for retailers. This fell alongside plans to create a £3bn National Skills Fund to retrain workers and meet the needs of business and a promise to “drive down costs” and “support small businesses”. However, the Prime Minister’s tagline of “Get Brexit Done” left a lingering scent of concern among companies, with many unsettled over how the Conservatives will approach international trade if the party wins a majority and Britain leaves the EU on 31 January 2020. The CBI’s Mr Hardie fired a warning shot over the potential for a cliff-edge no-deal in 2021 when the transition arrangement with the EU expires even if the UK leaves under the Withdrawal Agreement on January 31 2020. “Firms need the certainty of a closely aligned, frictionless relationship with the EU. The stability provided by transition [period] is a vital first step, but it cannot be a Trojan horse for a bad deal,” he said. – Telegraph (£) John McDonnell says he wouldn’t stay neutral in a second Brexit referendum John McDonnell has said he will not stay neutral in a second EU referendum vote as Labour sought to clarify the party’s Brexit strategy with less than three weeks until voters go to the polls. In an interview on Sunday, the shadow chancellor said he and fellow cabinet members will be able to campaign for either side in a referendum if they form the next government. His comments follows Jeremy Corbyn’s declaration on Friday that he would be an “honest broker” and neither campaign to leave nor remain under a Labour administration. McDonnell told Sophy Ridge on Sky News that Corbyn would allow individual members of the cabinet to campaign on the basis of their judgment. “Members of the shadow cabinet, well, members of the government then, will be able to campaign,” he said. Asked whether he would stay neutral, he said: “No, I won’t and I don’t think Jeremy’s asking people to do that. I’ll wait until I see the details of the deal that we negotiate.” – Guardian Jeremy Corbyn could be lone ‘neutral’ voice on Brexit as John McDonnell signals backing for Remain – Telegraph (£) > WATCH: Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell discusses Brexit with Sophy Ridge Tory plan to deliver Brexit is ‘a fantasy’, claims Tony Blair Tony Blair has branded the Tory plan to deliver Brexit a “fantasy” and said he would not trust Boris Johnson with a blank cheque. The former prime minister will deliver a speech on Monday and is expected to describe the state of British politics as “utterly dysfunctional”. Mr Blair, speaking at a Reuters Newsmaker event, will say that voters should look at this election seat by seat, describing the General Election as “650 mini elections”. He is expected to say: “The Conservative Party say vote Tory and Brexit will be done; it will be over. “They even add – do it and we can get back to dealing with the important issues. “The cheek is quite breath-taking. So, having visited this debacle upon us, which has distracted us from those big issues for over three years, they now use the distraction as a reason for doing Brexit, not abandoning it. “But it appeals. It is, however, a fantasy. Brexit isn’t over on 12 December, nor even on 31 January next year. We immediately begin the new phase of Brexit negotiation.” He is expected to add: “The Conservatives calculate that they can force people to elect them, despite worry over Brexit, because Jeremy Corbyn is the alternative”. – ITV News UK risks becoming ‘Trump’s poodle’ if Boris Johnson wins election, Liberal Democrats warn… Britain risks becoming “Donald Trump’s poodle” if Boris Johnson wins next month’s election and pushes through his “extreme” Brexit plan, Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Chuka Umunna has warned. Mr Umunna accused the prime minister of importing Donald Trump-style populist, right-wing, nationalist politics into the UK and warned that a Conservative victory on 12 December would give him “carte blanche” to continue it. Speaking ahead of the Nato summit in London on 4 December, Mr Umunna announced that Lib Dems are committed to maintaining the UK’s commitments to spend 2 per cent of GDP on defence and 0.7 per cent on international aid. And he said that the defence budget would be £1 billion and the aid budget £340 million higher under the Lib Dems than Tories, because of the “Remain bonus” of stronger economic growth if Brexit is halted. In a speech in the Lib Dem target seat of Watford on Monday, Mr Umunna will warn that if the UK leaves the EU under Mr Johnson’s leadership, it risks becoming “a vassal state of the United States”. – Independent …as Jo Swinson admits the Lib Dems are suffering a ‘squeeze’ in the election campaign Jo Swinson has admitted the Lib Dems have suffered a “squeeze” in the polls, and she shifted its election position from arguing she could be come prime minister to telling voters only her party could block Boris Johnson from getting a majority. The Lib Dem leader said on Sunday morning the Brexit Party decision to stand down candidates in Tory-held seats had “clearly affected the shape of the campaign”. Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, Swinson said would be prepared to vote for legislation put forward by the prime minister that put his Brexit deal to a second referendum. “You know, there is a real opportunity for Liberal Democrats to win seats from the Conservatives and stop Boris Johnson and his bad Brexit deal,” she said. – Huffington Post > WATCH: Liberal Democrat Leader Jo Swinson discusses Brexit with Andrew Marr Stephen Pollard: Only three words in the Tory manifesto matter: Get Brexit done How good is your memory? If you are able to recall even the basic events in your life from the end of last month, then the good news is that your memory far exceeds that of most political commentators – and many politicians. The received wisdom about the Tory manifesto is that it is a thin, unambitious damp squib of a document. Commentators have lined up to dismiss it as a nothing. Supposed shrewdies inform us that this is a deliberate strategy to avoid the catastrophic error of the 2017 manifesto. Where that set of promises turned a possible Conservative landslide into a desperate deal with the DUP to remain in office, this time around the Tories wanted a document that risks, says and does next to nothing. The received wisdom, however, is nonsense. This is – by a distance – the most far-reaching Tory manifesto of the past 30 years. Arguably, it exceeds anything promised even by Margaret Thatcher in 1979. Anyone who cannot see that has clearly been asleep since June 23 2016. The manifesto is radical for one key reason: it promises credibly that we will be out of the EU, with a deal that has already been agreed (the big difference with Theresa May’s vague set of Brexit promises), by January 31 2020. Like the Tory campaign, the manifesto is centred on one pledge: getting Brexit done. To not see just how important that is, is to forget everything that has happened in British politics since the referendum. For three years, Parliament has refused to implement the result. Whatever the reasons, and whether you think that a scandal or a relief, that is a statement of fact. Indeed, the only reason we are now in the middle of an election and discussing manifestos is because Parliament would not accept Brexit. – Stephen Pollardfor the Telegraph (£) Andrew Green: Labour’s immigration policy is a threat to the country’s future Concealed in Labour’s election manifesto is a threat to the future of our country. No, not Brexit and all that, but a threat to the whole scale and nature of our society which stems from the immigration policies underlying their document. These policies have three aims. First, to strengthen their position with the ethnic communities who are increasingly important electorally. Nowadays, about one third of children born in England and Wales have at least one foreign born parent. The growing ethnic part of our electorate is made even more powerful by the custom of some communities to vote en bloc as advised by their “community leaders”. This, of course, hugely increases their influence with individual MPs. If and when we leave the EU, non-EU migrants will find themselves on a level playing field with those from the EU. That is reasonable enough, but the effect is likely to increase the proportion of migrant workers from the third world where pay, even for skilled workers, is often much lower than in the UK. We can also expect that applicants will be encouraged in many cases by relatives who are already here. Labour’s commitment to ending the “minimum income requirements which separate families” will also play a role. At present, someone wishing to bring in a spouse must have an income of £18,600 per year. This is a vital safeguard designed to ensure that those who wish to bring partners to the UK can support them and their children. Doing away with it could drive an unprecedented influx from poorer countries with serious consequences for efforts to achieve better integration within our society. In the longer term, the aim of the hard left is to increase the size of the ethnic community so as to cement left-wing power. This, indeed, was the original purpose of Labour’s immigration “reform” under Tony Blair. – Lord Green of Deddington for ConservativeHome Brexit in Brief Brexit Party ‘could get 50 seats’, claims optimistic Brexit Party candidate – Express Abuse won’t stop my Brexit battle – Michelle Dewberry for the Express