Sign up here to receive the daily news briefing in your inbox every morning with exclusive insight from the BrexitCentral team Brexit divisions threaten to plunge the Labour Party Conference into chaos… Jeremy Corbyn was struggling to contain an open revolt by some of his most senior shadow ministers, MPs and party activists last night as anger over his refusal to back a policy of remaining in the EU threatened to wreck the Labour conference. With delegates already reeling from a failed attempt by Corbyn supporters to oust Tom Watson and abolish his role as deputy leader, anger erupted amid accusations that the leadership was trying to block democratic debate and fudge a decision about where Labour stands on the issue of leaving the EU. What was supposed to be a conference to showcase a party united behind new policies on education and health before a likely general election instead opened amid bitterness and acrimony, with a defiant Watson still in place, and Emily Thornberry, Keir Starmer and Clive Lewis, the shadow foreign secretary, Brexit secretary and Treasury minister, publicly defying Corbyn by backing Remain. – Observer Starmer and Thornberry ramp up pressure on Corbyn with pro-Remain message at rally – Independent Jeremy Corbyn left humiliated after secret plot to oust his deputy Tom Watson misfires and is stopped by outraged MPs – The Sun …as angry MPs accuse Jeremy Corbyn of a ‘stitch-up’ to stop Labour backing Remain in a second referendum Jeremy Corbyn has been accused of a “stitch-up” to avoid a conference defeat that would force him to support Remain in a fresh Brexit referendum. A new policy statement, likely to be agreed on Sunday, would push back a decision on Labour’s stance to next year. The party would wait until a “sensible” withdrawal deal had been negotiated within three months of winning a general election. Only then would Labour decide its stance at a second referendum to be held within a further three months – possibly next May, if Boris Johnson holds a snap election in November. – Independent Labour could wait until after election to decide position on second Brexit referendum – Sky News Boris Johnson to risk major Commons showdown by putting his Brexit deal into the Queen’s speech… Boris Johnson is considering using next month’s Queen’s Speech vote to ram through a Brexit deal – in an ambitious attempt to face down Tory rebels and Labour MPs at the same time. The Mail on Sunday can reveal Downing Street is studying plans to tie together a ‘huge domestic package’ with any new agreement that can be forged with Brussels – lining up the prospect of a major Commons showdown. The move would be a high-stakes gamble for the Prime Minister, who as we reported last week has compared himself to the Incredible Hulk. Losing a Queen’s Speech vote has traditionally been a resignation issue and could lead to a General Election. The speech itself, during which the Government will set out its legislative agenda, is scheduled for October 14. Traditionally, it is followed by five days of Commons debate before a vote from MPs to back the measures. That vote is pencilled in for October 21 – just days after a crunch meeting of EU leaders at which the Government will be pinning its hopes on securing a Brexit breakthrough. – Mail on Sunday …while Johnson’s aides warn he’s ready to ‘fight fire with fire’ if he loses the Supreme Court battle and Brexit is halted Boris Johnson’s aides have warned of “carnage” ahead as the battle to deliver Brexit reaches its climax. Supreme Court judges will rule this week on whether the PM acted unlawfully in suspending Parliament. But close allies say Boris is ready to “fight fire with fire” if Remainer MPs use it to thwart his efforts to take Britain out of the EU in 39 days’ time. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn vowed to block any Tory Brexit deal and force an election once BoJo has missed the October 31 departure deadline. The “rabble alliance” of Labour, Lib Dem and Tory rebels are plotting a twin-pronged attack to halt Mr Johnson’s Brexit bandwagon if he tries to quit with no deal. At a secret meeting last week, they agreed to launch fresh challenges in the Commons and the courts if he refuses to seek a delay beyond October 31. They are exploring the law to see if a senior civil servant or MP can deliver the request on behalf of the PM. – The Sun EU brushes off Government’s new Brexit plan, saying Johnson’s ideas ‘fall short’ Brussels has rebuffed Britain’s latest attempt to resolve the Brexit deadlock, contradicting ministers’ claims that steady progress is being made in talks with the European Union. It warned that fresh proposals to identify an alternative to the Irish backstop fell short of European Union demands and lacked crucial detail. The European Commission reportedly believes that the process is going backwards as the UK plans do not contain the essential elements needed to clinch an agreement. Its mood of pessimism followed a meeting between Steve Barclay, the Brexit Secretary, and Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator. In a note to EU ambassadors, the Commission said the UK suggestions “fall short of satisfying all the objectives of the backstop”, describing them as not legally operational. It also noted the UK is yet to table concrete plans to be the basis of formal talks. – iNews Foreign leaders want Britain to ‘get on with’ Brexit in order to begin striking lucrative trade deals, says Liz Truss Countries outside of the EU want Britain and Brussels to “get on with” Brexit in order to begin striking free trade deals with the UK, the Trade Secretary has said. Speaking on a tour of Australia, New Zealand and Japan, Liz Truss said that senior figures in all three countries wanted to reach agreements “quickly”, following two previous extensions to the UK’s exit date from the EU. In her first newspaper interview since being appointed International Trade Secretary, Ms Truss claimed that Brexit would allow ministers to draw new firms to Britain in the way Margaret Thatcher kick-started a wave of foreign investment by attracting Nissan, the Japanese motor giant, to build cars in Sunderland. Ms Truss was speaking in Tokyo having started the process for drawing up a post-Brexit trade agreement with Japan, with a “call for input” seeking the views of businesses on what the deal should contain. The former Chief Secretary to the Treasury said the Government had singled out Japan, Australia, New Zealand and the US as “like-minded” countries with which the UK would strike its “first wave” of free trade deals after leaving the EU. Addressing Boris Johnson’s efforts to deliver Brexit on October 31, Ms Truss insisted that ministers needed to meet the current deadline in order to restore the “huge amount of [public] trust” lost as a result of previous delays. – Sunday Telegraph (£) Michael Gove warns the Tories will collapse if the UK is not out of the EU by October 31st The Conservative Party is “on the razor edge of peril” and will “collapse” unless Tory MPs back the Brexit deal that Boris Johnson is negotiating with Brussels, Michael Gove has declared. In an article for The Sunday Times, the man in charge of no-deal preparations says Conservatives seeking to block Brexit risk destroying the party. Ahead of a Supreme Court showdown this week and Johnson’s trip to the UN, where he is expected to continue Brexit talks with Angela Merkel and other EU leaders, Gove says: “The behaviour of the anti-Brexit campaigners is doing real damage to our country. A relatively small, rich and powerful set of people in London are prepared to do almost anything they can to undermine the validity of a democratic vote.” Quoting Sophocles, Gove writes: “If we make the wrong decisions, we will see faith in our democracy damaged and confidence in the Conservative Party drain away. We are on ‘the razor edge of peril’ . . . If we still find ourselves in the European Union after October 31 then we will see [our] support collapse.” Gove also claims that it is the Liberal Democrats who are the “extremists”, not the government, because they want to stop Brexit without a second vote. – Sunday Times (£) Tactical voting by Remain supporters could defeat 60 Tories and end Johnson’s premiership at a snap election, poll indicates Tactical voting could cost the Conservatives up to 60 seats at a snap general election and eject Boris Johnson from No 10, new polling has found. Almost half of Labour supporters and an even higher proportion of Greens say they are ready to switch to the Liberal Democrats if it would help defeat the party committed to Brexit in their constituency. More than a third of Lib Dem backers would make the opposite journey at the ballot box – potentially delivering 60 seats and a mortal blow to Mr Johnson’s hopes of winning a majority. The poll, for the People’s Vote campaign, comes after it unveiled plans for the biggest vote-swapping drive in history, to support the best-placed candidate in more than 100 battleground seats. “Tactical voting could damage Johnson’s prospects fatally, meaning Labour could make net gains from the Tories,” said pollster Peter Kellner, the former YouGov president. – Independent Fury as Ireland’s Deputy PM Simon Coveney warns that no-deal Brexit could trigger ‘new Troubles’ Ireland’s deputy PM sparked uproar yesterday by saying a No Deal Brexit could trigger violence in Northern Ireland. Simon Coveney said a “crash” Brexit would “pose huge questions for politics and potentially for the management of civic unrest”. He rubbished claims Britain and the EU are edging closer to a deal — after upbeat comments from European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker. But his warning of a return to the Troubles prompted a backlash. DUP MP Ian Paisley stormed: “It’s disgusting anyone would want to seek to threaten violence because of Brexit. “Perhaps Mr Coveney should take a vow of silence.” On Thursday, Irish PM Leo Varadkar said how encouraging it was that the “rhetoric” around Brexit had been tempered. Last month senior sources close to Mr Coveney boasted that a terrorist attack in Fermanagh had forced Boris Johnson to rethink his plan to remove the backstop. The source claimed Mr Johnson and the “Brits” had become a “bit friendlier” towards Ireland because of the attempted murder of PSNI police officers. But Irish experts have claimed a revival in terror attacks is a symptom of wider “political failure” on the island. – The Sun Farage reveals how a Remainer Commons victory would secure a clean break from the EU Nigel Farage says that Boris Johnson will be forced to adopt his “clean break” Brexit policy – and abandon all hope of an EU deal – if Remainers succeed in delaying Britain’s departure from Brussels once again. The “bullish” leader of the Brexit Party said the Prime Minister will be left with no choice but to pursue an “unstoppable” Brexit alliance which would be “the best outcome for Brexiteers”. But Mr Farage believes “extraordinary political times” mean he could end up as Prime Minister because “if Joe Public think this is Mrs May’s deal they won’t like it. Speaking to the Sunday Express ahead of a major rally in Telford, Shropshire, on Friday, he called on Express readers and Brexiteers to “keep the faith. He warned that Boris Johnson will try to “con voters” with a “reheated version of Theresa May’s deal” but is confident he will fail. A Remainer alliance in Parliament led by Jeremy Corbyn has passed a bill forcing Mr Johnson to ask for an extension to the UK’s EU membership if he fails to come to a deal with Brussels by October 19. While the Prime Minister has said he will fight the bill in the courts, most political observers believe his only way of getting out by October 31 is to strike a deal with the EU. Mr Farage suggested the Remainer plotting has played into his hands, saying: “I think if he [Mr Johnson] fails getting this [EU deal] passed by the Commons, then I think the likelihood of him moving in my direction becomes likely. If [the deal] falls in the Commons I am going to feel optimistic about where we are going. – Sunday Express John Humphrys says the BBC ‘simply could not grasp’ why anyone would vote for Brexit in new memoir John Humphrys has lifted the lid on the BBC’s “institutional liberal bias” and accused the corporation of being out of touch with the nation in his memoir. The veteran broadcaster, who retired from Radio 4’s Today show two days ago, says bosses “badly failed” to read the public’s mood on Brexit and “simply could not grasp” why anybody voted Leave. In an extract published in The Daily Mail on Saturday, he recalled the morning after the referendum, writing: “Leave had won – and this was not what the BBC had expected. Nor what it wanted. No nods and smiles when the big bosses appeared. No attempt to pretend that this was anything other than a disaster.” In the book, called A Day Like Today, he adds: “Bosses, almost to a man and woman, could simply not grasp how anyone could have put a cross in the Leave box on the referendum ballot paper. – Sunday Telegraph (£) David Cameron warns Johnson not to break the law on Brexit Former prime minister David Cameron has warned Boris Johnson that breaking the law “is not a good idea” as the Brexit deadline approaches. Earlier this month, a law was passed requiring the government to formally request an extension on 19 October unless either a Brexit deal was reached with the European Union or parliament had voted in favour of a no-deal Brexit. Mr Johnson has previously said he would rather “die in a ditch” than obey the law. Mr Cameron told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme that he and Mr Johnson are “as one” on the importance of getting a Brexit deal. He said: “No deal is not a good idea. Breaking the law is not a good idea. Focus everything you’ve got on getting that deal, and that’s what he’s doing, to be fair to him.” – Sky News Michael Gove: We must leave the EU on time. We cannot let voters down again Westminster is sometimes called the mother of parliaments. But when the phrase was coined by the great Victorian reformer John Bright, he was referring not to the House of Commons but to the country. The nation was the source of democratic legitimacy, the people the sovereigns, parliament the body they entrusted with safeguarding their rights. The powers that parliament has are those given by the people, and they depend on trust. So when parliament asks the people to take a decision, trust in our democracy depends on parliament honouring their wishes. Many politicians who argued passionately for remain have, to their great credit, pledged to respect that result. But many others have done all they can to overturn it. The most recent, and remarkable, example of MPs acting to frustrate our exit was Jeremy Corbyn’s “Surrender Act”, supported enthusiastically by Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs and passed by parliament this month. It is explicitly designed to undermine the prime minister’s efforts to honour the referendum result. It seeks to mandate the government to accept whatever deal Brussels demands. It says the prime minister must ask the EU to keep us as a member until we agree the terms it dictates for our departure. In the centuries of our history I can think of no parallel for this sort of vote. Never before has parliament instructed a prime minister to accept whatever foreign powers demand. The MPs behind this act claim to be acting in the name of democracy. But when they were asked if we could let the people decide if they were right, in a general election, they refused. We cannot destroy confidence in the foundation of democratic politics: that politicians respect votes. Doing so would be truly dangerous — far more dangerous than the problems caused by leaving on October 31 without a deal. These will pass. When people cannot vote for peaceful change, the consequences endure, and resound, for far longer. In the difficult days ahead I hope all MPs recognise that we are servants of the people, they have spoken, and we must keep faith with their democratic verdict. – Michael Gove MP for the Sunday Times (£) Kate Hoey: Labour must stop alienating voters and recommit to its promise of honouring Brexit The Labour conference in Brighton will be a moment of truth for the party. Will the moment we abandon the manifesto commitments of 2017 that saw us have our biggest vote increase since 1945? Or will we stick to the promise we made to honour the vote of the British people – including millions of Labour voters – to leave the EU? We should have left by now. We were promised that we would. But a half-hearted and incompetent strategy from Theresa May, alongside a well-funded, relentless campaign to undermine the referendum and the Government’s negotiating position, has left us still in the EU after three years of drift and doom-mongering. Matters have been made worse by Speaker John Bercow’s bias, which has brought Parliament into disrepute. But in response, Jeremy Corbyn is in danger of adopting a still more absurd and tragic position, urged by senior figures Emily Thornberry and John McDonnell. To renegotiate a deal, to put it to yet another referendum, and then to campaign against that deal and in favour of remaining in the EU after all. What a self-defeating proposition. – Kate Hoey MP for The Sun Daniel Hannan: If the Establishment’s coup against Brexit succeeds, our institutions will never recover I had my Europhile three-year-old with me in Strasbourg last week. In his mind, the European Parliament means endless goodies: lollipops proffered by kind ushers, games with Daddy’s Spanish assistant, ice-cream at lunch because Mummy isn’t around. He is, in other words, pro-EU for similar reasons to many hard-nosed adults, though they generally demand costlier inducements than ice-cream. As I watched him darting down the long corridors, blond, chubby and cheerful, like a midget Boris Johnson, a melancholy thought stole over me. He is three-and-a-quarter years old. His entire life has been spent in a United Kingdom that has voted to leave the EU, but has not in fact left. We need to stand back from the immediate headlines to see the vastness of what has gone wrong. Never mind the arguments about backstops and prorogations. The real enormity is this: we voted to leave, but our leaders stepped in and blocked it. When I say “our leaders”, I don’t just mean MPs. I mean the entirety of what used to be called the Establishment: civil servants, big corporates, quangocrats. And, yes, lawyers, too. – Daniel Hannan MEP for the Sunday Telegraph (£) Jo Platt: Labour backing Remain would be a betrayal of Brexit voters – we must be able to find a compromise solution There is no shortage of loud voices in Westminster dominating the scene with their miraculous solutions to the Brexit debate. We have become almost accustomed to their daily sermons, preaching their preferred plan of leaving without a deal or revoking article 50. No deal or No Brexit – it is that simple, we just need to trust them and see how quick, easy and painless their path will be. It is in many ways understandable that after three years of extreme division and polarisation, extreme options like these have gained cult like support, all claiming on the tin that they will bring an immediate end to the crisis. But we must be honest with ourselves. Offers like these are always too good to be true. Neither of these options present sustainable paths forward – revoking would be a gross betrayal of democracy with enormous consequences whilst No Deal would inflict unnecessary and pointless harm when we will ultimately negotiate a new trade deal with the EU anyway. Parliament must start acting maturely by considering the paths that will produce a permanent Brexit settlement that enables us to forge a national consensus. That national consensus must start in the Commons. It will mean politicians from across the House laying down their weapons and agreeing to finally work constructively, as the country expects. This bold and brave step will set the ultimate example of how we can reunite and heal our divisions. It will then be up to us as local representatives to go into our communities and hold important and impassioned conversations but with cool heads to bring people with us on this journey of compromise and reconciliation. Simple clarity in the form of a Brexit policy in three words or less may appear the easy path but proposing credible long-term solutions and recovering the lost art of compromise to build consensus is the only mature, responsible and sustainable way forwards, even if it does require some rare nuance and a little patience. – Jo Platt MP for the Sunday Telegraph (£) John Baron: Johnson must keep calm, carry on – and reject the Withdrawal Agreement ‘May you live in interesting times’, goes the old saying. For those that lived through it, the saying might closely be applied to the long 2017-2019 session of Parliament, which has easily been the most extraordinary in our lifetimes. This session saw the aftermath of a bungled general election, the drama of the Article 50 court case and its triggering, the largest Government defeat in history, a change of Prime Minister, the announcement of a change of Speaker, topped off by a charged prorogation. It has been quite a ride. The period has confirmed that this is a Remain Parliament which has not reconciled itself to leaving the EU. The triggering of Article 50 by an overwhelming majority in 2017 which clearly endorsed the UK’s departure with or without a deal by March 29th 2019 has long been forgotten – Remain MPs have now extended the deadline twice, and have legislated for a third delay. This hinders Brexit for the time being, but it also offers the Prime Minister an opportunity. If he can hold his nerve and maintain possession of the narrative and truth that the Conservatives are working to implement the result of the 2016 referendum, in opposition to this Remain Parliament, then the Tories can win through at the forthcoming election. However, a core of Conservative backbench MPs, not necessarily members of the ERG, see any excessive compromise in an effort to secure a deal costing the Party dear. – John Baron MP for ConservativeHome William Shawcross: The Remainer elite is laughing in the face of our history There were very good reasons why 48 per cent of voters wanted to stay in the EU. What I find astonishing is the destructive and indecent lengths to which elite Remainers have since gone to overturn the vote to leave. The Lib Dem conference exulted with the Brussels mandarin, Guy Verhofstadt, when he called for “a European Union empire”. What? Progressive liberals applauding imperialism? To please the EU imperialists, the Lib Dems then voted to scrap Brexit, without even a nod to the 17.4 million who backed Leave in a referendum that Lib Dem leaders had long demanded. As power and loyalty have fled to Brussels, so national governments and institutions have lost strength. Brussels chooses our new rulers with little reference to the “member states” who have replaced nations. Thus the new European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, and her eight vice presidents were recently selected behind closed EU doors, in today’s equivalent of “smoke-filled rooms”. Our unknown new rulers rejoice in Animal Farm‑ish titles: “Commissioner for a Stronger Europe in the World”, “Commissioner for an Economy that Works for People” and “Commissioner for Protecting Our European Way of Life”. (The EU’s way of life does not recognise our Christian heritage, which was specifically banned from the European constitution, despite the pleas of Pope John Paul II.) These new imperial controllers have almost unchecked power and are now launched on an accelerated path towards Ever-Closer Union. How on earth do Lib Dems, let alone Tory “rebels”, think that that will be good for Britain, let alone the rest of Europe? – William Shawcross for the Sunday Telegraph (£) Dan Hodges: They are laughing at us. Humiliating us. Refusing to budge. Boris has only one option: No Deal The EU official opted not to speak in diplomatic code. ‘There are huge gaps in the UK offer. This just isn’t a serious solution. They are putting forward proposals that simply won’t work. Talk of a deal is spin and optimism going into overdrive.’ Boundless optimism is one of Boris Johnson’s greatest assets. And after the dour, grinding pragmatism of Theresa May, a more upbeat, confident demeanour from the Prime Minister is something to be welcomed. But this morning it’s time to park the optimism and face reality. Britain and Europe are eyeball-to- eyeball over Brexit. And the EU is not going to blink.This is the reality of where we are now. Europe is laughing at us. Not because they are cavalier about the impact of No Deal – though some Eurocrats clearly have little concern for how many Spanish manchego producers must be sacrificed on the altar of a glorious EU super-state. But because they find it comical that we still cannot see that, when they say there will be no more major concessions to the agreement they brokered with Mrs May, they really do mean it. – Dan Hodges for the Mail on Sunday Tony Parsons: In the pro-Remain establishment safe spaces of Parliament and the Supreme Court, no one can hear the people scream If you want to suck up to the establishment in this country, then you better back Brussels. If you want to be a well-paid talking head at the BBC, or climb the greasy ladder in Westminster and Whitehall, then you must say that only thick racist peasants who will all soon be dead voted to leave the European Union. Even when warbling Land Of Hope And Glory at the Last Night Of The Proms, you should sport a blue EU beret and wave the EU flag as though you would die for it. Want to get ahead? Then bend the knee to Brussels. Because backing Brexit has always been the anti-establishment belief. The real rebels are not grey old men like John Major. The true dissenting voices are the millions of ordinary, working-class patriots who believe — and it is such a simple belief — that we can be a free and independent nation once more. Remain could not win the argument at the polling booths. Even today Remainers are running from a general election. But Remain may yet win in Parliament and the Supreme Court — those comfy, pro-Remain safe spaces for the British establishment. In the Supreme Court and Parliament, they can’t hear the people scream. And yet David Cameron seems to truly believe that Boris Johnson backed Brexit only as a cynical career move. “The conclusion I am left with is that he (Boris) risked an outcome he didn’t believe in because it would help his career,” Cameron told ITV’s Tom Bradby. But the idea that backing the Leave side is a cunning career move is stark raving bonkers. If all you cared about was your career, then Remain has always been the only sensible option. – Tony Parsons for The Sun Brexit in Brief The unprecedented intimidation tactics of the ultra-Remainers are damaging our democracy – Janet Daley for the Sunday Telegraph (£) How Brexit Party will stand up to undemocratic bullies of EU elite – Martin Daubney MEP for the Sunday Express Cameron never understood Brexit as he was deaf to the British public – Nick Ferrari for the Sunday Express Richard Tice reveals the real reason the EU is desperate for Britain to stay in the bloc – Sunday Express