Red Box - Friday January 31 2020

PLUS: What will you do at 11pm?

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Friday January 31 2020

By Matt Chorley

Good morning,

When I was offered the job of doing Red Box I wasn't sure if it was a job. Sending an email.

The good (and bad) people of Westminster made sure it was. From January 2016 to January 2020, it has been a hell of a ride.

You might not have liked all of the twists and turns. You might not have liked the final destination.

But thanks for being with us for the ride. Now what?

You can catch me on ITV's This Morning from 10am explaining that after 11pm nothing will change.

Matt Chorley

Red Box Editor

@MattChorley

Podcast: Back to the future

On the morning after the referendum Tim Shipman and Matt Chorley tried to digest what and happened, and predict what came next. Three and a half years on, they went back to the podcast to see what they got right. And wrong.

LISTEN TO THE PODCAST
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Spotify spoti.fi/2PqUS9T

The briefing

Boris Johnson will address the nation tonight. You just might not be able to see it. The prime minister has recorded his video already, in which he declares: “This is the moment when we begin to unite and level up.” It is just not clear if any broadcasters will run this PR promo.

Nigel Farage has his big Leave means Leave party tonight in Parliament Square. Although if it’s like any of his other parties, it will end up disbanding when it doesn’t have any seats in Westminster.

Jeremy Corbyn is not saying whether he is celebrating or not. So unlike him to refuse to make a decision one way or the other on Brexit.

After the excitement has died down, the prime minister will call next week for a basic Canada-style trade deal — an “off-the-shelf” model first proposed by the EU's chief negotiator, Michel Barnier.

Before that, he will chair a cabinet meeting in Sunderland as a symbol of his commitment to Leave-supporting areas, many of whom lent him their votes for the first time.

What will actually change at 11pm? Spoiler alert: not much. We've got a handy guide.

Three EU leaders, Ursula von der Leyen, Charles Michel and David Sassoli, write in The Times today that Brexit is a matter of deep regret but "our three institutions will do everything in their power to make it a success".

One thing that might make the PM gulp on his fizz today: A new YouGov poll on Scottish independence has put Yes in the lead — by 51-49 — for the first time since 2015.

Away from the national obsession, coronavirus has been declared a global emergency, with health leaders in Britain ordering an escalation in planning for a significant outbreak of the flu-like illness.
Esther Webber's trivia question: Which MP brought in a private member's bill for an EU referendum in 2013 that was later adopted by David Cameron and paved the way for the 2016 vote? Answer at the bottom of today's email

RED BOX: COMMENT

We in the EU will make it work

Charles Michel, Ursula von der Leyen, David Sassoli – European Council, Commission and Parliament presidents

That's that then

A new dawn had broken had it not. It was the sort of bright sunny morning that makes you think you’re in an orange juice advert. Slight chill in the air.

In Downing Street, on the morning of June 24, 2016, it was decidedly frosty.

This bright weather was what usually accompanies scenes of spring election winners arriving to take power.

But that morning David Cameron appeared at the lectern to give it away. “I will do everything I can as prime minister to steady the ship over the coming weeks and months,” he said. “But I do not think it would be right for me to try to be the captain that steers our country to its next destination.”

At this point he — none of us — could have imagined what a choppy, stormy, unpredictable, sick-making journey it would be.

Nor the mis-casting of his successor as captain. Theresa May was at the bridge, hand loosely on the tiller, setting a direction to Brexit means Brexit.

Recognising that she needed a bigger crew to complete the journey she went into battle with her opponents, and ended up holed below the waterline.

Each time she set a new course, there would be mutiny. Some would throw themselves overboard, others would walk the plank. Until there was not enough hands on deck to keep the thing afloat.

Looking back at where we’ve come from, the sea now looks calm and still. A vast expanse of nothing. What even happened back there?

It doesn’t matter. None of it does. We never did find out what Brexit Means Brexit means. Or what Strong and Stable looked like.

What did the Swire Amendment do? Was the Malthouse Compromise a pub? Was Cooper Boles a seventies funk singer, an agricultural thrashing machine or an ITV Sunday night drama about two ill-matched detectives? Doesn’t matter.

Was it Florence or Lancaster House? Was Florence House one of the 38 ministers who quit because May’s Brexit plans were too hard or too soft? Doesn't matter.

Who were the enemies of the people? The mutineers? The saboteurs?

Did the performance art installation known as “David Davis” ever win the Turner Prize for with his searing existential comment about impact assessments being both in great detail and not actually existing? Did Dominic Raab ever find out how close France is to England? Did anyone smell Tim Farron's spaniel?

What was on Damian Green’s hard drive? What was on Paul Nuttall’s CV? What was on Matt Hancock's Matt Hancock app?

There was no need to expel Ken Clarke, promote Priti Patel or bludgeon a fox to death with a baseball bat.

No need to tell Russia to go away and shut up. It didn’t matter if Jesse Norman ran for leader. Or if Gavin Williamson leaked from cabinet. We don’t need to hear from the Stop Brexit man Steve Bray anymore than we need to hear from the do Brexit man Andrew Bridgen.

Bridgen is already 45 minutes into his 15 minutes of fame. He should go back to looking after the money he made with his brother pre-washing potatoes.

The man behind Mark Francois can retire and come up with a new comedy character. He is a potato in glasses. It is not clear if Bridgen has ever given him a wash.

It didn’t matter if we said bollocks to Brexit or believe in the bin or held Donald Trump’s hand because he has a fear of stairs. It doesn't matter what the prorogation that never happened meant. It really doesn’t matter what party Chuka Umunna is in or what Diane Abbott is drinking on the tube or the fact that Jacob Rees-Mogg’s idea of common sense is asking nanny to take his pyjama bottoms off before he puts his trousers on.

It doesn’t matter if we never hear from Andrew Adonis, Tony Blair, Tom Baldwin, Nick Clegg, Michael Heseltine or Roland Rudd ever again. The people didn’t listen to them before June 2016, and they needn't listen after. Their I-told-you-so-moment will come so late that nobody will be able to quite remember what they told us.

Whatever was written on the side of a bus. Whatever adequate food was stockpiled. Whatever Erskine May said. Doesn't matter.

The ferry-less ferry firm, the lorry-less traffic jam, the clueless people who got us into this.

What was shorter? Barry Gardiner’s Labour leadership bid? Chris Grayling’s time as Tory chairman? John Bercow?

It didn’t matter that the Brexit Party had no MPs. Or that Jo Swinson had no hope. It didn’t matter that Theresa May had no clue. Perhaps it was her destiny to just exhaust all other options.

You didn’t need to understand May fistbumping, dancing or coughing. You didn't need to understand even what she was doing. The late-night votes that agreed nothing. The early evening speeches to the nation that said even less. Perhaps it was her destiny to just exhaust all other options, before someone else — everyone's last option — came along and promised to clear it all up.

For the past three years we have all been present but not involved. Or we could have been.

One cabinet minister joked to me recently that the luckiest MPs are the ones who lost their seats in 2017 and came back last month. They know what they are doing, but they missed the madness.

Imagine being one of those insufferable, blonde, chiselled Oxbridge types who decide to row around the world during a gap yah. But imagine you set off on that chilly sunny June morning in 2016, and only now are you arriving back. You missed it. You missed it all.

The leaks. The resignations. The late night votes, the early morning emails. And all the bitterness and nastiness and tweets and bile and death threats. Pointless.

In the end the man who was judged in 2016 to be ill-suited to high office didn’t change. Instead the bar was lowered, the job spec tweaked, the nation’s patience wore out.

This full stop also renders Jeremy Corbyn obsolete. At the beginning of his leadership the Tories had a majority. At the end it is even bigger. He played almost no part in the Brexit debate, choosing constructive ambiguity and neutrality, leaving the picking of sides to others. Maybe it didn’t matter that his own tests were dismissed as “bollocks” by his own front bench. In the end they were right.

I know some people were (are) very emotional about the United Kingdom reordering its trading relationships. I struggled to get quite so worked up. I don’t define myself by the details of tariff agreements or student exchange programmes. Nor should you.

There are some who felt the Leave vote cut to the heart of what it meant to be British, to be European, to be them. But being told how someone views themselves is like having to listen to them describe a dream. Unbelievably tedious if unintentionally self-revelatory.

It is entirely possible to go about your life not thinking about this stuff. The mental health of the nation might have been better if more had done just that.

Let the victors have their moment. Let them gulp down their English sparkling wine and their humility all at once at 11pm. This is now on them. No excuses.

So, we have taken back control. But what for? What it is that we will actually do now that we could not do before?

Much of it is symbolism. And symbolism matters. But having the freedom to do something is not the same as doing it.

Is it enough to say that we are choosing to keep immigration at existing levels? That we are choosing to produce goods, hire workers, regulate industry on the same rules that we did before?

It would be a very British thing to do to make a great song and dance about leaving, and then quietly sneak back through a few side doors when nobody is looking.

They will be called bespoke deals, opt-ins, unique arrangements for a unique country.

We have spent so long arguing about taking the control back that we — the political class, the media class, the voting class — have given no real thought to what good (or bad) these new retrieved powers might be put to.

That’s what comes next. And unlike so much of what has come before, this is what will matter.

RED BOX: COMMENT

It took too long to get here but getting it done is only the start

James Cleverly – Conservative deputy chairman

What to do at 11pm

Boris Johnson will be in Downing Street with his filmographer, photographer and other top advisers. Dominic Cummings is expected in No 10, trying to show that he is in charge really.

Having done a ring-round of people from across the Brexit divide, I am struck how few plans high-profile Brexixteers have made.

Michael Gove, the co-leader of Vote Leave, is speaking at Dudley Conservatives. Jacob Rees-Mogg is at a North East Somerset Conservative Association dinner so he can celebrate with local Tories.

Andrea Leadsom is planning to have a "bottle of chilled Nyetimber, a plate of Scottish smoked salmon and large piece of Cornish Yarg . . . then 12 hours sleep".

Robert Buckland will be at a party political fundraiser in Wiltshire. Thérèse Coffey has "no specific plans". Grant Shapps is hoping "to get home from a Northern visit following Cabinet in time for a dinner with friends and family, where we will raise a glass (or two . . . ) to delivering democracy". Liz Truss will be at No 10.

Nicky Morgan is "out for drinks with friends — suspect we’ll raise a glass of prosecco to mark a historical day".

Alister Jack, the Brexit-supporting Scottish secretary, will be "getting an early night".

And all Steve Barclay, the Brexit secretary, can look forward to is being made redundant at 11pm.

It’s party time at last for some (but you can cry if you want to)

RED BOX: COMMENT

Millennials must be on board for Brexit to succeed

Mercy Muroki – Politics researcher

Cheers!

Outside the cabinet Matthew Elliott, who was chief executive of Vote Leave, will be "toasting the moment with a bottle of Brexit Beer, produced by one of Vote Leave’s supporters" (pictured above).

Sir Craig Oliver, architect of the Remain campaign, is having dinner with friends. "I’m determined to be positive. At the risk of being pious — I want us to get on and make the best of it."

Asked how he was marking Brexit, Sir Keir Starmer, frontrunner for the Labour leadership, said: “I don’t know! My diary is completely controlled by my campaign team. I suspect I’ll be spending the evening in a hotel bar in Bristol preparing for the following day’s leadership hustings.”

David Lidington, who was May's deputy, says that he will be "playing some music: Bach, Mahler or Beethoven. To remind myself that we may be leaving the EU but will always be part of Europe".

Paul Harrison, former May spin doctor, said: "Just after the stroke of 11pm, I’ll be enjoying the sensation of no dramatic change whatsoever due to the implementation period Theresa May shrewdly negotiated."

Theresa May, it may not surprise you, has constituency engagements.

Anna Soubry, former Tory minister and leader of Change UK, will be "down the local pub with my Neil as ever. But we will be feeling very sad because our country has made a bad mistake".

Tom Watson, former Labour deputy leader, will be "listening to an AC/DC tribute band in Birmingham. As the lyrics go : 'dirty deeds, done dirt cheap'."

Ruth Davidson said: "Not to sound too Presbyterian, but it's a normal working day for me. No plans."

Peter Mandelson will be "reflecting on the huge success of Britain’s past membership of the EU and the need to maintain close ties to those with whom we have such strong common interests".

Jeremy Hunt, former foreign secretary, said: "Strangely as a remainer I want to paint the town red. So bloody fed up with it."

I asked David Cameron what he would be doing. "Ha," he replied. "Nice try."

RED BOX: COMMENT

Brexit challenge hinges on business sentiment

Adam Marshall – Director General of the British Chambers of Commerce

Need to know

GAME OF CHICKEN: Mike Pompeo, US secretary of state, warned Britain not to play up food safety concerns over chlorinated chicken as a tactic in trade deal negotiations with America. (The Times)

DON'T BANK ON IT: The Bank of England has downgraded UK growth by the biggest amount since the 2016 Brexit referendum and warned that Boris Johnson’s deal will damage Britain’s economic potential. (The Times)

TICKET TO TROUBLE: Boris Johnson faces a rebellion from up to 30 Tory MPs as he prepares to give HS2 the green light. (The Times)

BREXIT TAX CUT: Boris Johnson has approved an increase in the threshold at which workers start paying national insurance from £8,628 to £9,500, resulting in a tax cut of £104 for a typical employee starting in April. (Daily Telegraph)

VOTE-WINNER? Labour leadership hopeful Keir Starmer has called on Boris Johnson to give the three million European nationals living in the UK the right to vote, including in general elections. (Daily Mirror)

ANCHOR'S AWAY: ITN has said that the veteran newsreader Alastair Stewart left the broadcaster over multiple “errors of judgment” in his use of social media rather a single incident. (The Guardian)

RED BOX: COMMENT

Britain needs a vision for its second cities

John Kampfner – commentator

I asked you if HS2 should go ahead. Two-thirds said yes. Full result here

Have your say

Yesterday I asked how you will be marking Brexit day.

Simon Evers said: "As it happens, going to the cinema to see Little Women. Not relevant to Brexiting, I know, but perhaps to the Labour leadership contest?"

Michael Jack said: "I will mark the day by writing a letter to Guy Verhofstadt asking him if he is still willing to pursue the idea of displaced Europeans like me having individual citizen membership of the EU. Such a status would help to keep alive the concept of co-operation amongst Europe's citizens."

Enda Cullen said: "After dry January I shall be drinking Belgian beer."

Susan Malcolm said: "On Brexit Day I shall be burying my head in the sand, hoping it is all a bad dream."

Lynden Lever said: "I’ll be going to Newbury to organise a funeral! Just a coincidence."

Ursula Jones said: "I am going to be in the pub drinking with friends and praising Boris, he is the saviour of all us true English folk. Cheers, Boris."

Bill Bradbury said: "Will be staying in bed with the blankets pulled over me."

Bill Giles said: "I am going to celebrate on Saturday. Having been disappointed in March and October last year I don’t trust the Remainers not to spring another surprise to thwart Brexit at the last moment."

Chez said: "Too premature to mark 31st January. I shall keep the bubbly on hold for the Big Ben bong next December, when deals are done and dusted."

Ian Orlebar said: "Putting a pinch of salt on every altar in the Pantheon whilst praying to every god (and goddess — let's keep it woke!) for the mother of all hurricanes to strike Parliament Square at 11pm."

Henrique Laitenberger said: "An EU citizen myself, I will be at a party with British Remainer friends to celebrate the friendships and opportunities that likely would have been unthinkable without EU membership. We may even follow the example of MEPs and sing Auld Lang Syne once the clock strikes 11pm."

Bob Bullock said: "I shall simply dress in black, say a prayer for all the poor and vulnerable (and the JAMs) and scowl all day."

TODAY: Which big decision should Boris Johnson take next week? Email redbox@thetimes.co.uk and we'll use some of the best tomorrow.

The best comment

Brexit ‘liberation day’ is self-serving fantasy

Philip Collins – The Times

Level-headed Leavers don’t feel like gloating

Iain Martin – The Times

Is Laurence Fox’s welfare a concern?

Caitlin Moran – The Times

Why Britain Brexited

Tom McTague - The Atlantic

Brexit ruined our social lives. Can we now kiss and make up?

Mary Killen - The Spectator

The cartoon

Today's cartoon from The Times is by Peter Brookes

Now read this

For three days in October Britain and the European Union stared into the abyss of a no-deal Brexit, write Bruno Waterfield and Oliver Wright.

The crisis had been triggered by a call between Angela Merkel and the prime minister. Boris Johnson was in deal-making mode. Despite the British compromise, scrambled together during frantic shuttle diplomacy between London and Dublin, the EU refused to budge.

The conversation was bad tempered and, in a break with protocol, Downing Street went public. Officials briefed journalists that Germany's position meant that a Brexit deal was “essentially impossible, not just now but ever”. Mrs Merkel was accused of being prepared to “torpedo the Good Friday agreement” and put peace at risk.

Read the full story

TMS

From the diary

By Jack Blackburn

Lucan hunters get lucky again

Junketing journos are rejoicing at reports that Lord Lucan is masquerading as an Australian Buddhist. Once again they can rack up air miles in pursuit of the man who, for legal reasons, we must again call the alleged nanny-murdering aristocrat. King of the Lucan hunters was a Daily Mirror man, Garth Gibbs, who said that not finding Lucan was his “most spectacular success in journalism”, crowing that he had “successfully not found him in more exotic spots than anybody else”. He returned Lucan-less from Cape Town, Macau and Hong Kong. Undaunted, Gibbs thought he would give the Bahamas a try. He died in 2011 when, one expects, he finally met his man.