Tag Archives: Prime Minister Boris Johnson

UK PM Johnson makes progress in COVID-19 fight, but still in intensive care

By Andy Bruce and Alistair Smout

LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson continues to make progress, four days after being admitted to hospital with COVID-19, but he remains in intensive care as officials signalled there was no end in sight to an unprecedented national lockdown.

Johnson, 55, was admitted to St Thomas’ Hospital on Sunday evening with a persistent high temperature and cough, and was rushed to intensive care on Monday where he has since spent three nights receiving treatment.

Ministers have said he has been sitting up in bed and talking to medical staff.

“He’s still in intensive care but he continues to make positive steps forward and he’s in good spirits,” Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said at a news conference in Downing Street.

Raab, who is deputising for Johnson during the most stringent shutdown in Britain’s peacetime history, said he had not spoken to the prime minister since he was admitted to intensive care.

“I think it’s important, particularly while he’s in intensive care, to let him focus on the recovery. We in the government have got this covered,” Raab told a news conference.

Earlier on Thursday, a Downing Street spokesman said Johnson had received oxygen support, but was not put on a ventilator.

The UK death toll in hospitals from coronavirus now stands at 7,978, a rise of 881 on the day but a smaller increase than the 938 seen in Wednesday’s data.

With Johnson absent and the death toll still mounting, the British government is wrestling with two major issues – how to finance a vast increase in state spending to support the shuttered economy, and when to start easing lockdown measures.

With the economy facing potentially the worst hit since World War Two, the government said it had expanded its overdraft facility with the Bank of England.

The central bank has agreed temporarily to finance government borrowing in response to COVID-19 if funds cannot immediately be raised from debt markets, reviving a measure last widely used during the 2008 financial crisis.

The BoE said it was a short-term measure and both it and government said any borrowing from the Ways and Means facility – effectively the government’s overdraft with the Bank – would be repaid by the end of the year.

The government has made pledges costing tens of billions of pounds to support businesses and workers hit by the virus. On Thursday, the government said an additional 1.2 million claims for welfare payments had been filed since March 16.

NO END TO LOCKDOWN

Raab said the peak of the virus outbreak had yet to be reached and that the government would not be able to say more about the duration of the lockdown until late next week, once experts have had chance to analyse data on how well it is working. It was introduced last month.

“The measures will have to stay in place until we’ve got the evidence that clearly shows we’ve moved beyond the peak,” he said.

While Johnson’s condition was said to be improving, it was unclear how long he might be incapacitated, with some political commentators saying there was a power vacuum in his absence.

Raab said on Thursday he had the power to make “necessary decisions” in the prime minister’s absence and that government will continue to follow the strategy set out by Johnson. He said cabinet could take decisions collectively.

The United Kingdom is entering what scientists say is the deadliest phase of the outbreak, with deaths expected to continue to rise over the Easter weekend.

But in a sign the shutdown measures were working, health officials have said the number of coronavirus infections and hospital admissions had begun to show signs of flattening.

“We’ve always been clear that it would take a period of time to see the impact of those measures in the statistics that we publish every day,” Johnson’s spokesman said.

“We’ve always said that if the scientific advice suggests further steps are needed we’d be prepared to take them, but for now our focus is on ensuring the steps we already have in place are properly enforced.”

Police said they would be taking tougher action to do just that before the four-day Easter holiday weekend because many people were continuing to ignore the ban on social gatherings.

(Additional reporting by Kate Holton; Writing by Michael Holden and Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Stephen Addison)

UK PM Johnson ‘clinically stable’ in intensive care battling COVID-19

UK PM Johnson ‘clinically stable’ in intensive care battling COVID-19
By Elizabeth Piper and Kylie MacLellan

LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was “clinically stable” in intensive care on Wednesday and responding to treatment for COVID-19 complications, amid questions about how key coronavirus crisis decisions would be made in his absence.

Johnson, who tested positive nearly two weeks ago, was admitted to St Thomas’ hospital on Sunday evening with a persistent high temperature and cough but his condition deteriorated and he was rushed into an intensive care unit.

The 55-year-old British leader has received oxygen support but was not put on a ventilator and his designated deputy, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, said he would soon be back at the helm as the world faces one of its gravest public health crisis in a century.

Downing Street said that Johnson was not working, but was able to contact people if needed.

“The prime minister remains clinically stable and is responding to treatment. He is in good spirits,” Johnson’s spokesman said, similar to what Downing Street has been saying over the past two days.

As Johnson battled the novel coronavirus in hospital, the United Kingdom was entering what scientists said was the deadliest phase of the outbreak and grappling with the question of when to lift the lockdown.

Inside the government, ministers were debating how long the world’s fifth-largest economy could afford to be shut down, and the long-term implications of one of the most stringent set of emergency controls in peacetime history.

The United Kingdom’s total hospital deaths from COVID-19 rose by a record 786 to 6,159 as of 1600 GMT on April 6, the latest publicly available death toll, though just 213,181 people out of the population of around 68 million have been tested.

Britain was in no position to lift the shutdown as the peak of the outbreak was still over a week away, London Mayor Sadiq Khan said.

“We are nowhere near lifting the lockdown,” Khan said.

ACTING PM RAAB?

Johnson was breathing without any assistance and had not required respiratory support, said Raab, who said the prime minister, whom he described as “a fighter”, remained in charge.

There are few precedents in British history of a prime minister being incapacitated at a time of major crisis, though Winston Churchill suffered a stroke while in office in 1953 and Tony Blair twice underwent heart treatment in the 2000s.

Johnson has delegated some authority to Raab, who was appointed foreign minister less than a year ago, though any major decisions – such as when to lift the lockdown – would in effect need the blessing of Johnson’s cabinet.

Britain’s uncodified constitution – an unwieldy collection of sometimes ancient and contradictory precedents – offers no clear, formal “Plan B”. In essence, it is the prime minister’s call and, if he is incapacitated, then up to cabinet to decide.

Raab said ministers had “very clear directions, very clear instructions” from Johnson but it was not clear what would happen if crucial decisions needed to be made which strayed from the approved plan.

Michael Heseltine, who served as deputy prime minister to John Major in the 1990s, told the Telegraph Raab’s position needed to be clarified.

Former Foreign Secretary Malcolm Rifkind said most major decisions over the coronavirus strategy had been taken with the important exception of whether or not to ease the lockdown, a call that will need to be made in the next week or soon after.

“That is not just a medical judgement. It has to be a balance between the medical considerations and the consequences of leaving the whole economy shut down,” Rifkind told BBC TV.

While such a decision would be made by cabinet even if Johnson were not unwell, he said Britain’s prime minister had authority and sway as the “primus inter pares” – Latin for “first among equals” – others did not.

“He very often can steer the direction in a particular way. Dominic Raab doesn’t have the authority nor would he claim it,” Rifkind said.

(Additional reporting by Kate Holton, Costas Pitas, Sarah Young, and David Milliken; writing by Michael Holden and Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Nick Macfie)

Britain speeds towards Brexit as Johnson wins large majority in election

By Guy Faulconbridge and William James

LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson won a resounding election victory on Friday that will allow him to end three years of political paralysis and take Britain out of the European Union by Jan. 31.

Brexit represents the country’s biggest political and economic gamble since World War Two, cutting the world’s fifth largest economy adrift from the vast trading bloc and threatening the integrity of the United Kingdom.

For Johnson, who campaigned on a vow to “Get Brexit Done”, victory was a vindication after anti-Brexit opponents tried one maneuver after another to thwart him during his first chaotic months in office.

“We will get Brexit done on time by the 31st of January, no ifs, no buts, no maybes,” a triumphant Johnson told supporters at a rally in London.

“Leaving the European Union as one United Kingdom, taking back control of our laws, borders, money, our trade, immigration system, delivering on the democratic mandate of the people,” he said, reprising the refrains of his successful Brexit referendum campaign of 2016.

Sterling soared, on course for one of its biggest one-day gains in the past two decades

Nearly half a century after Britain joined the EU, Johnson must now strike new international trade deals, preserving London’s position as a top global financial capital and keeping the United Kingdom together.

That last goal looks more challenging, with Scotland voting for a nationalist party that wants an independence referendum, and Irish nationalists performing strongly in Northern Ireland.

“Boris Johnson may have a mandate to take England out of the European Union. He emphatically does not have a mandate to take Scotland out of the European Union,” said Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon.

Her Scottish National Party (SNP) won 48 of Scotland’s 59 seats in the national parliament.

RED WALL CRUMBLES

In England, the Conservatives won large numbers of seats in the opposition Labour Party’s so-called Red Wall, declining industrial heartlands once hostile to Johnson’s party.

Brexit, which has shattered old party loyalties and divided Britain along new fault lines, was the cause of the shift. In the Red Wall, a majority of voters favored leaving the European Union and rejected Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s ambiguous stance on the issue.

In a symbolic win, the Conservatives took Sedgefield, once held by former Prime Minister Tony Blair, Labour’s most successful leader.

Educated at Eton, the country’s most elite private school, and known for his bombastic rhetoric, Johnson seemed to critics to be an unlikely candidate to win over working class communities, but Brexit helped him redraw the electoral map.

In his victory speech, he struck a rare note of humility as he addressed voters who had deserted Labour in his favor.

“Your hand may have quivered over the ballot paper before you put your cross in the Conservative box, and you may hope to return to Labour next time round, and if that is the case, I am humbled that you have put your trust in me,” he said.

U.S. President Donald Trump was quick to congratulate Johnson.

“Britain and the United States will now be free to strike a massive new Trade Deal after BREXIT. This deal has the potential to be far bigger and more lucrative than any deal that could be made with the E.U.,” Trump wrote on Twitter “Celebrate Boris!”

European politicians were less enthusiastic.

German lawmaker Norbert Roettgen of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party said “the British people have decided and we have to accept their choice. With Johnson’s victory Brexit has become inevitable”.

NO MORE DELAYS

Johnson, 55, will now be able to lead Britain out of the EU by Jan. 31, 10 months after the original deadline of March 29, which was repeatedly pushed back as a gridlocked parliament failed to take any clear decisions on Brexit.

However, with the complex task of negotiating his country’s future relationship with the bloc still ahead of him, he may struggle to reunite a divided nation.

Many voters regard him as a populist charlatan who played fast and loose with the facts and made unrealistic promises.

But his landslide win marks the ultimate failure of the anti-Brexit camp, who tried to thwart the 2016 referendum vote through complex legislative maneuvers and could not convert huge anti-Brexit street protests into a coherent political strategy.

With Labour split and unclear on Brexit, the strongly anti-Brexit Liberal Democrats had hoped to do well but they won only 11 seats, a crushing result. Party leader Jo Swinson lost her seat in Scotland to the SNP and resigned.

With results in from all but one of the 650 parliamentary seats, the Conservatives had won 364, their biggest election win since Margaret Thatcher’s 1987 triumph.

Labour, led since 2015 by the veteran socialist Corbyn, had won just 203 seats, the party’s worst result since 1935.

Corbyn’s offer of nationalizations and big state spending failed to win over voters, while his equivocal position on Brexit left many angry and confused, especially in Red Wall areas where large majorities had voted for Brexit in 2016.

Corbyn said he would quit as Labour leader after a “process of reflection”.

The party now faces a brutal battle between Corbyn’s socialist followers and his centrist critics.

A SOFTER BREXIT?

After Jan. 31, Britain will enter a transition period during which it will negotiate a new relationship with the EU.

This can run until the end of 2022, but the Conservatives have pledged not to extend the transition beyond 2020.

A big majority may allow Johnson to extend trade talks beyond 2020 because he could overrule the Brexit hardline European Research Group (ERG) faction in the party.

“The bigger the Tory majority of course the less influence over this the ERG and Eurosceptics will have,” said hardline Brexiteer Nigel Farage, whose anti-EU campaigning played a major part in persuading former Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron to call the 2016 referendum.

“It will be called Brexit but it won’t really be,” Farage said.

Johnson was helped by Farage’s Brexit Party, which stood down hundreds of candidates to prevent the pro-Brexit vote from being split. The insurgent party poached a significant number of voters from Labour.

In his victory speech, Johnson gave no details of how he would handle Brexit after Jan. 31. Instead, he made a typically light-hearted offer to his supporters.

“Let’s get Brexit done but first, my friends, let’s get breakfast done.”

 

(Reporting by Alistair Smout, Elizabeth Piper, David Milliken, Kate Holton, Kylie MacLellan, Andy Bruce, Paul Sandle, William James, Michael Urquhart, Tommy Reggiori Wilkes, Costas Pitas and Andy MacAskill in London and Michel Rose in Brussels; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge, Michael Holden and Estelle Shirbon; Editing by William Maclean and Giles Elgood)

 

 

Brexit on a knife edge as PM Johnson stakes all on ‘Super Saturday’ vote

Brexit on a knife edge as PM Johnson stakes all on ‘Super Saturday’ vote
By Guy Faulconbridge and Kate Holton

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s exit from the European Union hung on a knife-edge on Friday as Prime Minister Boris Johnson scrambled to persuade doubters to rally behind his last-minute European Union divorce deal in an extraordinary vote in parliament.

In one of the most striking flourishes of the three-year Brexit drama, Johnson confounded his opponents on Thursday by clinching a new deal with the EU, even though the bloc had promised it would never reopen a treaty it agreed last year.

Yet Johnson, the face of the Brexit campaign in the 2016 referendum, must now ratify the deal in the British parliament where he has no majority and opponents are plotting maximum political damage ahead of an imminent election.

The numbers are too close to call: Johnson must garner 318 votes in the 650-seat parliament to get a deal approved. Yet his Northern Irish allies are opposed to a deal and the three main opposition parties have pledged to vote it down.

“We’ve got a great new deal that takes back control — now parliament should get Brexit done on Saturday,” Johnson said ahead of the first Saturday sitting of parliament since the 1982 Argentine invasion of the Falkland Islands.

If he wins the vote, Johnson will go down in history as the leader who delivered Brexit – for good or bad. If he fails, Johnson will face the humiliation of Brexit unraveling after repeatedly promising that he would get it done.

Goldman Sachs said it thought the deal would pass and raised its estimate of Brexit with a deal on Oct. 31 to 65% from 60%. It cut its odds on a no-deal departure to 10% from 15% and kept unchanged its 25% probability of no Brexit.

The pound held at five-month highs of $1.2874 against the dollar, down from Thursday’s peak of $1.2988.

Johnson won the top job by staking his career on getting Brexit done by the latest deadline of Oct. 31 after his predecessor, Theresa May, was forced to delay the departure date. Parliament rejected her deal three times, by margins of between 58 and 230 votes.

Downing Street is casting the Saturday vote as a last chance to get Brexit done with lawmakers facing the option of either approving the deal or propelling the United Kingdom to a disorderly no-deal exit that could divide the West, hurt global growth and trigger violence in Northern Ireland.

‘PRETTY CLOSE’

To win the vote, Johnson must persuade enough Brexit-supporting rebels in both his own Conservative Party and the opposition Labour Party to back his deal.

Concerned about the potential impact of a no-deal departure, Johnson’s opponents have already passed a law demanding he delay Brexit unless he gets a withdrawal deal approved by Saturday.

The government has said both that it will comply with this law and that Britain will leave the EU on Oct. 31 whatever happens. Johnson has not explained how he plans to take these two apparently contradictory steps.

The message from Johnson’s advisers is: “New deal or no deal but no delay.”

The prime minister was due to hold a cabinet meeting at 1500 GMT on Friday.

As lawmakers mull one of the United Kingdom’s most significant geopolitical moves since World War Two, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators are due to march towards parliament demanding another referendum on EU membership.

Parliament will sit from 0830 GMT on Saturday. Johnson will make a statement to lawmakers, after which there will be a debate and then a vote. The debate was originally scheduled to last 90 minutes, but is no longer time-limited.

NORTHERN IRISH OPPOSITION

The Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) said it would oppose the deal and lobby a faction of around 28 hardline Brexit supporters in the Conservative Party to do the same.

“We will be encouraging (other lawmakers to vote against) because we believe it does have an impact on the unity of the United Kingdom, will spark further nationalist sentiment in Scotland and will be detrimental to the economy of Northern Ireland,” the DUP’s Sammy Wilson said.

“Voting this down tomorrow is not the end of the game, in fact it probably opens up possibilities for the government which are not available at present after a general election.”

Without the DUP’s 10 votes, Johnson will need Brexit-supporting Labour Party rebels to support his deal.

Saturday’s vote will be “pretty close” but likely just fall short of approval, said John McDonnell, the second most powerful person in the Labour Party.

“I don’t believe it will pass, I think it will be defeated but… the numbers are going to be pretty close,” McDonnell told Sky News.

If the vote is a tie, then the speaker of parliament, John Bercow, would hold the deciding vote. According to vague convention, the speaker would seek to keep the issue open for further discussion.

(Additional reporting by Elizabeth Piper and William James; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Frances Kerry)

UK PM Johnson makes final Brexit offer to cool EU reception

By Elizabeth Piper, William James and Kylie MacLellan

MANCHESTER, England (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a final Brexit offer to the European Union on Wednesday and said that unless the bloc compromised, Britain would leave without a deal at the end of this month.

In what supporters cast as a moment of truth after more than three years of crisis, Johnson stuck to his hard line on Brexit, giving some of the first, albeit vague, details of what he described as “constructive and reasonable proposals”.

With the Oct. 31 Brexit deadline moving closer, Johnson’s aides cast the proposals to be delivered to Brussels as London’s final gambit to try to break the deadlock – principally over arrangements for the Irish border – and find a path to a smooth departure from the EU.

“We are coming out of the EU on October 31, come what may,” Johnson told party members, after expressing “love” for Europe in a speech that focused mostly on domestic issues such as health, the economy and crime.

“We are tabling what I believe are constructive and reasonable proposals which provide a compromise for both sides,” Johnson said. “Let us be in no doubt that the alternative is no deal.”

Many diplomats fear the United Kingdom is heading towards a no-deal or another delay as they say the British proposals are not enough to get an agreement by Oct. 31. Johnson said further delay was “pointless and expensive”.

The initial reaction from other European capitals was cool. Berlin and Paris said they were awaiting details.

EU diplomats and officials in Brussels were less polite with one calling the reported proposals “fundamentally flawed”.

“If it’s take it or leave it, we better close the book and start talking about the modalities of an extension,” a senior EU official told Reuters.

“Essentially it is a non-runner,” said another EU diplomat.

NO DEAL?

Quitting the EU is Britain’s most significant geopolitical move since World War Two. It is, though, still uncertain if it will leave with a deal or without one – or even not leave at all.

Deutsche Bank said it saw a 50 percent chance of a no-deal Brexit by the end of the year. This would spook financial markets, send shockwaves through the global economy and divide the West. It could also bring chaos to British ports and disrupt supply lines in goods from food products to car parts.

Despite Johnson’s repeated promises to deliver Brexit on Oct. 31, parliament has passed a law stating that Britain must request a delay if it does not have a deal by Oct. 19. Johnson has repeatedly refused to say how he will get around the law.

A senior British official said: “The government is either going to be negotiating a new deal or working on no deal – nobody will work on delay.”

Ireland, whose 500 km (300 mile) land border with the United Kingdom, will become the frontier of the EU’s single market and customs union, is crucial to any Brexit solution.

The problem is how to prevent Northern Ireland becoming a back door into the EU market without erecting border controls that could undermine the 1998 Good Friday Agreement that ended decades of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland in which more than 3,600 people were killed.

The Withdrawal Agreement that former Prime Minister Theresa May struck last November with the EU says the United Kingdom will remain in a customs union “unless and until” alternative arrangements are found to avoid a hard border.

Johnson said Britain had compromised in putting forward a proposal to try to change that so-called backstop, an insurance policy to ensure there is no return to a hard border.

Giving little detail on his proposals, Johnson said there would be no checks at or near the Irish border. He said London would respect the 1998 peace agreement. He did not explain how.

IRELAND

Britain would “protect the existing regulatory arrangements for farmers and other businesses on both sides of the border” while Northern Ireland would leave the bloc alongside the rest of the United Kingdom, he said.

“By a process of renewable democratic consent by the executive and assembly of Northern Ireland,” Johnson said. “We will go further and protect the existing regulatory arrangements for farmers and other businesses on both sides of the border.”

He said the United Kingdom “whole and entire” would withdraw from the EU, with London keeping control of its own trade policy from the start. Technology could offer a solution, he said, without giving details.

“I hope very much that our friends understand that and compromise in their turn,” said Johnson, who took office in July after May stood down.

With the EU already pouring cold water on some of the reports of his proposal, the likelihood of a no deal appears to be rising – something Johnson’s opponents say they believe is the prime minister’s overriding goal.

John McDonnell, finance policy chief for the opposition Labour Party, described Johnson’s proposals as “a cynical attempt to force through a no-deal Brexit”.

Johnson has repeatedly said he wants a deal.

(Additional reporting by John Chalmers and Gabriela Baczynska in Brussels; Writing by Elizabeth Piper and Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Angus MacSwan)

Brexit ‘inferno’ lays bare a divided United Kingdom

By Guy Faulconbridge and Elizabeth Piper

LONDON (Reuters) – The fury of Britain’s Brexit “inferno” is so intense that it could encourage violence unless politicians tone down their rhetoric, the husband of a lawmaker murdered a week before the 2016 EU referendum said on Thursday.

Parliament reached boiling point on Wednesday when Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his opponents engaged in hours of vitriolic argument over Brexit, with lawmakers hurling allegations of betrayal and abuse of power across the chamber.

Jo Cox, a 41-year-old parliamentarian from the opposition Labour Party, was murdered on June 16, 2016 by Thomas Mair, a loner obsessed with Nazis and extreme right-wing ideology. She was the mother of two young children.

Cox’s husband Brendan said he was shocked by the inflammatory language on display and both sides should ponder the impact of the words they used.

When asked how his late wife might have responded, Cox said: “She would have tried to take a generosity of spirit to it and thought about how at this moment you can step back from this growing inferno of rhetoric.”

“To descend into this bear pit of polarization is dangerous for our country,” he told the BBC. “It creates an atmosphere where violence and attacks are more likely.”

Brexit has illustrated a United Kingdom divided about much more than the European Union and has fueled soul-searching about everything from secession and immigration to capitalism, empire and Britishness itself.

The rage and ferocity of the Brexit debate have shocked allies of a country that has prided itself as a confident – and mostly tolerant – pillar of Western economic and political stability.

Cox was clear that the language across the Brexit schism was troubling and that the United Kingdom needed to come together rather than tear itself apart.

Some on both sides of the debate are now using the politics of contrived outrage to argue their point. Johnson says parliament is betraying the will of the people over Brexit, while opponents cast him a dictator who has ridden roughshod over democracy to take the United Kingdom to the brink of ruin.

Parliamentary speaker John Bercow told lawmakers to stop treating each other as enemies, saying the atmosphere in the House of Commons was the worst he had known since he was elected 22 years ago.

“The culture was toxic,” Bercow said in parliament.

BREXIT SCHISM

Johnson returned to the chamber on Wednesday after the Supreme Court ruled that his decision to suspend parliament earlier this month was unlawful.

He goaded his opponents either to bring down the government or get out of the way to allow him to deliver Brexit. His opponents roared “resign” and some cast him as a cheating dictator who should stand aside after the court ruling.

Johnson provoked anger by repeatedly calling a law that forces him to ask the EU for a Brexit delay unless he can strike a deal as “the Surrender Bill”. Speaking to Conservative lawmakers on Thursday, he defended his use of the term and received support from the party.

Johnson told the 1922 Committee: “It IS a surrender act,” arguing that it hurt Britain’s negotiating stance with the EU. The prime minister added that he took threats to lawmakers very seriously.

But some were still furious over his response on Wednesday to a question about Jo Cox.

Labour’s Paula Sherriff told the House she had received death threats, some of which echoed the prime minister’s own rhetoric. Johnson replied: “I have never heard so much humbug in my life”, sparking uproar.

It was not just politicians who were angry. Johnson’s own sister Rachel described her brother’s words as a “particularly tasteless” way to refer to the memory of a murdered lawmaker.

“Words like collaborationist, traitor, betrayal, my brother using words like surrender, capitulation, as if the people who are standing in the way of the blessed will of the people as defined by 17.4 million votes in 2016 should be hung, drawn, quartered, tarred and feathered,” she told Sky News.

“I think that it highly reprehensible language to use.”

In the 2016 referendum, 17.4 million voters, or 52 percent, backed Brexit while 16.1 million, or 48 percent, voted to remain.

But after more than three years of crisis since then, it remains unclear how, when or even whether the country will leave the bloc it joined in 1973.

Nicholas Soames, grandson of Britain’s World War Two leader Winston Churchill, said the atmosphere in the chamber was the most poisonous he could remember in 37 years in parliament. “I despair, to be frank,” Soames, 71, said.

(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Andrew MacAskill, Angus MacSwan and Giles Elgood)