Boris Johnson news: Labour calls Swinson 'childish' after Lib Dem leader rejects Corbyn plan to thwart no-deal Brexit by becoming PM
Conservative MP breaks ranks to support plan as Brexit crisis continues
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Your support makes all the difference.Jeremy Corbyn has challenged opposition parties and Tory rebels to instal him as caretaker prime minister so he can call a general election and prevent a no-deal Brexit under Boris Johnson.
Jo Swinson dismissed the plan as “nonsense”, saying the Labour leader could not unite opposition MPs, before proposing either Ken Clarke or Harriet Harman as a more suitable caretaker PM.
But Labour MPs rallied around the plan, urging Ms Swinson to reconsider her position.
The Lib Dem leader was branded “childish” by shadow education secretary Angela Rayner. The SNP, meanwhile, claimed they would work with Mr Corbyn, while a group of rebel Tory MPs said they were “happy to meet” him to discuss his plan.
Ms Swinson said she wanted to meet Mr Corbyn to discuss a solution to the Brexit crisis.
Meanwhile, the caretaker government plan has infuriated Tory MPs.
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said: "I think it's absolutely extraordinary that any Conservative MP considered even for one minute installing Jeremy Corbyn in Downing Street.
"Jeremy Corbyn would wreck our economy, he would destroy jobs and the livelihoods, savings, I think he also can't be trusted with security or crime and ... I just think that any Conservative should think very, very hard about doing this. It actually presents a very clear choice.
"You either have Jeremy Corbyn as prime minister overturning the result of the referendum or Boris Johnson respecting the referendum, putting more money into the NHS, more police on the streets to keep us all safe."
Conservative MP Guto Bebb did break ranks to support Mr Corbyn's plan.
If you would like to see how the day's news unfolded, please see what was our live coverage below:
Labour will attempt to bring down Boris Johnson's government within "days" of MPs returning to parliament after the summer recess, in an effort to stop a no-deal Brexit.
The Independent Group for Change - once known as Change UK - has also rejected Jeremy Corbyn's caretaker government proposal.
Anna Soubry, who leads the group of five MPs, said Mr Corbyn "is not the person given he struggles to maintain the confidence of his own backbenchers".
Jeremy Corbyn's proposal has been met with cautious optimism from some of the smaller parties.
Plaid Cymru's Westminster leader Liz Saville Roberts has said her party is open to a unity government regardless of who leads it.
A Conservative MP has broken ranks to support making Jeremy Corbyn a caretaker prime minister to avert the “generational damage” from a no-deal Brexit.
Guto Bebb criticised other parties and MPs fighting a crash-out from the EU who have rejected the Labour leader’s offer – after the Liberal Democrats branded it nonsense.
“Those who have said they will do any necessary to stop the long-term damage of a no-deal exit must take seriously this type of offer,” Mr Bebb said.
“I certainly take the view that a short-term Jeremy Corbyn government is less damaging than the generational damage that would be caused by a no-deal Brexit.”
More details here:
An interesting development; former Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman has tweeted in support of Jeremy Corbyn, saying the
Labour leader was "right to reach out across parties to stop No Deal Brexit".
"No Deal Brexit would be catastrophic," she said.
"We will all work together to enable Parliament to prevent the deep damage a No Deal Brexit would do to our country!"
The mother of the House was proposed as a possible caretaker prime minister by the Liberal Democrats.
Earlier today Jo Swinson said Ms Harman had told her she was open to the role.
If you missed this earlier - mental health charity Mind has criticised Boris Johnson over his comments yesterday which linked crime and mental health.
"The prime minister has been criticised for broadly linking mental healthissues to various kinds of crime across the UK," writes Harry Cockburn.
"Mental health charity Mind, said Boris Johnson should exercise caution in the associating violent crime with mental health problems and pointed out that people who suffer from mental health problems are more likely to be at risk themselves than the other way round.
"Mr Johnson was speaking during his first Facebook Live “People’s PMQs”, in which he answered questions from the public."
Read more here:
Predictably, Boris Johnson is not happy about Jeremy Corbyn's caretaker government plan.
A spokesperson for the prime minister's office said the Labour leader was showing contempt for the 2016 referendum.
"Jeremy Corbyn believes that the people are the servants and politicians can cancel public votes they don't like," the spokesperson said.
A Labour grandee has claimed the party has eradicated antisemitism.
Lord Roy Hattersley said he believes the party has got rid of the "ghastly" problem.
The former MP and deputy leader of the party said the issue within its ranks "came as a shock, a surprise and a horror to me" as he blasted Jeremy Corbyn's response to it.
He spoke out during an appearance at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
Although highly critical of the party's response, Lord Hattersley said: "I think we have managed to expunge the party of that ghastly condition.
"We didn't do it quickly enough, we didn't do it tough enough and we weren't positive enough in our determination to expunge anti-Semitism but we've now done it.
He added: "I was appalled to find that we had a problem. Until the problem became public, I had not the faintest idea that the problem existed.
"The fact that it exists came as a shock, a surprise and a horror to me and was made all the more horrible to me by the slowness of which we tried to wipe it out.
"I think we have done that now or may have driven some of it underground but it's not there in the way it was six months ago."
Lord Hattersley has been critical of Jeremy Corbyn's leadership but said he may now stand a chance of taking Labour back into Government.
"The fundamental reason that I was opposed to his election as leader was I did not believe that Labour would win an election under his leadership," he said, arguing the party "has a moral duty to win elections".
"I suppose I have to consider the possibility that I might be wrong - it is just possible that Jeremy might win."
"We’ve become so conditioned to the madness, now we let it all slide by in a numb trance," argues our columnist Mark Steel.
"We could see Boris Johnson in a battleship up the Thames, giving orders to shell the of the Houses of Parliament, as he announces: “We won a referendum to bring back power to parliament, which is why it’s essential to destroy parliament, so parliament can no longer oppose the will of parliament by continuing to sit in parliament.”
"And most of us would go: “At least it’s a sunny day for it.”
"Every day a report comes out, such as the one that predicted half of Britain’s farms would go bankrupt in a no-deal Brexit, and it’s dismissed as scaremongering, as it was written by people who know nothing about farming, such as farmers and economists and farming economists.
"Because if you really want to know about farming you do what any sensible person does and consult Priti Patel."
Read more here:
The UK has insisted Iran must abide by its assurances that a supertanker will not proceed to Syria following its release by authorities in Gibraltar.
A Foreign Office spokesman, commenting following the reported release of Grace 1, said: "The UK notes the conclusion of Gibraltar's legal proceedings and the steps Gibraltar's authorities have taken to prevent the ship's cargo from reaching Syria in contravention of EU Syria sanctions.
"We note the Government of Gibraltar has received assurances from Iran that the Grace 1 will not proceed to Syria.
"Iran must abide by the assurances they have provided. We will not stand by and allow Iran - or anyone - to bypass vital EU sanctions on a regime that has deployed chemical weapons against its own people.
"There is no comparison or linkage between Iran's unacceptable and illegal seizure of, and attacks on, commercial shipping vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and the enforcement of EU Syria sanctions by the Government of Gibraltar.
"Freedom of navigation for commercial shipping must be respected and international law upheld."
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