Brexit study hailed by Boris Johnson as solution to crisis concludes he is wrong to declare Theresa May’s deal ‘dead’

Hi-tech solutions to avoid Irish border checks three years away, so existing deal should be beefed up – not ripped up

Boris Johnson must drop his insistence that Theresa May’s Brexit deal is “dead” and sign a reworked agreement according to a final version of a study hailed by the next likely prime minister as a solution to the Irish border crisis.

The U-turn is recommended in a report on hi-tech solutions to avoid border checks, which calls for the existing deal to be beefed up – not ripped up, as the likely next prime minister wants.

Mr Johnson had hailed the “abundant” solutions in its interim report into so-called “alternative arrangements” as proof that the Irish backstop could be taken out of the divorce deal altogether.

But it says a full solution is up to three years away, calling instead for an “additional protocol into the existing withdrawal agreement” to make clear the backstop would never come into effect.

Its authors also again refused to estimate the cost of their proposals – while denying it would be “billions” – and admitted they would require security checks, albeit away from the border itself.

Calling for compromise, including by the new prime minister, the report’s author, Shanker Singham, said: “There will have to be ladders down on all sides.”

After the interim report was published last month, Mr Johnson said there was a way to “get rid of the backstop, in order to allow us to come out without this withdrawal agreement”.

He hardened his message at leadership hustings on Monday, calling the backstop “an instrument of our own incarceration in the single market and customs union – it needs to come out”.

The comments – and an identical commitment by his rival, Jeremy Hunt – slashed the odds on a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, causing sterling to slump sharply.

Brexit supporters view the backstop – a guarantee that an open border will continue – as a device to trap the UK indefinitely in a customs union with the EU.

But the full report, by the Prosperity UK think-tank, funded by a Brexit-supporting hedge fund manager, says the existing deal should be bolstered to ensure the backstop will “not be triggered”.

“Since these obligations are entirely on the UK side, it would be for the UK to ensure that the backstop is not triggered as long as it fulfils the commitments set out,” it recommends.

The obligations would be the gradual introduction of technology to allow checks to be carried out miles from the border and a “trusted trader” scheme – exempting all firms up to the VAT threshold of £85,000.

Nicky Morgan, the former Tory cabinet minister backing the study, said it required “pragmatism and goodwill on all sides”.

On the backstop protocol, she said: “You could have something that clarifies, that supersedes,” adding: “Here is something creative that will allow us to move onto the next stage.”

Ms Morgan admitted there would be “security costs” – as well as customs declarations costs – but argued they were “a matter for the UK government”, not for the authors to calculate.