We’ll keep asking the one question Boris Johnson refuses to answer

Having ruled out an extension beyond December 2020 of negotiations on future relations with the EU, is the prime minister setting Britain up for a no-deal Brexit at the end of next year?

In an election, it can seem that politicians have an answer for everything. As they travel about from rally to TV debate to photo op, they are asked huge numbers of questions and in most cases are able to reel off a pre-packaged response packed with figures and dates and quotable buzzwords to bolster their cause.

So when they have literally nothing to say on an issue, that makes a reporter’s ears prick up.

In this case, it was the issue of whether – having ruled out an extension beyond December 2020 of negotiations on future relations with the EU – Boris Johnson is setting Britain up for a no-deal crash out at the end of next year. That seemed to me one of the biggest questions facing the country, so when I had a chance to buttonhole the prime minister on a campaign visit to Salisbury, I asked him whether businesses should be making contingency plans for no-deal.

He didn’t say yes and he didn’t say no. Instead, he told me a deal was already in place to leave the EU “smoothly and seamlessly” in January.

Now, Johnson knows full well that his withdrawal agreement doesn’t cover the sort of trade arrangements needed to avoid a crash-out on World Trade Organisation terms, and all the risks of disruption to transport and food supplies and British exports that it would imply, but simply defers the issue to the end of a transition period on New Year’s Eve 2020.

So I pointed out that we weren’t talking about the January divorce deal, but about the trade deal due to be completed by the (insanely tight, many experts say) deadline of 31 December. The same reply came back – we’ve got a deal to leave in January.

Intrigued, I asked him if he could advise companies that there was no need to spend money on preparing for a possible no-deal outcome in December. Once again, the same reply, pretty much word for word, focusing on the January divorce and completely ignoring the end-of-year cliff edge which his policies have created.

My colleague Ben Kentish had another go at the prime minister’s press conference at the Nato conference in Watford. Was he concerned that the UK might be leaving the EU in a year’s time with no trade deal with either the US or our former European partners?

This time, Johnson didn’t only ignore the issue, he brought the press conference to an abrupt halt, spluttering something about “nonsense” and “scraping the barrel”.

Clearly, it’s an issue the prime minister doesn’t want to discuss. Maybe because the prospect of a 2020 dominated by fraught negotiations with Brussels and overshadowed by business uncertainty and the looming threat of a chaotic no deal doesn’t quite chime with his optimistic election offer of “getting Brexit done” and moving on to other priorities.

But the fact that he has nothing to say on the subject doesn’t mean there’s nothing to see here. Far from it, once election day is past, there’s no doubt that the whole deal-or-no-deal show – complete with the familiar face of Michel Barnier and the last-minute wrangling and the calls for extensions and the fear of a crash out – will once again be back in town.

Yours,

Andrew Woodcock

Political editor