Boris Johnson could go to prison if he refuses to delay Brexit, Lord MacDonald says 

Boris Johnson could go to prison if he refuses to delay Brexit, the former Director of Public Prosecutions has said. 

Lord MacDonald, 66, said today that should Johnson decide to ignore a bill which prevents a No Deal exit he could face prosecution.

This is because, should Johnson ignore the bill, he could be found in contempt of court. Asked if it would be ‘an extreme outcome’, Lord MacDonald said ‘it is by convention that if you are found guilty of defying a court order then you are jailed’.

A rebel anti-No Deal law is expected to receive Royal Assent on Monday after peers agreed to its passage on Friday. 

It will require the PM to seek a Brexit delay beyond October 31 if Britain and Brussels have not struck an agreement in the run up to Halloween.  

Johnson has earlier said he would not entertain seeking another deadline extension from Brussels, as the incoming law compels him to do so if no agreement is in place by October 19. 

But Mr MacDonald added, in an interview with Sky News: ‘A refusal in the face of that would amount to contempt of court which could find that person in prison.’ 

Last night, the PM wrote to all Tory members to indicate that he would rather defy the law than beg Brussels for a delay in bringing Britain out of the EU.

The Prime Minister said he was only bound ‘in theory’ by a law which is expected to receive Royal Assent on Monday, taking a No Deal Brexit off the table.

In his letter, he reiterated his determination to stand firm against Remainers, saying: ‘They just passed a law that would force me to beg Brussels for an extension to the Brexit deadline. This is something I will never do.’

And his special adviser Dominic Cummings is reported to have a ‘different interpretation’ of the anti-No Deal legislation, believing it won’t force Mr Johnson to ask for a Brexit extension.

Earlier on Friday, Mr Johnson told reporters he would not entertain seeking another deadline extension from Brussels, as the incoming law compels him to do so if no agreement is in place by October 19.

He was urged last night by Tory grandee Iain Duncan Smith to hold his nerve, saying he would be ‘martyred’ if he chose to break the law and risk a possible prison sentence for contempt of Parliament.

Mr Duncan Smith told The Telegraph: ‘This is about Parliament versus the people. Boris Johnson is on the side of the people, who voted to leave the EU.

‘The people are sovereign because they elect Parliament. But Parliament wants to stop the will of the people.’

But others, including his cabinet ministers, are urging him to abandon his Brexit strategy and ‘come up with a plan B’ after his plans for a snap general election were thwarted by opposition parties. 

And Dominic Grieve, a former Tory MP who had the whip removed for rebelling last week, said: ‘He can’t ignore the law. A Prime Minister is subject to the law of the land just like anybody else. 

‘If he were to attempt to ignore it the government would be taken to court and he would be ordered to send the letter.

‘And if he didn’t send the letter he would be sent to prison for contempt.’ 

It comes as:

• Cabinet ministers told the PM to ‘come up with a plan B’ amid failed snap election
• Members of European Research Group are reported to be in talks with Brexit Party
• A Daily Mail poll shows the public back a No Deal exit over Jeremy Corbyn for PM
• Anti-No Deal bill is set to receive Royal Assent on Monday after debate this week
• The former Tory MP Dominic Grieve said the Prime Minister ‘can’t ignore the law’ 

Also today, it was reported that Boris Johnson’s controversial adviser believes the Prime Minister won’t have to ask for a Brexit extension under the new anti-No Deal legislation.

Dominic Cummings, 47, is understood to have a ‘different interpretation’ of the meaning and effect of the rebel legislation – which is expected to receive royal assent on Monday.

The legislation is thought to require the PM to seek a Brexit delay beyond October 31 if Britain and Brussels have not struck an agreement in the run up to Halloween. 

But Mr Cummings, at a special advisers meeting last night, is alleged to have said the Prime Minister will not need to do this, according to Sky News – sparking a fierce debate of how legally watertight the new legislation is. 

And also at the meeting, is reported to have suggested that Mr Johnson will spend the next five weeks campaigning – irrespective of whether an election has been called. 

Mr Johnson’s latest plans for a snap election appeared to have been scuppered yet again last night by a ‘stitch-up’ between Jeremy Corbyn and Remain parties. 

Labour, the Lib Dems and Scots and Welsh nationalists agreed to block the public going to the polls before October 31. 

It leaves the Prime Minister in limbo, forced to choose between resigning or defying a law passed by MPs ruling out a No Deal Brexit.

He has emphatically ruled out further delay.   

If Mr Johnson fails to carry out the will of Parliament, he risks being taken to court and, if a judge ordered him to obey Parliament, he could be held in contempt and even jailed for refusing.  

One senior government figure has now said his whole strategy is ‘in tatters’ and that he needs to have a ‘fundamental re-think’ of Downing Street’s approach.  

It came as the Conservative party remained at loggerheads over the Brexit crisis. 

But today, it emerged that Members of the European Research Group are reported to have held ‘very tentative’ discussions with the Brexit Party leader over the possibility of a pact saying it ‘would be mad’ not to pursue one.  

But there are concerns the plan may be thwarted by Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s chief strategist, who as director of Vote Leave refused to join forces with Nigel Farage when he helped run Leave.EU.

A source told The Daily Telegraph: ‘There have been conversations between the Brexit Party and the ERG. Not just with Farage but also at a local level. The feeling is that it would be mad to let the Remainers do an alliance but not the Brexiteeers.’    

The news comes as senior Tory Brexiteer Steve Baker warned on Tuesday that Boris Johnson must do a deal with the Brexit Party ahead of a snap general election in order to have any hope of winning a majority. 

The new law blocking no-deal will rule out an early election before the European Council summit on October 17 as Labour and other opposition parties want the threat of leaving the EU on Halloween to have expired before agreeing to a fresh poll. 

Labour, the Liberal Democrats, SNP and Plaid Cymru met on Friday and agreed to block the PM’s election request when it is put to the House of Commons again on Monday.

A similar motion was defeated by MPs on Wednesday, failing to make the two-thirds threshold needed to dissolve Parliament.

Opposition parties believe they have successfully backed Mr Johnson into a corner on his pledge to leave on October 31 ‘do or die.’

They will vote down or abstain when the Prime Minister tables another general election bid on Monday.

The Prime Minister has been forced down two alleys: resign or quit. He will resign if he has to make that choice, according to the Spectator’s Political Editor, James Forsyth.

Writing in the Sun, he said a source  had told him: ‘The public increasingly realise that MPs and Jeremy Corbyn want to delay Brexit and Boris wants to get this done. That’s good for us and bad for them.’ 

If he were to resign, the Queen would ask MPs if anyone else could form a government capable of commanding a majority in the Commons and if the answer was no there would have to be an election. The law would still dictate that a Brexit delay must be sought, with a poll likely to then be held in November.

Earlier yesterday, Mr Johnson said he would not entertain seeking another deadline extension from Brussels, as the incoming law compels him to do if no agreement is in place by October 19.

Asked if he would obey the new law’s demand for him to write to EU leaders requesting more time, Mr Johnson said: ‘I will not. I don’t want a delay.’

The Times reported that senior Government figures now want Mr Johnson to ‘come up with a plan B’ and distance himself from Tory Eurosceptics after he was boxed in by the Opposition.

‘Boris needs to make peace with the Tory rebels and get serious about making a deal with Brussels, even if that means throwing the Spartans [hardline Brexiteers] under a bus,’ one Cabinet minister told the paper.

‘Dominic Cummings, Mr Johnson’s senior adviser, may be very clever but his plan has failed. We now need a plan B.’

Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, was scathing about Mr Corbyn’s decision to block an election.

Writing in The Telegraph, she said the Labour leader was showing ‘disdain for democracy’ and causing ‘bewilderment and anger’ among voters, while accusing him of blocking a vote because he thinks the public ‘can’t be trusted to decide’.

But Mr Johnson could be set to use the election manoeuvring to his advantage by quitting Number 10 in order to hand power to Mr Corbyn, forcing him to call for a Brexit delay and face the backlash from leave voters at the next election.

Mr Johnson made the traditional prime ministerial trip to the Queen’s Balmoral estate after visiting Aberdeenshire on Friday. But the visit will be shorter than expected due to the political turmoil in Westminster.

The PM, accompanied by partner Carrie Symonds, 31, stayed at the castle on Friday night before their return to London today.

Events continued to be rocky for the PM as more senior Tory MPs announced they would be quitting Westminster.

Protests are scheduled across the country over the weekend against Mr Johnson’s leadership and Brexit strategy, with demonstrations in London today.

MPs return to Parliament for the Queen’s speech on October 14 and Remainers have the numbers to oust Johnson in a vote of no confidence if he indicates he will refuse to delay Brexit.

Mr Corbyn and the other leaders of the ‘Rebel Alliance’ agreed to combine forces to stop Mr Johnson forcing an early general election on Monday. The Prime Minister will need the support of two thirds of the House of Commons to succeed but with the opposition now all on the same page his attempt at triggering a snap poll appears doomed to failure.

That could leave the PM stuck in Number 10 but unable to deliver a No Deal Brexit on October 31 and he could be forced to resign rather than break his ‘do or die’ pledge.

Downing Street is believed to be considering a fall-back option if the bid on Monday fails which would see it introduce a new, very short piece of legislation calling for an election and setting a date.

Such a course of action would enable the government to skirt the two thirds majority rule set out in the Fixed-term Parliaments Act with a simple majority enough to get it through.

But it would be a risky move because the draft law would be amendable so rebel MPs could hijack it and set their own poll date for after October 31. 

Mr Johnson’s comments came as he suffered another photo call calamity when a bull he was leading on a rope overpowered him at a farm in Aberdeenshire and charged into a plain clothes police officer.

Mr Johnson’s Brexit difficulties were yesterday illustrated in a new poll by ICM which puts the Tories at 37 per cent and Labour trailing on 30 per cent – a large enough lead to potentially give the Conservatives a majority – when people were asked how they would vote at a snap election before Halloween.

But Tory support dipped to 28 per cent – tied with Labour – when people were asked how they would vote in an election held after the current departure date.

Much of the lost Tory support in the second scenario appears to jump to the Brexit Party and the new numbers are likely to intensify calls for Mr Johnson to strike an electoral pact with Nigel Farage.

Mr Farage has said he will only consider an alliance with the PM if he agrees to pursue a ‘clean break’ No Deal Brexit from the EU on October 31.

Mr Johnson has vowed to deliver Brexit ‘do or die’ and with or without a deal on October 31 and has repeatedly said he will not in any circumstances ask Brussels for an extension.

But if MPs block an election again and a No Deal split becomes impossible, Mr Johnson may have no other choice but to quit.

Separately, Mr Johnson was facing growing pressure to restore the whip to 21 Remainer rebels as ex-Cabinet minister Sir Michael Fallon said there should be ‘some kind of appeal mechanism’.

A Lib Dem spokeswoman confirmed opposition parties would work together to abstain or vote against the government on Monday.

She said: ‘We were all clear we are not going to let Boris Johnson cut and run. The Liberal Democrat position for a while now is that we won’t vote for a general election until we have an extension agreed with the EU. I think the others are coming round to that. As a group we will all vote against or abstain on Monday.’

Plaid Cymru’s Westminster leader Liz Saville Roberts also confirmed the move, telling the BBC: ‘We were in unity in our opinion, our priority is of course to stop a No Deal Brexit.

‘In the short time we need to make sure that we get past the 31st October and an extension to Article 50.

‘Now in that respect we were in agreement that the Prime Minister is on the run. Boris is broken.

But with Labour, the SNP and other opposition parties now in agreement that they will not support a poll before the end of October at the earliest, Mr Johnson is likely to be scuppered.

The set back to Mr Johnson’s hopes of forcing an early election came as he signalled there could be a path back to the Conservative Party for the 21 rebels he stripped of the whip this week after they voted to block No Deal.

Speaking in Scotland, he told reporters: ‘Yes of course I’m going to reach out to those colleagues and have been reaching out to them to try and find ways of building bridges but I’ve got to be clear we must get Brexit done and that’s my message to my colleagues.’

Separately, the High Court rejected a legal challenge which sought to overturn Mr Johnson’s move to suspend Parliament until October 14. Parliament is due to be prorogued at some point next week.

However the case brought by anti-Brexit campaigner Gina Miller and backed by Sir John Major and Labour could still be taken to the Supreme Court for an appeal.’We have an opportunity to bring down Boris, to break Boris and to bring down Brexit, and we must take that.’

Emily Thornberry, the shadow foreign secretary, said Labour would block an early election until the party is ‘absolutely sure’ that the UK cannot crash out of the EU without a deal on October 31.

A Labour Party spokesman said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn hosted a positive conference call with other opposition party leaders this morning.

‘They discussed advancing efforts to prevent a damaging no-deal Brexit and hold a general election once that is secured.’

Paul Scully, deputy chairman of the Conservative Party, said: ‘This week Jeremy Corbyn has voted for the British government to surrender its negotiating position and delay yet again.

‘Now he’s broken his promise to the people to hold an election and is stopping the voters deciding who goes to Brussels on 17 October to negotiate.

‘Labour are blocking this country from moving on and refuse to be held to account for it.’

The opposition thinking is that by delaying an election until November, Mr Johnson will be forced to seek an extension – as required by law – if he wants to remain in Downing Street.

Such an outcome would likely lead to Mr Johnson and the Tories being eaten alive by Mr Farage and the Brexit Party.

Friday’s poll by ICM Research appears to confirm that Mr Johnson will be in enormous trouble politically if he does backtrack on his Brexit promise – something he is adamant he will not do. 

Westminster voting intention for an election before October 31 put the Tories on 37 per cent, Labour on 30 per cent and the Brexit Party on just nine per cent.

 But for an election after October 31 the Tories were on 28 per cent and so were Labour while the Brexit Party were on 18 per cent.

Mr Johnson suffered a difficult day on Thursday as his political week went from bad to worse.

His brother Jo blindsided Number 10 by announcing his resignation from the Cabinet despite a late night phone call from the PM urging him not to quit.

Jo Johnson said yesterday morning that he wished his brother ‘all the best’ and insisted he wanted ‘this government to succeed in what it is doing’.

Conservative former minister Claire Perry yesterday became the latest Tory MP to announce her intention to quit at the next election.

Fury of forgotten voters: Almost half back Boris Johnson on early election and most want No-Deal rather than Jeremy Corbyn, poll shows – as rumours swirl PM could quit after Labour ‘stitch up’ scuppers his plans

By Jack Doyle and Daniel Martin for the Daily Mail 

The British public are utterly frustrated with politicians, a poll for the Daily Mail has found.

Three-quarters of those questioned said the political class had failed to function effectively and were not serving the interests of the country.

The survey found that almost half want an early election and that MPs should not have blocked one in a Commons vote on Wednesday, while less than a third do not.

Boris Johnson remains the most popular choice for prime minister, with a 20-point lead over Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – who came in behind those who gave the answer ‘don’t know’.  

And given the choice between a No Deal Brexit and accepting the Labour leader in No 10, our poll found those questioned overwhelmingly chose the former. 

In addition, more people agreed with Mr Johnson’s decision to expel 21 Tory MPs who voted with Labour against a No Deal Brexit this week.

In a surprise result, Mr Johnson was found to be more trusted on the NHS than Mr Corbyn, despite the health service traditionally seen as the preserve of Labour. 

Numbers aside, a ‘stitch-up’ between Mr Corbyn and Remain parties last night scuppered Boris Johnson’s bid for a snap election. 

Labour, the Lib Dems and Scots and Welsh nationalists have agreed to block the public going to the polls before October 31.

It leaves the Prime Minister in limbo, forced to choose between resigning or defying a law passed by MPs ruling out a No Deal Brexit. He has emphatically ruled out further delay.

Following a torrid week in which he lost a string of Commons votes, lost his majority and saw his own brother quit as a minister, Mr Johnson struck a defiant note yesterday and hinted he could defy the anti No Deal law.

Asked about the possibility of asking the EU for an extension, he replied: ‘I will not. I don’t want a delay.’ 

Although he remains more popular than Mr Corbyn, there has been a sharp increase in the proportion believing he is doing a worse job than they would have expected.

The Conservative lead in the polls has also fallen to just five points. They are now on 29 per cent (down two points), Labour on 24 per cent (no change) and the Liberal Democrats on 18 per cent. The Brexit Party has had a boost, rising three points to 17 per cent.

According to the Electoral Calculus website, a general election would leave the Conservatives 14 seats short of a majority. The Tories are forecast to win 312 seats – down six – while Labour would be on 218 – down 44. The Lib Dems would gain 36 seats to give them a tally of 48, and the Brexit Party would pick up 15 seats. 

The poll was carried out by Survation, which questioned 1,006 people on Thursday and yesterday.

Asked whether Britain’s political class are functioning effectively and serving the interests of the country, just 13 per cent agreed. An astonishing 75 per cent said the political class was not functioning effectively, while 12 per cent said they did not know.

Asked whether they wanted an election, 48 per cent said they did and 31 per cent said they did not. The rest said that they did not know. More people said they opposed the MPs’ vote to block Mr Johnson from calling an election, by 43 per cent to 35 per cent.

However, voters prefer that an election takes place after negotiations with the EU are completed by 43 per cent to 36 per cent.

Mr Johnson came out top when asked who made the best prime minister. Some 46 per cent opted for Mr Johnson, compared with 26 per cent for Mr Corbyn. He is more trusted on the economy, crime, the NHS and education. On the NHS, the lead is 35 per cent to 30 per cent for the Labour leader.

When voters were asked a separate question including Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, the figures were 44 per cent for Mr Johnson, 19 per cent Mr Corbyn, 16 per cent Miss Swinson and 21 per cent ‘don’t know’.

Asked to choose between two options – a No Deal Brexit and Mr Corbyn entering Downing Street – voters chose the former by 52 per cent to 31 per cent. However, when asked whether they were in favour of a No Deal exit, just 22 per cent said it was their preferred outcome.

Some 37 per cent said they wanted to remain in the EU, compared to 32 per cent saying Britain should leave without a deal.

Overall, however, a separate question found the voters opted 53 per cent for Remain and 47 per cent for Leave.

Asked how they rated the performance of Mr Johnson as PM, 37 per cent said ‘good’ (down four points) and 40 per cent said bad (up five). The rest said neither good nor bad, or said they did not know. Asked whether that was better or worse than they expected, 32 per cent said better (down eight), 33 per cent said worse (up 11), while the rest said neither or don’t know.

Mr Johnson received support for Wednesday’s expulsion of 21 Tory MPs from the party, including Ken Clarke and Philip Hammond.

They had voted for a Bill blocking No Deal by forcing the PM to go to Brussels to ask for an extension to Brexit.

Some 43 per cent said they approved of the expulsions, compared with 32 per cent who were against. However, voters were split down the middle on whether they supported the No Deal Bill – 37 per cent backed it while 37 per cent opposed it.