Philip Hammond has warned that any successor to Theresa May who seeks to push a no-deal Brexit through parliament “cannot expect to survive very long”, as Michael Gove joined the crowded contest for No 10.
In a warning shot to Eurosceptic contenders for the Tory party leadership, the chancellor refused to rule out voting down his own government in a no-confidence motion if the new prime minister sought to take the UK out of the EU without a deal.
“I think it would be very difficult for a prime minister who adopted no deal as a policy — we are leaving with no deal as a matter of policy — to retain the confidence of the House of Commons,” Mr Hammond told the BBC’s Andrew Marr show on Sunday.
Asked if he would vote to bring down his own government, he responded: “I’m saying this is a very difficult situation. It would challenge not just me, but many of our colleagues, and I hope we will never get to that position.”
One official close to Cabinet said: “100 per cent there will be MPs out there who would join with Hammond and vote the government down if it became the only way of avoiding no deal.”
Boris Johnson, who set the tone of the Tory leadership race on Friday when he announced his intention to take the UK out of the EU on October 31 “deal or no deal”, is the favourite to become the UK’s next leader. Many MPs believe he offers the best chance to win over the party’s grassroots and take on Nigel Farage’s new Brexit party.
“Boris is focused only on showing colleagues why he is the best placed candidate to deliver Brexit and beat both Corbyn and Farage with an exciting agenda that is in step with the priorities of the public,” said an ally.
But Mr Johnson remains a divisive candidate and a group within the parliamentary party has launched a campaign known as ‘Operation Arse’ to prevent him making it through to the shortlist that will be voted on by the Conservative party membership.
Throughout the weekend the airwaves and news pages were peppered with calls for a new prime minister who is has a command of detail — one of Mr Johnson’s perceived weaknesses.
“It’s really hard to know whether any of the attacks matter,” said a senior Conservative MP. “He is so fundamentally flawed, he’s the Kama Sutra candidate: he’s held every position on every conceivable topic. That’s why we don’t trust him.”
Other candidates setting out their pitch for the leadership include former Brexit secretary Dominic Raab, who said he was prepared to leave the bloc without a deal.
“I would fight for a fairer deal in Brussels with negotiations to change the backstop arrangements, and if not I would be clear that we would leave on WTO terms in October,” he told the BBC.
Other would-be leaders have said the UK should be focused on getting a deal. Rory Stewart, a centrist Tory who was recently promoted to the cabinet as international development secretary, said he could not serve in a government that pursued a no-deal Brexit or was led by Mr Johnson.
Foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt told the Sunday Times that “doing deals is my bread and butter”, while Matt Hancock, the health secretary, said on Saturday he would pursue “alternative arrangements” to avoid a hard border in Ireland while being honest about the choices “between sovereignty and market access and the trade-offs to get a deal through this parliament”.
Mr Gove, the Eurosceptic environment secretary, is casting himself as a bridge-builder in the race and is expected to present himself as a “unity candidate”. He has previously spoken out against a no-deal exit; on Sunday he said he would “deliver Brexit”.
Alongside Boris Johnson, Mr Gove was one of the leading figures in the Leave campaign in the 2016 Brexit referendum. In the subsequent Conservative leadership election he initially backed Mr Johnson but then dealt a severe blow to his chances by suddenly withdrawing his support.
Andrea Leadsom, the former Commons leader who quit the cabinet in protest at Mrs May’s deal, also announced her candidacy on Sunday for a contest that is could include as many as 15 candidates.
Although the contest does not formally start for another two weeks, a number of senior Tory MPs are concerned that the campaign will become a Eurosceptic “arms race”, with candidates showing off their pro-Brexit credentials to win over the Tory party’s grassroots membership.
Under the party’s rules, Tory MPs — who number 313 — select a shortlist of candidates to go through to a run-off in which about 100,000 Conservative activists are allowed to vote.
