CABINET BOOST
Theresa May’s Cabinet remains firmly behind Chequers Brexit plan say No10 – despite Salzburg slapdown and Boris Johnson backing rival proposal
THERESA May’s Cabinet remains firmly behind her Chequers plan for Brexit despite is being ripped apart in Salzburg, Number 10 have said.
And it comes as Boris Johnson revealed he is backing a rival proposal to cut ties with Brussels and pressure her to alter her course in talks with Brussels.
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She gathered her top team in Downing Street for the first time since EU leaders mauled her proposals at a summit in Austria.
They discussed granting limitless access to migrants from the continent for more than two years after we leave - even in a “no-deal” scenario.
The Sun revealed Home Secretary Sajid Javid is proposing that EU citizens be waved through the border into Britain as long as they show their passport and pass a criminal record check.
It comes just days after the PM unilaterally declared all EU citizens will be allowed to stay in Britain – regardless of what happens to ex-pats living on the Continent.
The migration plans will further anger Brexiteers, who want her to ditch her Chequers compromise and aim for a more ambitious free trade arrangement.
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Mr Johnson, the former Foreign Secretary, revealed his support for the alternative blueprint - launched by Tory heavyweights.Jacob Rees-Mogg and David Davis this morning.
Called “Plan A+”, the report by the Institute of Economic Affairs urges Mrs May to open trade talks with the US to try and break the deadlock with Brussels.
The major intervention, just days before the Tory conference, piles the pressure on the PM to opt for a looser arrangement with the EU like Canada currently enjoys.
And the Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab broke ranks and risked infuriating No10 by suggesting he was “always listening to new proposals and new ideas” ahead of its publication.
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Mrs May is facing criticism from both sides to drop her current proposals, after pro-EU ex-minister Nicky Morgan .
She instead and called for a simpler, less ambitious Norway-style deal which keeps Britain more closely entwined with Brussels.
Her intervention puts the PM in an even more awkward position ahead of today’s Cabinet – where she will try and rally her top team to keep backing her Chequers compromise.
But there is likely to be a lengthy inquest into what went wrong at last week's informal summit in Austria, where she was bluntly told key elements of it would not work.
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Mrs May insists her proposal, which would see Britain maintain a "common rulebook" with the EU for trade in goods and agriculture, is the only credible option on the table which would avoid the return of a "hard border" between Northern Ireland and the Republic.
But in his weekly column for the , Mr Johnson warned it would play into the hands of Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party if the Government continued to pursue the same course in the facing of rising public hostility.
He said: "I am afraid that Chequers = surrender; Chequers = a sense of betrayal; Chequers = the return of Ukip; Chequers = Corbyn."
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