Boris Johnson has resigned. The Foreign Secretary becomes the second senior Cabinet Minister to quit over the deal agreed at Chequers, which he reportedly called a ‘turd’.
At the weekend, those close to Boris were clear that he wouldn’t resign. They said that the only people who would benefit from his resignation would be Michel Barnier and co and that he intended to stay and fight against further concessions to the EU. So, what has changed? Well, a cynic would say David Davis’s resignation. But I understand another factor for him has been how he would defend this plan in public. The more he thought about it, the more he felt he couldn’t do it. I understand he is now of the view that no deal is better than this deal.
Boris Johnson had also decided that he had no realistic prospect of improving the Chequers plan from inside government.
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