What happened in Brexit this weekend? Here is the story in one sentence. Boris Johnson asked the EU to extend UK membership, something he said he would never do. The rest is spin.
How many times did Boris Johnson promise not to seek an extension of the UK membership of the EU? More than I can count.
Yet that is what he has now done. By sending a letter to the European Council requesting an extension, the Prime Minister has done something he said he would not do. He talked a good fight, then caved.
There are perfectly good reasons for that; I suspect many of the voters he needs will accept them. There is also a debate about whether any of this matters: he may well get a majority for his deal next week anyway.
But those things are secondary elements of this story. The simple central fact here is that he complied with the Benn Act and sent the letter.
The rest – the second letter, the “cheap photocopy”, the lack of a signature – is chaff, theatrical nonsense scattered by No.
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