No 10 implies it was Buckingham Palace’s decision for king to meet Ursula von der Leyen
At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson defended Rishi Sunak’s decision to advise the king to meet Ursula von der Leyen today, but suggested that the decision was “fundamentally” one for Buckingham Palace.
The spokesperson said:
[The PM] firmly believes it’s for the king to make those decisions.
It’s not uncommon for His Majesty to accept invitations to meet certain leaders, he has met President Duda [of Poland] and President Zelenskiy [of Ukraine] recently. He is meeting with the president of the EU today.
Buckingham Palace has implied Downing Street had the final say in allowing the meeting to go ahead. (See 11.25am.)
At the lobby briefing, asked why the final protocol talks were taking place in Windsor, the PM’s spokesperson said:
There are a number of occasions when these sorts of talks have been held on significant occasions, this is no different.
Key events
The DUP is expected to accept Rishi Sunak’s protocol deal, Susan Thompson is reporting in a story for the Irish News. She says:
The DUP is expected to accept the protocol deal currently being finalised by the prime minister with the European Union.
According to a source with knowledge of the DUP’s thinking, a dinner has been pencilled in for this evening in London with party supporters to explain the DUP’s rationale for their acceptance of the deal. The date of the dinner will be dependent on when the PM and the EU announce the new deal.
Sammy Wilson, the DUP chief whip, is expected to explain the DUP’s position.
If correct, this would be a very positive result for Rishi Sunak. But Thompson does not say in her report when the DUP might signal its acceptance of the deal. Other reports suggest the DUP might want to take their time before coming to a final assessment, not least to allow time to read the legal text.
And if the DUP does accept the deal, that will be quite a climbdown for some of its MPs. In an article for the Sun on Sunday yesterday Ian Paisley, the DUP MP, said the deal would be unacceptable unless it involved the removal of the current protocol. He wrote:
Perhaps the PM will turn magician and conjure up a rabbit out of the hat.
But I don’t think there are any rabbits — or even a hat to pull them from.
If his plan involves keeping any part of the protocol the DUP will not be going back into power-sharing. It is that simple.
This sounded like an impossible ask. The new deal will sit alongside the current protocol, but the EU has always refused to tear up the current text.
Ursula von der Leyen and Rishi Sunak have both been tweeting about their meeting in Windsor, which is due to start around now.
Their press conference will take place at 3.30pm.
Rishi Sunak will deliver a statement to MPs about his protocol deal at 6.30pm. But MPs will get details earlier, from Sunak’s press conference with Ursula von der Leyen.
TODAY:
One statement – @RishiSunak – Northern Ireland Protocol Update at 1830
(No UQs and no other statements)
There will be a minute silence after prayers for Betty Boothroyd with formal tributes tomorrow
— Labour Whips (@labourwhips) February 27, 2023
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former business secretary, has restated (see 11.22am) his opposition to the king meeting Ursula von der Leyen on the day the Northern Ireland protocol deal is being unveiled. He said:
It is surprising that the king will meet Ursula von der Leyen today as it antagonises the people the prime minister needs to conciliate.
It is also constitutionally unwise to involve the king in a matter of immediate political controversy.
(As stated earlier, when Rees-Mogg was leader of the Commons in 2019, he dragged the late queen into political controversy by asking her to prorogue parliament to limit the opportunity for MPs to block Brexit. The supreme court ruled this unlawful.)
Steve Baker, NI minister and former ERG chair, describes protocol deal as ‘fantastic result’
At the weekend the Sunday Telegraph said that Steve Baker, the Northern Ireland minister who used to be chair of the European Research Group, and who resigned from Theresa May’s government over her Brexit deal, was “understood … to be on resignation watch after being frozen out of negotiations” on the protocol.
Not any more. This is what Baker told reporters a few minutes ago when he came out of Downing Street, where he has been attending a briefing on the deal.
I can only say this – the prime minister is on the cusp of securing a really fantastic result for everyone involved.
No 10 implies it was Buckingham Palace’s decision for king to meet Ursula von der Leyen
At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson defended Rishi Sunak’s decision to advise the king to meet Ursula von der Leyen today, but suggested that the decision was “fundamentally” one for Buckingham Palace.
The spokesperson said:
[The PM] firmly believes it’s for the king to make those decisions.
It’s not uncommon for His Majesty to accept invitations to meet certain leaders, he has met President Duda [of Poland] and President Zelenskiy [of Ukraine] recently. He is meeting with the president of the EU today.
Buckingham Palace has implied Downing Street had the final say in allowing the meeting to go ahead. (See 11.25am.)
At the lobby briefing, asked why the final protocol talks were taking place in Windsor, the PM’s spokesperson said:
There are a number of occasions when these sorts of talks have been held on significant occasions, this is no different.
Getting king to meet EU chief as protocol deal being announced will ‘go down very badly’, says former DUP leader
The European Commission’s statement about Ursula von der Leyen’s meeting with the king not being part of the protocol process (see 11.58am) may have come too late. Arlene Foster, the former DUP leader and former first minister of Northern Ireland, says it was “crass” for No 10 to schedule the meeting and that it will “go down very badly” in Northern Ireland.
I cannot quite believe that No10 would ask HM the King to become involved in the finalising of a deal as controversial as this one. It’s crass and will go down very badly in NI.
We must remember this is not the King’s decision but the Government who it appears are tone deaf.
— Arlene Foster DBE PC #ProudofNI. (@ArleneFosterUK) February 27, 2023
The European Commission says Ursula von der Leyen’s meeting with the king is not part of the Northern Ireland protocol deal process, the BBC’s Jessica Parker reports.
#EU chief @vonderleyen‘s audience with the King is “not part” of the NI Protocol talks process, says the European Commission.
Her meeting with His Majesty is described as “separate” to the discussion she’s having with #UK PM Rishi Sunak.
— Jessica Parker (@MarkerJParker) February 27, 2023
Betty Boothroyd, first female speaker of House of Commons, has died
Betty Boothroyd, the former Labour MP and first woman to be speaker of the House of Commons, has died. Holding the role from 1992 to 2000, she was the first person to be elected speaker after the Commons debates started being permanently televised in 1989 and her ebullient performance in the chair helped to make parliamentary proceedings, and particularly PMQs, compelling viewing for a niche TV audience.
In a tribute, Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the current speaker, said:
Not only was Betty Boothroyd an inspiring woman, but she was also an inspirational politician, and someone I was proud to call my friend.
To be the first woman speaker was truly ground-breaking and Betty certainly broke that glass ceiling with panache.
She was from Yorkshire, and I am from Lancashire – so there was always that friendly rivalry between us. But from my point of view, it was heartening to hear a northern voice speaking from the chair.
She stuck by the rules, had a no-nonsense style, but any reprimands she did issue were done with good humour and charm.
Betty was one of a kind. A sharp, witty and formidable woman – and I will miss her.
Nigel Farage says it is ‘disgraceful’ Sunak has asked king to meet Von der Leyen, and implies Charles should have refused
That did not take long. Nigel Farage, the former leader of Ukip and then the Brexit party, has said it is “absolutely digraceful” that Rishi Sunak is getting the king involved in the optics around the unveiling of the Northern Ireland protocol deal.
Interestingly, in a video message on the topic, Farage does not just criticise Sunak. He seems to criticise the king too, implying that he should have refused to meet Ursula von der Leyen. Farage says:
So it is Northern Ireland protocol day and the unelected Ursula von der Leyen is making her way to Windsor. Yes, Windsor has been chosen, it’s going to be called the Windsor agreement, and guess what? The king is going to meet her this afternoon.
I think this is absolutely disgraceful of Rishi Sunak to even ask the king to get involved in something that is overtly political in every way.
But I wonder whether the king had to accept. I wonder whether the king is taking a very big chance with that section of the electorate, that section of this country, that actually are his biggest supporters.
The unionists like the monarchy, they want to like Prince Charles. This is going to put the most enormous strain on it.
According to Cameron Walker, the royal correspondent at GB News, Buckingham Palace has stressed that the king is meeting Ursula von der Leyen this afternoon on the advice of the government.
BP Spokesperson: “The King is pleased to meet any world leader if they are visiting Britain and it is the Government’s advice that he should do so.”
— Cameron Walker (@CameronDLWalker) February 27, 2023
Ursula von der Leyen to meet king when she visits Windsor to unveil protocol deal with Sunak
Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, will meet the king when she is in Windsor today, PA Media is reporting.
European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, will meet with the king at Windsor Castle on Monday afternoon, the PA news agency understands.
Von der Leyen will be in Windsor for a press conference with Rishi Sunak at around 3.30pm when the protocol deal will be unveiled. We do not know yet whether she will see the king before that, or afterwards.
The meeting is likely to be hugely controversial because it suggests that No 10 is trying to create the impression that the protocol deal has royal endorsement. At the weekend there were even suggestions that Downing Street wants the deal to be known as the Windsor agreement. Unionists tend to be arch-monarchists, and there have been suggestions that this is some crude ploy to use the king to win over the Democratic Unionist party. But the unionists are also inherently suspicious of the intentions of the UK government, and hyper-alert to signs that they are being manipulated, and so, if this is the No 10 plan, it is likely to backfire.
At the weekend, when it was first reported that the king might be involved in some way, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Tory Brexiter, said:
If there were a plan to bring the king in before there is domestic political agreement, it would border on constitutional impropriety.
Rees-Mogg, of course, is something of an expert on constitutional impropriety. As leader of the Commons in 2019, he went to Balmoral to get the Queen to agree to prorogue parliament – a move subsequently ruled unlawful by the supreme court because it was done with the intention of limiting the time MPs would have to debate Brexit.
Labour sets out how it wants to be judged on whether it is meeting its growth ‘mission’
Here is the Labour party document giving details of its “mission” to secure the highest sustained growth in the G7. This is one of the five missions announced by Keir Starmer last week. Labour calls this an “ambition”, not a target, and Starmer said he wanted to achieve it by the end of the first term of a Labour government.
Today’s document gives more details of how Labour wants to be judged on whether it is fulfilling this mission. It says (bold text from original document):
We will hold ourselves to account for achieving this mission by measuring progress against clear outcomes.
On growth, we will measure the annual rate of GDP per capita growth compared to other countries using data published by the ONS (Office for National Statistics), as well as data and forecasts from the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and the OECD. Our ambition is to have the highest growth in the G7 over consecutive years by the end of the parliament.
We will measure living standards using official measures of disposable income for the median household. Our ambition is to eliminate the gap between the median British family and those in France and Germany, making progress in closing the gap by the end of the parliament. We will also measure regional and sub-regional living standards using measures published by the ONS, including gross disposable household income per head.
We will measure productivity in regions of England and nations of the UK using ONS data on output per hour worked. Our ambition is productivity growth in every region and nation by the end of the parliament.
We will measure the availability of good jobs in every part of the country using a range of metrics that cover different aspects of working life in different industries.
The document also sets out the policies by which Labour hopes to achieve this. They are all policies that have been announced before, but in this document they are pulled together and presented as the “first policy steps” towards achieving the mission.
Q: Do you want to allow young workers from the EU to come to the UK to address labour shortages?
Starmer says Labour is more likely to favour using the visa scheme to address this. Labour will not be anti-business, and it does not want labour shortages to gum up business.
But he says he wants to fix the fundamentals too. This is what mission-led government is about. He concedes this offer is “not very retail” (ie, it is hard to sell to voters as a reason for voting Labour), but it is important for the government to be focused on the long term. He says he does not want to be focused just on sticking-plaster politics, he says.
And that’s it. The Q&A is over. I will post a summary soon.
