The Chancellor, pictured in Dundee today, pointedly declined to endorse the PM to carry on beyond 2022
The Tory civil war was raging today as Philip Hammond refused to back Theresa May as leader for the next election.
The Chancellor pointedly declined to endorse the PM to carry on beyond 2022 amid increasing signs of friction between top ministers.
Supporters of Mr Hammond and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson have been trading blows despite desperate efforts to broker a truce in the run-up to Mrs May’s crucial speech last week.
There were claims that Mr Hammond had made a major concession by agreeing the UK would only seek a two-year transition period in Brexit negotiations, rather than much longer.
But friends of Mr Hammond, seen as the champion of ‘soft’ Brexit in the Cabinet, have reacted with fury to the jibes, accusing Mr Johnson of being ‘simple minded’.
Mr Hammond was in Scotland today to meet with business leaders and the oil and gas sector, before holding talks with Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson.
During a meeting with journalists, he dodged a series of questions about Mrs May’s leadership and when asked who the ‘optimum person’ to lead the Conservatives into the next election would be – he refused to endorse the Prime Minister.
Instead of throwing his support behind Mrs May, he said he would not get involved in discussions about ‘future Conservative party leadership’ and claimed the Prime Ministers ‘has made it very clear she has a job to do’.
Mr Hammond then claimed to be ‘completely behind her’ in managing Brexit negotiations, but when asked again if he believes she should continue as Tory leader for 2022 – he refused to say.
Boris Johnson, pictured on a visit to Prague today, is risking a fresh Cabinet meltdown over Brexit as relations with Chancellor Philip Hammond deteriorate
Mr Johnson was meeting Czech Republic counterpart Lubomir Zaoralek in Prague today
He instead again suggested that Mrs May would remain as Prime Minister to deliver Brexit which is the ‘primary focus’ over the ‘next couple of years’.
Asked another two times if he believes Mrs May should stay on, and why he had so far refused to back her Mr Hammond said ‘Theresa May is clearly the best person to lead the Conservative party, to lead the government, through this very complex process of Brexit.’
Mr Hammond added: ‘I’m not going to talk about future Conservative leadership. I want to talk about the job in hand. She’s been very clear that [Brexit] is the job in hand, that is the job she considers she was elected to do and she’s going to get on with it.’
When asked if he expects another leader to be in place for the next General Election, he said: ‘these are not issues for today. We are focused entirely on delivering a Brexit that works for Britain.’
Mr Hammond’s comments come as speculation continues to grow over the future leadership of the Conservatives.
At the weekend it was reported that the Chancellor had sent a text message to Mr Johnson pledging to support him in a leadership race if Mrs May did walk away from the job following her disastrous election result.
Newspaper reports claimed Mr Hammond had offered his support in exchange for remaining as Chancellor.
Mr Hammond was shown drug development technology by Professor David Gray during a visit to Dundee University’s School of Life Sciences
The PM and Leo Varadkar discussed the prospects for a Brexit deal at No10 today – with the Taoiseach saying he believed progress was ‘possible’
Yesterday, he refused to deny the messages instead claiming: ‘There was an awful lot of communication going on during the early hours of that morning – texting, telephone calling – between all sorts of colleagues.’
He said that he did not ‘recognise some of the material’ reported in the Sunday papers.
Mr Hammond said: ‘What I do know is that the most important conversation I had on that night was with Theresa May when she told me she had decided to seek to form a government. She asked me to serve in it and I committed to do so and to back her.’
Speculation over a Conservative leadership challenge was reignited last week after Mr Johnson published a 4,300 word newspaper article on Brexit just days before Mrs May was set to lay out her vision in a speech.
And as a feud between cabinet ministers over Brexit, he denied thinking Mr Johnson is ‘simple-minded’ as reports claimed, saying: ‘I don’t think Boris is simple-minded on anything.’
Mr Hammond also claimed he was ‘quite happy’ with a Brexit transition of around two years, despite suggestions he favours stalling the process until after the next General Election.
‘The bottom line is that this is not going to be easy, something that’s overlooked by simple-minded Brexiteers like Boris,’ one ally told the Telegraph today.
‘Philip isn’t being ideological about it, he is pragmatic.’
The latest damaging spat threatens the delicate balance that was struck over the PM’s speech in Florence last week.
In a bid to revive stalled talks with the EU, Mrs May made a series of concessions on money, citizens’ rights and law.
She said the UK was ready to cover the huge hole left inBrussels’ finances for another two years after we formally leave in 2019 – contributing potentially another 20 billion euros – and meet other liabilities that could total tens of billions more.
She also said the European court could help enforce the rights of EU nationals – easing back a previous red line – and admitted that bringing in tougher immigration measures would take time, raising the possibility that free movement rules could essentially stay in place for longer.
But Mrs May said in return for the ‘generous’ offer the UK must have full access to the single market during a two-year ‘transition’ period.
Mr Johnson praised the speech as ‘positive, optimistic and dynamic’. But he had thrown the Cabinet into chaos the previous week with a bombshell article seen as an attempt to push the PM into a harder stance on Brexit.
He even made an apparent resignation threat to maximise his leverage, before backing off on the eve of the speech.
More context was given to the warring between Mr Johnson and Mr Hammond’s allies over the weekend when it was claimed that the Chancellor offered to back the Foreign Secretary for the Tory leadership in the aftermath of the disastrous election result.
Mr Hammond is reported to have texted his Cabinet rival at 4am on the morning after the election to offer his support when it looked like Mrs May could be forced from office.
It is believed May faced plots from four minsters to oust her from leadership, including one for Boris and another in support of David Davis.
Mr Hammond is said to have proposed a deal in which he remained as Chancellor, with David Davis handling Brexit while Mr Johnson could ‘run the shop’.
The proposal was put as Mr Johnson sat with friends digesting the fallout from the disastrous election result in the early hours of June 9.
Theresa May delivered her Brexit speech in Florence on Friday making a series of concessions to the EU but calling for a two-year transition deal
Boris Johnson hailed the speech in a tweet afterwards, saying it ‘rightly’ disposed of the ‘Norway option’ of staying in the EU single market
Mr Johnson is now thought to be agitating on the issue of whether Britain should have to adopt EU rules and regulations after formally leaving the bloc in March 2019.
Ministers are hoping they can skate over the topic of new regulation, even though we will not be able to vote on the substance of rules during the transition.
Many point out that due to the glacial speed of legislation in the EU, any new rules that come into force during the two years will in reality have been approved by the UK while it was still a member of the bloc.