Boris Johnson was savaged as ‘pitiful’ and a poor Foreign Secretary today after his big Brexit speech fell flat.
The Foreign Secretary laid out his vision for a liberal Brexit in an eagerly anticipated speech yesterday, kicking off what is due to be a series of Government interventions to lay out the ‘road to Brexit’.
But Mr Johnson was condemned for a lack of detail on how Brexit would actually be delivered.
In an upbeat speech, Mr Johnson called on Leave and Remain supporters to unite behind the Brexit mission and denied it was a ‘giant V-sign from the cliffs of Dover’.
Boris Johnson (pictured making yesterday in Westminster) warned cancelling Brexit would be a ‘disastrous mistake’ but acknowledged for the first time that anger at the result was ‘hardening’
Tory rebel Anna Soubry led criticism of Mr Johnson, branding him ‘pitiful’ and a poor foreign secretary
Tory rebel Anna Soubry led criticism of Mr Johnson.
She told Channel 4 News: ‘I’m afraid to say that Boris has confirmed my very worst fears about him. I don’t think he’s a very good Foreign Secretary.
‘It was actually a pitiful speech and I think a lot of people found it really rather embarrassing.’
An unnamed minister told Politico there was ‘nothing’ in the speech.
They said: ‘Absolutely no detail. He is completely in denial about the complexity of the exit and the negative economic and political consequences.
‘It is bluster, which will cost the country dear. The tragedy is that by the time anybody realises it and he has been proved wrong the real cost will have set in and we will have left the EU. In five years time he will be dead meat.’
Despite the criticism Tory darling Jacob Rees-Mogg – the leader of Brexiteer backbench Conservatives – yesterday said the speech was ‘reassuring’ and a ‘classic of Boris oratory’.
Following his speech, Mr Johnson dodged questions over whether he would resign if the Cabinet fails to fully endorse his vision of a buccaneering, free trade Brexit.
He also admitted to detecting a ‘hardening of the mood, a deepening of the anger’ over the June 2016 vote.
Mr Johnson accepted he was divisive but insisted ‘people’s feelings matter’ and that he wanted to engage with critics.
Speaking at Policy Exchange in Westminster (pictured) the Foreign Secretary admitted opposition Brexit was ‘hardening’ but insisted ‘these fears can be allayed’
Mr Johnson was greeted by protesters at the central London venue for his big Brexit speech
In his speech, Mr Johnson said: ‘Brexit is about re-engaging this country with its global identity & all the energy that can flow from that.
‘And I absolutely refuse to accept the suggestion that it is some unBritish spasm of bad manners.
‘It’s not some great V-sign from the cliffs of Dover.’
He added: ‘Brexit is the expression of a legitimate and natural desire for self-government of the people, by the people, for the people.
‘And that is surely not some reactionary Faragiste concept’.
Mr Johnson argued efforts by Remain-supporting ministers to keep Britain closely aligned with Brussels rules after Brexit would not amount to ‘taking back control’.
The British people should not have new laws imposed from abroad, he declared, extolling the benefits of leaving the EU’s customs union and the single market.
Mr Johnson insisted Brexit was about ‘self confidence’ and rejected the calls for a second referendum
In a warning to Mrs May ahead of the next phase of negotiations – in which the EU is demanding the right to impose EU laws during the transition – Mr Johnson said: ‘If we are going to accept laws, then we need to know who is making them, and with what motives.
‘We need to be able to interrogate them in our own language, and we must know how they came to be in authority over us and how we can remove them.’
He added: ‘People voted Leave – not because they were hostile to European culture and civilisation, but because they wanted to take back control.
‘That is why it is so vital not to treat Brexit as a plague of boils or a murrain on our cattle, but as an opportunity’.
In a message to Remainers, he said: ‘More people voted Brexit than have ever voted for anything in the history of this country.
‘I say in all candour that if there were to be a second vote I believe that we would simply have another year of wrangling and turmoil and feuding in which the whole country would lose.
‘So let’s not go there.’