Boris on Trump:
‘I am increasingly admiring of Donald Trump. I have become more and more convinced that there is method in his madness.
‘Imagine Trump doing Brexit. He’d go in bloody hard…
‘There’d be all sorts of breakdowns, all sorts of chaos. Everyone would think he’d gone mad. But actually you might get somewhere. It’s a very, very good thought.’
Boris on Brexit approaching a ‘moment of truth’ and arguments within party:
‘I’m not going to hide it from you. There is an argument going on.’
He said Brexit would happen ‘and I think it will be irreversible.’ But added: ‘The risk is that it will not be the one we want.’
‘There’s a high chance of Britain ending up with an arrangement that violates many of the Brexiteers’ ‘red lines’, keeping it ‘locked in orbit around the EU, in the customs union and to a large extent still in the single market.
‘So not really having full freedom on our trade policy, our tariff schedules, and not having freedom with our regulatory framework either.’
Boris on the Treasury:
‘Basically the heart of Remain.’
Boris on Remainers:
‘What they don’t want is friction at the borders. They don’t want any disruption of the economy. So they’re sacrificing all the medium and long-term gains out of fear of short-term disruption. Do you see what I’m saying? The fear of short-term disruption has become so huge in people’s minds that they’ve turned into a quivering wreck.
‘They’re terrified of this nonsense. It’s mumbo jumbo.’
Boris on Brexit issues being overblown:
‘Yeah, of course. There will be some bumps in the road,’ he said. But ‘prophecies of doom’ about disruption of customs are ‘pure millennium bug stuff’.
‘All the planes crashing from the sky. It’s absolute nonsense.’