Portrait of the week

Home Theresa May, the Prime Minister, found herself in another crisis over Brexit. Backbenchers whispered that 48 letters were being collected to present to the chairman of the 1922 Committee to trigger a vote of confidence. What annoyed some of her own MPs was a scheme (intended to make less likely the imposition of a backstop agreement over the Irish border) to extend by up to a year the Brexit implementation period that was supposed to end on 31 December 2020. During an emergency cabinet conference-call, Esther McVey, the Work and Pensions Secretary, was said to have told Mrs May that she was ‘devastated’ by the provision. An unnamed Conservative former minister told the Sunday Times: ‘The moment is coming when the knife gets heated, stuck in her front and twisted.

Home Brexit was in crisis as the European Council (of heads of state or government) met. Theresa May, the Prime Minister, told the House of Commons that it was time for ‘cool, calm heads to prevail’. These proved in short supply. Dominic Raab, Jeremy Hunt, Michael Gove, Penny Mordaunt, Chris Grayling, Liz Truss and Geoffrey Cox openly ate pizza in the office of Andrea Leadsom. The EU rejected Mrs May’s proposal that the UK as a whole could remain under the EU customs union for a definitely limited time after 2020 (when the planned transition period ends). Some hoped for no deal; some hoped for no Brexit. Mary Midgley, the philosopher, died aged 99. Failure of overhead electricity lines led to services from Paddington being cancelled.

Home EU officials were suspiciously cheerful over the prospects of Brexit negotiations running up to the next summit on 18 October. ‘I think there is a chance to have an accord by the end of the year,’ said Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council. Jean-Claude Juncker, the president of the European Commission, did a little dance in humorous emulation of Theresa May’s dance moves the week before at the Conservative party conference. British ministers invented the concept of the ‘hybrid backstop’ for Northern Ireland, involving some more checks and an extension of the United Kingdom’s membership of the customs union.

Home Boris Johnson, the former foreign secretary, played a well-nourished Banquo’s Ghost at the Conservative party conference, where Theresa May, the Prime Minister, declared that Britain after Brexit would be ‘full of promise’. She had insisted that the Chequers proposals for Brexit were the only ones possible. Mr Johnson called them ‘deranged’. Mrs May felt obliged to tell Andrew Marr on television: ‘I do believe in Brexit.’ Philip Hammond, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, mocked Mr Johnson’s way of speaking: ‘Boris sits there,’ he told the Mail on Sunday, ‘and at the end of it he says, “Yeah but, er, there must be a way, I mean, if you just, if you, erm, come on, we can do it, Phil, we can do it.

Home Theresa May, the Prime Minister, held a special cabinet to retrieve something from the wreckage of the Brexit policy she had imposed at Chequers this summer. Mrs May had shown surprise at a summit in Salzburg four days earlier when the EU rejected her proposals. ‘The suggested framework for economic cooperation will not work,’ said Donald Tusk, the President of the European Council. He then posted a picture on Instagram of himself and Mrs May with a cakestand and the caption: ‘A piece of cake, perhaps? Sorry, no cherries.’ Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, said that this was ‘insulting the British people’.

Home Britain was overwhelmed by Brexitry. Before flying off to an EU summit in Salzburg, Theresa May, the Prime Minister, interviewed on Panorama, said that if Parliament did not ratify the Chequers plan, ‘I think that the alternative to that will be having no deal.’ The International Monetary Fund warned against ‘a no-deal Brexit on WTO terms that would entail substantial costs for the UK economy’. Philip Hammond, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said: ‘We must heed the clear warnings of the IMF.’ Mr Hammond was said to have suggested in cabinet that Britain might have to remain a member of the EU beyond 29 March next year, but he was ‘slapped down’ by Mrs May.

Home Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, was said to want to throw a lifeline to Theresa May, the British Prime Minister, but he insisted: ‘It is not possible to get freedom for goods without freedom for services, in particular for the movement of people.’ Up to 80 Tory MPs would vote against the government’s plan hatched at Chequers in July, Steve Baker, a former Brexit minister, said. A few dozen members of the European Research Group met to see how they might make best use of rules on Conservative leadership election. The Trades Union Congress said it could throw its ‘full weight’ behind a referendum on the final Brexit deal.

Home Mark Carney kindly said he would stay on as governor of the Bank of England if it helped the government ‘smooth’ the Brexit transition. Lord King of Lothbury, Mervyn King, a former governor of the Bank of England, said that ‘incompetent’ preparation for Brexit had left Britain without a credible bargaining position. Paul Pester announced his resignation as chief executive of TSB after seven years, following the computing failure at the bank. Chris Evans announced on air that he would be leaving the Radio 2 breakfast show at the end of the year; he is to host Virgin Radio’s equivalent. David Watkin, the architectural historian, died aged 77. Lord Melchett , the former chairman of Greenpeace, died aged 70.

Home Theresa May, the Prime Minister, flew off to South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria accompanied by a trade delegation. In a speech in Cape Town she promised an extra £4 billion in British investment in Africa. ‘True partnerships are not about one party doing unto another,’ she said, but the achievement of ‘common goals’. The government announced plans for Britain’s own satellite navigation system if Brexit meant it was expelled from the European Union’s Galileo project. A gang flew men from Chile to burgle houses around London, said police who arrested 36 men in the past eight months, 16 of them being convicted and eight deported, with 12 leaving the country while still under investigation.

Home Government finances were in surplus by £2 billion in July. Public sector net debt rose to £1,777.5 billion, equal to 84.3 per cent of GDP, £17.5 billion more than a year before, but less as a proportion of GDP than last year’s 86 per cent. Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, flew to Washington and made a speech urging the European Union to take stronger sanctions against Russia. President Vladimir Putin of Russia danced with Karin Kneissl, the new foreign minister of Austria, at her wedding, and then met Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany at the Meseberg Palace near Berlin.

Home Unemployment fell by 65,000 to 1.36 million — at 4 per cent the lowest level since 1975. The economy in the United Kingdom grew by 0.4 per cent in the second quarter, compared with 0.2 per cent in the first. The rate of inflation rose a jot from 2.4 to 2.5 per cent, measured by the Consumer Price Index. Sports Direct, run by Mike Ashley, agreed to buy the House of Fraser chain of 59 department stores for £90 million after it had gone into administration. Homebase said it was closing 42 of its 241 stores. Marks & Spencer closed seven clothes stores as part of its programme to close 100 by 2022. Ofcom fined Royal Mail £50 million for anti-competitive behaviour.

Home When families and doctors are in agreement, medical staff will be able to remove tubes supplying food and water to people in a permanent vegetative state without applying to the Court of Protection, the Supreme Court ruled. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists called on Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, to allow women in England to take abortion pills at home rather than in a clinic. A man was jailed for four and a half years and his wife for three and a half years at Leeds Crown Court for tricking their daughter into travelling to Bangladesh in order to force her into marriage. Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, in a meeting with his Chinese counterpart during his visit to China, said: ‘My wife is Japanese. My wife is Chinese.

Home Dame Margaret Hodge accused Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, of being an ‘anti-Semite’ and a ‘racist’ in front of a number of MPs at Westminster; within 12 hours she had received a disciplinary letter. ‘People have to be judged on what they do and not on what they say,’ she insisted on BBC radio. The government announced pay rises for a million public sector workers, with 2.9 per cent for the armed forces, 2.75 per cent for prison officers, up to 3.5 per cent for teachers and 2 per cent for police and general practitioners. The budget for London’s Crossrail project rose from £14.8 billion to £15.4 billion.

Home The administration of Theresa May, the Prime Minister, staggered on, as Conservative MPs exchanged angry words in the Commons, with supporters of Brexit and its enemies voting in turn against government bills. The government even failed to shorten the parliamentary session by five days to avoid trouble, instead provoking threats of defeat on the adjournment debate. An amendment to the Trade Bill seeking to impose a customs union on the government was defeated by 307 to 301, thanks to four Labour MPs who voted with the government. Guto Bebb resigned as minister for defence procurement to vote against the government on amendments that it accepted to the Customs Bill.

Home Boris Johnson resigned as Foreign Secretary the day after David Davis resigned as Brexit Secretary, both in reaction to a government plan for Brexit agreed by the cabinet after being held incommunicado at Chequers for 12 hours, their mobile phones confiscated. At Chequers, Mr Johnson was reported to have said: ‘Anyone defending the proposal we have just agreed will find it like trying to polish a turd.’ In his resignation letter he said that the Brexit ‘dream is dying, suffocated by needless self-doubt’, adding: ‘We are truly headed for the status of a colony.’ Dominic Raab, the housing minister, replaced Mr Davis; Kit Malthouse replaced Mr Raab.

Home In an attempt to distract the nation from the toothache of Brexit, the government announced a £4.5 million scheme to encourage homosexuals to hold hands; a law would be considered to ban corrective therapy, which Penny Mordaunt, the Equalities Minister, said could involve rape. A man known as Nick, whose true name is withheld for legal reasons, who alleged there was a paedophile ring at Westminster, was charged with perverting the course of justice. Labour restored the whip to Jared O’Mara, the MP for Sheffield Hallam, from whom it had been suspended in October. Gavin Williamson, the Defence Secretary, was interrupted during a statement to the Commons by the voice of Siri on his mobile phone.

Home The Commons voted in favour of a new runway at Heathrow by 415 votes to 119. Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, who had previously promised to lie in front of the bulldozers, absented himself from the vote, instead meeting the Deputy Foreign Minister of Afghanistan in Kabul. ‘My resignation would have achieved absolutely nothing,’ he said. Greg Hands resigned as trade minister because he opposed the runway. The Scottish government said it still supported the runway even though SNP MPs at Westminster abstained. Spanish-owned Ferrovial, which operates Heathrow, is to move its international headquarters from Britain to Amsterdam because of Brexit.

Home Theresa May, the Prime Minister, said that spending on NHS England would increase by £20 billion a year by 2023. Some of the money would come from economic growth and a ‘Brexit dividend’, but more would come from taxes to be announced by the Chancellor at the next budget. Paul Johnson, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said that the divorce settlement with the EU and Britain’s commitments to replace EU funding had already accounted for ‘all of our EU contributions’ for the next few years. The government said the use of medicinal cannabis was to be reviewed.