Boris Johnson's manifesto was full of 'lies', claims ex-MEP

Ex-Brexit Party MEP for London Ben Habib has accused Boris Johnson of backtracking on a pledge to make a clean break from the EU. - Credit: BBC

A former Brexit Party MEP has suggested the Tory manifesto contained lies on Brexit – claiming there was not a “single accurate thing” in the section on leaving the EU.

Ben Habib, an ex-Brexit Party politician who represented the seat of London in the European Parliament for six months before it was abolished in January this year, said No 10’s internal market bill had “no teeth” and that a “Brexit betrayal” was firmly on the prime minister’s cards.

Writing in the Express, Habib accused Johnson of contorting the Tory manifesto pledge to completely remove all of the UK from the customs union.

He wrote: “His deal left Northern Ireland in the EU’s customs union and put a border down the Irish Sea.

“It also committed Northern Ireland and, by creeping extension, the UK to EU state aid and other laws.

“Moreover it left the Court of Justice of the European Union in charge of enforcing whole swathes of laws in the UK, including those mentioned above.

“There is not a single accurate thing in the paragraph lifted from the manifesto.”

The property developer went on to suggest Johnson was cowering away from threats to override the Withdrawal Agreement by passing controversial clauses in the internal market bill.

“No sooner had it been announced, the government kicked the bill into the long grass,” he lamented.

“It now will not be passed until at least December and then only implemented if parliament has yet another vote on it.”

He went on: “Maybe Boris will follow through with it and actually put right what he put wrong in the Withdrawal Agreement?

“There is little chance of that.

“To deliver his promises, there must be no border in the Irish Sea. Not even the bill sought to get rid of that border.

“The only way out of this mess would be to repudiate the entire Withdrawal Agreement.”

Stepping up his attack on the prime minister, Habib wrote: “As of yet there is not even a hint that he might do so. The fact he brought the bill forward in fact suggests the opposite.

“On 1 January 2021, the United Kingdom will do what no country has ever before done, willingly partition itself in an act of constitutional self-harm and national humiliation.”

Habib and the Brexit Party stepped down candidates at the general election to get Boris Johnson elected, and eventually went on to support his deal.