Boris Johnson resignation: Former Foreign Secretary appears for first time since stepping down

Fiona Simpson9 July 2018
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Boris Johnson has emerged for the first time since stepping down as Foreign Secretary.

He was pictured leaving the foreign secretary's official residence at Carlton Gardens, central London, following his resignation earlier on Monday.

The former Foreign Secretary and Mayor of London looked dishevelled as he left the building and got into a black car hours after stepping.

He appeared wearing a white shirt with the top button undone and without a tie.

Mr Johnson resigned just hours after Brexit Secretary David Davis walked out of the Cabinet.

Jeremy Hunt has been appointed as Foreign Secretary while Dominic Raab will take over from Mr Davis.

Theresa May’ leadership was thrown into disarray following the departures over her Brexit Chequers’ deal

Furious Right-wingers were due to confront her at a meeting of the Tory 1922 backbench committee this evening.

Shock resignation: Boris and his wife leave Carlton House after stepping down
PA

Conservative in-fighting broke out in the Commons later as Mrs May was forced to deny last week's Chequers agreement was a "betrayal" over Brexit.

MP Peter Bone faced shouts of "shame" and "nonsense" from Tory colleagues as he claimed activists in his Wellingborough constituency refused to campaign at the weekend as they felt "betrayed" over what emerged from the Cabinet summit.

Mrs May said she was "very sorry" the activists did not feel able to campaign, before adding: "This is not a betrayal."

David Davis pictured after quitting the government, resigning his post as Brexit Secretary
AFP/Getty Images

She said: "We will end free movement, we will end the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, we will stop sending vast sums of money to the European Union every year, we will come out of the Common Agricultural Policy, we will come out of the Common Fisheries Policy.

"I believe that is what people voted for when they voted to leave and we will deliver in faith to the British people."

In his resignation letter, Mr Johnson wrote: "Brexit should be about opportunity and hope. It should be a chance to do things differently, to be more nimble and dynamic and to maximise the particular advantages of the UK as an open, outward-looking global economy.

"That dream is dying, suffocated by needless self-doubt.

"We have postponed crucial decisions - including the preparations for no deal, as I argued in my letter to you of last November - with the result that we appear to be heading for a semi-Brexit with large parts of the economy still locked into the EU system but with no UK control over that system."

In a scathing dismissal of Mrs May's proposals for post-Brexit relations with the EU, he added: "It is as though we are sending our vanguard into battle with the white flags fluttering above them."

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