Mrjohnson is determined to leave the European Union on 31st october, ideally with a deal, otherwise without one. His government, though, has a majority in the commons ofjust one and 21 conservatives have signed a letter this week telling the Prime Minister his policy is wrong. If they did support a vote of no confidence and injected Boris Johnson from downing street, can they prevent a no deal brexit . Thats a good question, and this government of National Unity is the kind of thing a nation reaches for and people begin suggesting when there absolutely is no unity. Jeremy corbyns plan this week was to try to get other opposition people to unite behind him, and he would become Prime Minister and then he promised them this would be limited, he didnt say for how long, with the aim but not certainty of delivering aim but not certainty of delivering a general election and so on. At that point, unity such as there might be among the opposition people began to break up. If borisjohnson lost a vote of no confidence, there are two problems. One, he may not respect any alternative grouping that said we can form a government, particularly if there is the disarray that we have already seen in response toJeremy Corbyns government. He would also have the ability to call a general election himself. Even if one were not forced on him by the 1a day period of that. So he doesnt entirely lose room for manoeuvre if that happened. He could even at the beginning of september when Parliament Comes back call a general election at that point. He could catch everyone then. You could, and there is not going into that. It is not in a certainty, but what is happening is that both sides are plotting on exact what they will do on the 3rd of september, because the anti know dean voters dont want to give any room for the government to give any room for the government to suspend parliament, and they are trying to get this in early. Not just the no confidence things, but a lot of mps are trying to work out if they can get hold of the house of commons passed legislation, forcing the government to have an extension, so the government to have an extension, so there is a legislative drive, the no confidence lot, then the government itself is not passive, it is working out what it can do, calling an election might be one of those things. David, Jeremy Corbyn has a point to an extent. He is the leader of her majesty, he is the obvious person to call on if Boris Johnson loses a vote of confidence. We really are in this position of testing what the conventions and unwritten parts of the constitution do, and what they mean. One of the things that has been really interesting is when people say on the corbin side, you cannot possibly have somebody who is not the leader of the opposition. And on the other side, they say it is a coup against borisjohnson, who has been selected by the vast number of people, 90,000 conservatives, not by anybody else, but that is the system. And then, bronwyn has quite rightly said, the 1931 National Government makes it quite clear that our constitution actually does permit somebody who can form a majority in parliament to become the head of government. The question is the mechanism by which that happens. As that happens, everybody is shouting coup at each other. I everybody is shouting coup at each other. Lam everybody is shouting coup at each other. I am taking a simplistic view of this. If Boris Johnson does other. I am taking a simplistic view of this. If borisjohnson does not have a majority in the house of commons and have a majority in the house of cottittiofis and someone have a majority in the house of commons and someone else can, then if you can discover who that someone else is, then that is actually as near as the will of the british people as far as can be expressed. Do you agree with that, bronwyn . do, but it depends what they are commanding a majority for. There is no majority as having Jeremy Corbyn as the new Prime Minister, without any constraints. He said it would be time limited, would simply be for this purpose, but our constitution does not, despite the two month president in 1931, does not have such a thing as a temporary Prime Minister just such a thing as a temporary Prime Ministerjust for this purpose. Two month president. Ministerjust for this purpose. Twomonth president. But it could conceivably happen. And so people are talking, there was a beautiful interview this morning with ken clarke. Youjust interview this morning with ken clarke. You just arrived back from holiday. J svensson, the new leader of the lib dems had found him up on holiday and said, look, if this were to come about, he is the father of the house, he is the longest serving mp. Snow might there since 1917. The house, he is the longest serving mp. Snow might there since1917. He said, i took this call, i came back, and if they didnt want me to do it. Ahe and if they didnt want me to do it. A he seemed tickled by the idea. And he could imagine himself being Prime Minister. It is funny how contagious it is. It is such a crazy world, and you if you could possibly get ken clarke to be Prime Minister by some kind of mechanism, he would probably turn out to be far more popular than even borisjohnson or karen may jordan. More popular than even borisjohnson or karen mayjordan. Jeremy corbyn. It didnt go down well with Jeremy Corbyn, because he is too divisive a figure. But then there is the question whether that is the mechanism, bronwyn is right, the other mechanisms that people were disgusting is whether or not parliament could legislate for a further extension and beyond that, whether there could ever be a majority for a second referendum or a revocation. Diane, this is the difficulty, because what we are really talking about whether or not the uk leaves without an agreement to leave on the 31st of october. The law, as it currently stands, says we leave on the 31st of october, whatever else happens. Everything else is a manoeuvre to ensure that happens or prevent it happening. Well, as a person who did not grow up well, as a person who did not grow up in the uk, and i had very little understanding of how complex the constitution of british law can be, lam very constitution of british law can be, i am very confused, given that it has been three years. It seems more and more things are flying out of the pandora box and trying to get this sorted. I am not sure when and how this will be sorted. So far, the stock market and the market in general is expecting a no deal brexit, and from the european side, they are expecting a no deal brexit. It seems a lot of these manoeuvres, however effort people are putting m, however effort people are putting in, idont however effort people are putting in, i dont know how effective they would be, and so far, theresa may was not able to secure a majority to have her deal past, i am was not able to secure a majority to have her deal past, lam not was not able to secure a majority to have her deal past, i am not sure this will, at any point, come into effect, that will stop a no deal, would it . I think the momentum is not towards a no deal, it doesnt seem to me that the government is making the overtures towards europe that we prepare for a no deal. Boris johnson meets Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel ahead of the g7 next weekend. That opens up some sort of potential for weekend. That opens up some sort of potentialfor movement, doesnt weekend. That opens up some sort of potential for movement, doesnt it, on one side of the other . So far, borisjohnson has on one side of the other . So far, Boris Johnson has been on one side of the other . So far, borisjohnson has been standing with his arms folded and saying, provided they come and scrap the backstop, and we wont talk about that today, then we can talk. Then we can talk, but there is not much to say. He and his people let it be known that this isa his people let it be known that this is a tactic towards trying to get a better deal from europe is a tactic towards trying to get a better dealfrom europe by being focused on no deal, and sometimes there isnt that wrinkle. I think there isnt that wrinkle. I think the momentum is now towards no deal, but people then start saying, look, after no deal, there has to be a deal, so lets start almost talking about that already. There are so many changes day by day, so towards the beginning of last week, we had this Great Campaign by the government and government supporters in favour of no deal, which is to try and convince everybody that no deal wouldnt be a great problem, possibly just to no deal wouldnt be a great problem, possiblyjust to convince europe that we would possibly consider it in the great game of chicken that people. By the end of the week, the thing had begun to shift back again to the plausible or possible route by which Parliament May express a majority against no deal. What you could feel at the beginning of the week, you felt differently about it by the end of the week. This seesaw is going to go on now for the next month or so, i cannot see an for the next month or so, i cannot see an interlude. I think it would help to step back from all of these manoeuvres and see what we can all agree on, and that is that there is no consensus. This country, the two main Political Parties, in fact, almost all the Political Parties are to one extent or another divided, and it is not like any manoeuvre currently being proposed will change that. It seems to me that the idea of having some kind of caretaker government that can lower the temperature, by sometime, allow for a more considered discussion of all this wouldnt be a bad idea. But Jeremy Corbyns idea, as is so often been the case in the past century or more from the hard right and hard left, had awkward overturns of a coup, or come in by the back door, and we can all of historical precedents for that, which ended badly in europe. The ken clarke idea has greater attractions. Would it be impossible for it Caretaker Administration composed not as is currently proposed of people who really wa nt currently proposed of people who really want to remain dontjust wa nt to really want to remain dontjust want to head off and have a no deal brexit, but clearly are committed, at least all the names that have beenin at least all the names that have been in the public, our earth people who want to remain. That is not going to work, it certainly will not forge a consensus. That is when you get into the language the Prime Minister is used when he has talked about collaborators, people in politics here who in his view are collaborating with brussels, and that then has a very unpleasant sound to it. I think we can all agree that the country needs to move beyond that combative language. How long it might take to come up with some sort of consensus, was at 4. 8 margin at the time of the referendum . Margin at the time of the referendum . That was margin at the time of the referendum . That was never going to be enough to persuade the remain voters that this was the best outcome for the country. The argument that speaks to, though, i would have thought, but apparently this is a view that can only be taken this is a view that can only be ta ken by this is a view that can only be taken by remain voters, is for the second referendum. That is where that one goes, because it allows you to settle that argument clearly, and to settle that argument clearly, and to try and make an appeal or a series of appeals to what is a divided nation. Most of us who kind of ta ke divided nation. Most of us who kind of take the long view of this, that immediately after the referendum, the people who had dominated the leave side treated the referendum as if it had been overwhelmingly won, and this was a huge error. Not least because they then couldnt deal, quite a lot of them, with the likely consequences of quite a lot of them, with the likely consequences of that position themselves. I would like to Say Something else about the virtues of buying time and all of this, as we all know, political energies have been exhausted over this fight over the last three years. In the meantime, there are serious threats to our peace and prosperity, which are not receiving a lot of attention. China and russia, both of them, set on courses which could be very anti the article and very hostile. We are on the edge of a recession. If we could find a mechanism to kick this down the road a little bit and find a government which would begin to address some of these serious threats to our peace and prosperity, and it is possible that in the end, this will all be resolved by some external mechanism, something that Vladimir Putin does or something that is done in the south china sea, that will make people realise there is more to life than brexit. There is a question about whether this has come about due to the luxury of a lack of external enemy. I wish you were right, but if there is some way of suspending all of this, it does not seem suspending all of this, it does not seem easily available and we are heading for no deal, and the government has obviously been trying to be really reassuring about no deal in the past couple of weeks and saying much is being done, which it is. But we cannot control as the uk key elements of a no deal, we cannot control what france does with its ports and we cannot anticipate the many complexities and we cannot control the question of the irish border which still hangs there. If we are out with no deal, someone will want to close it. Vladimir putin and ping are licking their lips, as they see both us and america in disarray, youre in disarray, the uk, which has been with the united states, a bastion of peace and prosperity in the well, certainly since the second world war, in disarray. There is nothing good that can come out of this. Lets come out to another point in the world, what genre saying, the of china. 22 years after the uks last governor of hong kong sailed into the sunset and the union flag was lowered for the last time, china says the British Government has no power to rule and no power to supervise hong kong. Pro democracy protests, now entering their eleventh week, and how to end them is an internal matter. Yet it was through its ambassador in london, liu xiaoming, that the government in beijing chose to signal to the world that its patience for the tumult in what is euphemistically called the special administratrive region, is all but over. On thursday, mr lui declared at a News Conference should the situation deteriorate further, the Central Government will not sit on its hands and watch. Diane, on saturday morning, we saw imagesjust over the diane, on saturday morning, we saw images just over the border of military vehicles all lined up for aero herself, in practice, involving the armed police. Has beijings police run out and what can protesters do to avoid the backlash that people fear . I thought a significant point was last week, when carrie lam appealed to the protesters in tears, saying, please think of hong kong, think of the welfare of the city and our hometown. It reminded me of the moment when we were in tenormin squarer 30 years ago, the then chairman of the communist party came to see the students are on Hunger Strike and said please go home. In tiananmen square. That was the turning point, the decision was made that perhaps a hard crackdown would happen. I think we have that perhaps a hard crackdown would happen. Ithink we have passed that perhaps a hard crackdown would happen. I think we have passed that point in hong kong, that china has made up its mind that if need be, china will intervene, and that, i think, is a dangerous point. Of course, think, is a dangerous point. Of course , now we think, is a dangerous point. Of course, now we see think, is a dangerous point. Of course, now we see the military personnel is stationed, just across the border from hong kong. Then we also see the protesters in the streets again this weekend, so in a way, it has very much a parallel to tiananmen 30 years ago, when we as students thought we had the support of international community, in fact, we had possibly more support then than what the hung protesters have now. And we felt quite invisible, we felt that we had the upper hand, and of course, a History Lesson taught us of course, a History Lesson taught us that students never had the upper hand, it is the government that had the upper hand. And that is a very depressing precedent. There is the hope that hong kong has a visibility that the streets of beijing lacks 30 yea rs that the streets of beijing lacks 30 years ago, not least because we are seeing the events unfold live on our screens, a reference, or the other ways that people have of communicating. If you have a crackdown, you cannot hide it. Look at this rampagings point of view, the problem goes far beyond hong kong. When i visited china for the time in 30 years, i lived in china through much of the revolution, but didnt return until last autumn, i was struck by how widespread and repressed was the descent in china, who seems to me that when considering what to do about this, jinping and his government have to think about the domestic repercussions. They must be very concerned that there could be an eruption inside china. If i am not mistaken, you will know more of chinese history than myself, every chinese history than myself, every chinese dynasties has eventually been overthrown by a peasant revolt ora been overthrown by a peasant revolt or a revolt, if not by peasants, by dissenters. It seems to me that what they will have to think hard about, is whether a crackdown in hong kong will make more or less likely an eruption inside china. In this case, i would actually say that even though it is a possibility, that is very much not the case, and the difference this time is that jinping has a lot of support within china, within mainland china, in terms of how to deal with hong kong in a decisive way, because the mainland chinese have not been taking lightly that the Hong Kong Chinese think somehow, they are different, they are more superior, they deserve more democratic rights than the mainland chinese. They had been very much supporting xi jinping. On top of that, if you see what happened over the past weekend, 41 tycoons is assigned an open letter, celebrities we nt assigned an open letter, celebrities went on tv such as jackie chan. Assigned an open letter, celebrities went on tv such asjackie chan. 41 tycoons signed a letter. They we re 41 tycoons signed a letter. They were giving support of the chinese government, there were advertisements taken out on every newspaper. China has a huge economic muscle. And it hasnt had that much international criticism. In the uks case, it is the sound of silence. Consequences for china economically of a serious crackdown in hong kong, all the more so if it involves casualties of significant numbers, which it could very easily do. It seems to me the consequences, economically, would be severe, and once again, would not be limited to hong kong itself, but would blow back into china. And for the chinese government, the History Lesson they learned from tiananmen was that the short term pain was worse than the long term gain. They cracked down on tiananmen and they created what they call stability for the next 30 years. China saw the most Unprecedented Development in the world that the world has not seen for a century. They are actually primed to think that even though hong kong might suffer in the short time, if necessary, they are going to intervene in order to prevent further disruption and downturn in economic terms. Here is a paradox which i would like your views on. Here is an immensely confident and economically strong china, and yet, underxi economically strong china, and yet, under xi jinping, economically strong china, and yet, underxijinping, there has been a gradual move back towards authoritarianism. Now, it is hard to square that with a degree of confidence about the future. If you have confidence about the future and confidence in your people, you dont need to make yourself president for life and describe yourself as being the author as xi jinping thought, and you dont need to look at every dissident that you can get your hands on and harry any protesters and demonstrators, because you can rely upon your appeal to the people on the basis of how well the country is going. This is a paradox i dont understand, because it does mean that when you do get flare ups of dissidents etc, you are almost bound to deal with it by a kind of force which is dangerous in itself. It might work in the short term or in the medium term, but it also might not work. It creates itself destabilising. Not work. It creates itself destabilising. It is not work. It creates itself destabilising. It is a paradox not work. It creates itself destabilising. It is a paradox and essence, that the chinese leadership does not want people to ask for the Political Freedoms that might go with those economic freedoms, and that has been the case right through this extraordinary economic transformation. Are a uk government with a special response ability to speak up, not just with a special response ability to speak up, notjust because of the accord under which hong kong did to the one country two systems, but because we cannot expect donald trump, who will stand up for the dissent in hong kong. He hasjust said, perhaps xi jinping dissent in hong kong. He hasjust said, perhaps xijinping should go and meet the protesters, which given what you said about tiananmen doesnt sound likely. Well, the precedents set here in the uk isnt terribly encouraging in the last two years. In all a terribly encouraging in the last two years. In alla manner of terribly encouraging in the last two years. In all a manner of ways, we have signalled to the chinese that we are more interested in a happy economic relationship than we are in china attending to human rights. |j com pletely china attending to human rights. |j completely agree and i think brexit will make it more that way and we will make it more that way and we will be desperate for trade deals that. I do agree with you, we have a special responsibility and it is not one that we are accepting or recognising. My fear about pot Foreign Policy after brexit is it will become more that way, it will look like our trade policy. In fact, when you mentioned donald trump, that statement just shows how little he understands china, chinese history, and the leadership psychology. In fact, he suggested that perhaps xi jinping could meet with him and talk about hong kong in terms of the trade. So he is using hong kong as a bargaining chip in his trade deals, which i do not believe xi jinping would be receptive too. That is after he has bought greenland. We believe that one for another programme. Thank you very much. Thank you, too, for your company, join us at the same time next week for dateline london. Hello, not a bad day for most of us across england and wales, but in scotla nd across england and wales, but in scotland and Northern Ireland, blustery showers by the order of the day, and they will continue into tomorrow and the week ahead as well. This is the weather front that brought that wash out of a day across the country yesterday. The weather front has moved out of the way now and the skies had cleared, but the low pressure is still with us and it is here to stay or through the weekend. There are a lot of isobars there, and that is an indication that the wind will be quite strong as well, particularly around the coasts of Northern Ireland and western scotland. Elsewhere, it is a case of scattered showers carried by these south westerly winds. Wind around the coast will be around 30 40 mph here, possibly 50 mph later in the afternoon in the north west of the country. Top temperatures today, 2223 in country. Top temperatures today, 22 23 in the south, in the north, closer to 18. The showers will become frequent this evening in the far north west of the country, the wind will be strong as well, gales around the coasts for a time, but for much of england and wales, it is looking dry. However, notice that there is some rain by the end of the night across the south east, possibly east anglia as well. This weather front here will be skirting the far south and south east of the country, so for the early birds, sunday morning in the south may start of grey, bits and pieces of rain, but it shouldnt last for very long, it should be out of the way by late morning. In the north west, showers continue, you can see the low pressure to the north of scotla nd low pressure to the north of scotland spinning around here, no change, 17 at the top temperature on the sunday in glasgow and edinburgh, 22 in london. That is sunday, no real change on monday in the far north of the country, low pressure still close, out in the north norwegian sea, but it is still sending showers and a breeze to scotland, may be some making their way into Northern Ireland, the lake district, lancashire and the odd light one for the south, but for the south and east, dry and sunny on monday. 21 in london, 16 in the north. And the outlook for the next few days, looking reasonably settled in the south of the country, bar the odd shower. The north, we will continue with the showers for the week. This is bbc news. The headlines at midday. Ten men, aged between 13 and 30, are being questioned on suspicion of murdering pc Andrew Harper in berkshire. He is clearly a man who, in his short period of time, has touched many lives and has been an Exemplary Police officer. Pro democracy protesters take to the streets of hong kong once more theyve been supported by thousands of teachers. Meanwhile, chinese troops have put on a show of military strength in the border city of shenzhen. Following months of unrest in sudan, the Ruling Military Council prepares to sign a power sharing deal with the civilian opposition. In cricket stuart broad is pushing for england to win the second ashes test, despite five sessions having been lost to rain