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Brexit Bulletin: And Then There Were 10

Brexit Bulletin: And Then There Were Ten

(Bloomberg) -- Today in Brexit: One by one the Tory leadership hopefuls will fall. The last one standing has to solve Brexit.

What’s Happening?

And they’re off — eight men and two women are in the running to be Britain’s next prime minister. From the instantly recognizable Boris Johnson to the less well-known Mark Harper (a former minister and, pre-2016, chief whip), they’ll be hard to avoid in the coming days and weeks. 

It will take six weeks to produce a winner, but the process of whittling down the candidates will begin almost immediately, with a first round of voting among Tory lawmakers due to take place on Thursday. The final two candidates will go to the 160,000 rank-and-file party members to make the final decision.

Monday saw several big hitters open their campaigns with set-piece events, while most of the others gave interviews or sent out a blizzard of tweets. (Worried that you missed any? Here’s a handy list so you can keep track.) 

Although there are already divisions around taxation and spending policies — Johnson’s plan to lower taxes on high earners came in for heavy fire from rivals — the key schisms are over Brexit.

No-dealers Dominic Raab and Esther McVey talked tough, Michael Gove tried to detoxify the concept of a new (short) Brexit delay, while ex-Remainer Jeremy Hunt tried to sound tough and pragmatic at the same time. Matt Hancock, the health secretary, said Parliament would simply block a no-deal Brexit. Outsider Rory Stewart spent a fair bit of time trying to catch Johnson’s attention on Twitter. 

Today’s Must-Reads

  • Want more on what the candidates think? The ConservativeHome website asked each of them 15 questions
  • Whoever wins the contest will have to hit the ground running with no time to work out what to do, former Tory leader William Hague says
  • Could Boris Johnson really withhold the UK’s £39 billion Brexit divorce payment? It might need the International Court of Arbitration in the Hague to decide, Peter Foster writes in the Telegraph.
  • Britain’s senior civil servants are preparing for a Boris Johnson premiership, but are determined to resist a push for no-deal, Rachel Sylvester writes in The Times

Brexit in Brief

Under Pressure | U.K. workers saw wages and training fall in industries where the Brexit-related depreciation of the pound drove up import costs, according to an academic paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research in the U.S. Researchers said sterling’s fall has had a “deskilling impact” on workers in industries that rely on specific foreign sources for products in their supply chain.

On the Slide | U.K. manufacturing output fell 3.9% in April, the most in almost 17 years, as the boost from Brexit stockpiling evaporated and car producers went ahead with planned shutdowns. The economy as a whole shrunk for a second straight month, Office for National Statistics figures published Monday showed.

Brexit Bulletin: And Then There Were 10

BOE Poised | The Bank of England doesn’t have to wait until the Brexit political uncertainty is resolved before raising interest rates, according to policy maker Michael Saunders. “The MPC has already raised rates twice since the Brexit vote,” he said in a speech. “We will act again if needed to ensure a sustained return of inflation to target over time.”

Meanwhile | It’s not exactly sunny in the opposition ranks. The weekly meeting of Labour MPs descended into open warfare on Monday, the Financial Times reports, with MPs furious over poor EU election results and the party’s ongoing antisemitism issue.

Want to keep up with Brexit?

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To contact the editor responsible for this story: Neil Callanan at ncallanan@bloomberg.net, Leila Taha

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.