Jeremy Corbyn calls on Boris Johnson to resign after Supreme Court ruling

24 September 2019, 17:37

Jeremy Corbyn has called on Boris Johnson to resign saying he has "misled the country" after his prorogation of Parliament was ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court.

The Labour leader said: "The prime minister acted illegally when he tried to shut down opposition to his reckless and disastrous plan to crash out of the European Union without a deal.

"But he has failed. He will never shut down our democracy or silence the voices of the people.

"The democracy that Boris Johnson describes as a “rigmarole” will not be stifled and the people will have their say.

"Tomorrow, parliament will return. The government will be held to account for what it has done.

"Boris Johnson has been found to have misled the country. This unelected prime minister should now resign."

Jeremy Corbyn was due to speak tomorrow at lunchtime, at the end of the conference, but has made a speech at the Labour conference today because parliament is being reconvened tomorrow.

Continuing his attack on the prime minister, Mr Corbyn said "[Resigning] would make him the shortest serving British prime minister in history and rightly so.

"His is a born-to-rule government of the entitled who believe that the rules they set for everyone else don’t apply to them."

The Labour leader said a general election should take place as soon as no deal has been taken off the table.

Criticising the prime minister's stance on a no-deal Brexit, Mr Corbyn said: "The prime minister has no mandate for a no-deal crash-out, which is opposed by a majority of the public.

"It would force up food prices, cause shortages of medicines and threaten peace in Northern Ireland, thus destroying the work of the Good Friday agreement."

Jeremy Corbyn stressed that ""Labour will do the opposite, we will bring people together.

"A Labour government will transform our economy and communities. We stand not just for the 52 per cent or the 48 per cent but for the 99 per cent."

He added: "My job, as Leader, and our job as the Labour Party is to champion those people, to stand up for those communities and deliver the real change our country needs."

Speaking from the UN General Assembly in New York, the prime minister said: "Obviously this is a verdict that we will respect and we respect the judicial process.

"I have to say that I strongly disagree with what the justices have found. I don't think that it's right but we will go ahead and of course Parliament will come back."

A No 10 source said: "The PM will not resign following the judgment.

Speaker John Bercow says parliament will 'resume' tomorrow morning at 11.30am.

He added that Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) - which would usually be held on a Wednesday - will not go ahead, but there would be time made for urgent and ministerial questions, and applications for emergency debates.