Cambridge Professor Tells LBC The Queen Could Fire Boris Johnson

7 August 2019, 18:36

A Cambridge University professor has told LBC that the Queen could fire Boris Johnson should he lose a vote of confidence in Parliament, but that it's unlikely she would.

David Howarth told Eddie that there hadn't been royal intervention in the political process for a "very long time," he said the last time "monarch actually fired a Prime Minister was 1834."

He said the law was clear and the Queen could fire Boris Johnson. David Howarth is Professor of Law and Public Policy at the University of Cambridge

Rumours have been flowing of a Remainer plot to drag the Queen into the middle of the Brexit crisis by demanding that she sack Boris Johnson if he refuses to step down in the event he loses a confidence vote in Parliament.

Eddie Mair was speaking to David Howarth who is Professor of Law and Public Policy at the University of Cambridge. Picture: LBC

Professor Howarth told LBC that the Queen would be advised by a, so called, "Golden Triangle" made up of the Queen's Private Secretary, the Cabinet Secretary and the Principal Private Secretary to The Prime Minister.

The academic said the "main line of thought" was to "keep the Queen above politics."

He said the "trouble with the present situation" was that whatever the Queen does it "looks political," he told Eddie "not firing Boris and firing Boris both equally count as interventions."

But, he said he thought should things get to that situation then people would try to "persuade Boris to go, so he doesn't embarrass the Queen."

Eddie asked why the Queen was allowed to do it, but nobody would ever want her to. Professor Howarth explained to LBC how things worked in other countries with similar situations.

Watch the whole expert commentary in the video at the top of the page.