SKY NEWS – NIALL PATERSON ON SUNDAY – 10.00 – 17.09.17 – INTERVIEW WITH DAMIAN GREEN MP, CONSERVATIVE

NIALL PATERSON: We are joined now by the First Secretary of State and one of Theresa May’s closest allies, Damian Green. Mr Green, a very good morning to you.

DAMIAN GREEN: Good morning.

NP: We will of course deal with Brexit and related matters in just a minute but I wondered if we might start with Parsons Green and I wondered if you could update us. Two arrests have now been made, the threat level remaining at critical.

DAMIAN GREEN: It is. As you say there was obviously an arrest in Dover yesterday and late last night the police arrested someone else in London but the police operation is still continuing obviously very, very intensively. The threat level remains at critical which is the highest level it can be, it means that the independent JTAC committee that assesses the terror threat thinks that an attack is imminent and so obviously that means everyone must stay vigilant. They should go about what they were going to do anyway but stay vigilant and police activity remains particularly intense.

NP: How unhelpful is it to have the President of the United States tweeting unfounded speculation in the immediate aftermath of the attack? We’re told that Theresa May has believed it to be unhelpful, let’s be honest about it, she must be livid.

DAMIAN GREEN: As you say, it is unhelpful for anyone to speculate about police information or police activities when they are conducting operations in any kind of crime but particularly in counter terrorism operations so I would urge anyone from the President of the United States downwards not to tweet speculation about police activities when they are actually happening.

NP: You said there anyone from the President down but it is pretty remarkable that the holder of one of the highest offices in the world feels free to tweet in 140 characters about an ongoing investigation about an incident in which hundreds of people potentially narrowly escaped death.

DAMIAN GREEN: Yes, as I say, it’s unhelpful and nobody should do it but I should emphasise at the same time that we have and we maintain very close co-operation with the American security services, that we use their information, they use our information and the fact that we can share that information makes the people of this country safer. A lot of counter terrorism work for obvious reasons is intelligence led, you need to know who is involved and what they are doing and who their associates are and the wider the net of information gathering you have, the better it is, that is why we have close co-operation with the Americans and it is why we are proposing this morning that as part of the Brexit negotiations we sign a security treaty with the other EU countries so that we can maintain and, if possible enhance the same sort of security co-operation that we have with them. As we’ve seen, terrorism is an international activity, we want to keep obviously people safe on the streets of London from wherever they come from and we know there are many British citizens in other countries and we can all keep each other safe so international co-operation on counter terrorism is absolutely vital and that is why we have proposed a security treaty.

NP: Well let’s stick with the topic of unwelcome interventions. Boris Johnson, presumably you’d have preferred he kept his counsel when it came to Brexit.

DAMIAN GREEN: Well I’ve read Boris’s article and I can’t say there was anything surprising in it. Boris is an optimist, he argued his case eloquently during the referendum campaign that he thought Brexit was a great opportunity for this country and that’s what’s in that article. I do think we’re having a weekend of excitement about the timing of it, just before the Prime Minister’s speech but I really think that people should calm down. What’s important, we have this hugely important negotiation, we have the most important negotiations any British government has had for decades and in the long run what matters is what deal we get and therefore the timing of individual articles in individual newspapers is a pretty second order issue. I read the article and there is nothing in it that contradicts the Lancaster House speech.

NP: Mr Green, the problem is of course is that Boris Johnson is not a backbencher, he is the Foreign Secretary and logically the only way that he could not be undermining the Prime Minister ahead of her speech in Florence is if what he said in this 4000 word article chimes exactly with what Theresa May is planning on saying and we both know that’s not the case.

DAMIAN GREEN: Well I’m not sure you’ve seen what she is going to be saying in Florence. I suspect not otherwise Sky would be broadcasting it! So we’ll all have to wait and see what’s in the Prime Minister’s speech on Friday but I think the underlying point there is that the Cabinet is united in working for the best possible Brexit deal for Britain and what has been good is that those who fought hard on either side of what was a pretty strong referendum campaign – strong in terms of the strength of the feelings on both sides – that those of us who argued for remain like me, those who argued to leave like Boris, can now get together and actually work out what’s best for Britain now that the British people have delivered their verdict, that’s what I’m interested in, what deal we get for the British people at the end of it.

NP: Okay, given that this is such a united government, you won’t mind if I put some of Boris’s plan towards you. He doesn’t mention transition, he makes it clear he believes there should be no payments after the point of exit from the European Union and again, once again we have this mythical £350 million a week that he and precious few others say is available for the NHS. Theresa May is going to be mentioning that I suppose?

DAMIAN GREEN: Look, certainly the issue of money is an important one but before you get how much money will be available to the British government afterwards, you have to negotiate that figure. We have said, and we will maintain this, is that we the government recognise that Britain is a country that meets its obligations and that we will have obligations to continue to pay while we’re still a member, obviously not beyond that but also there will be projects and perhaps institutions that we want to remain a member of. Let me refer back to the security issue we were discussing a couple of minutes ago. As part of the security treaty that we propose we will want to remain a member of Europol, that’s a Europe wide organisation and clearly if we are a member of that …

NP: Okay Mr Green, I want to bring the topic back to Boris Johnson because he is the Foreign Secretary and there are significant others within your party who read his intervention on Friday as an attempt either to hamstring or to tie the Prime Minister. Why is there so much anger from a section of the 22 Committee if Boris Johnson is simply setting out the ground on which Theresa May will build?

DAMIAN GREEN: I think Boris, as I say, if you read the article, it is expressed in the ebullient way that Boris always does, he is a very entertaining writer but the underlying thrust of it is everything that Boris has argued before and indeed …

NP: So he is not going to be sacked for insubordination, he is not going to be sacked for speaking out days ahead of Theresa May’s most significant intervention on Brexit since the Lancaster House speech?

DAMIAN GREEN: No, he isn’t and the reason is that he, like the rest of the Cabinet, like the Prime Minister, is all about wanting to get the best deal for the British people. That is a long and difficult process that will take us the next 18 months or so but getting that right is so important for the future of this country that very many people feel very strongly about it. There are obviously discussions inside government as there are in public about how we best achieve that and that’s the way of the world.

NP: I am really sorry, Mr Green, to keep pressing you on this but your colleague within the party, Ruth Davidson, has said that at times like this your thoughts should only be of service and instead what we get from Boris Johnson, at a time when people are being treated in hospital, when the terror threat level is at critical, meaning that an attack is imminent and lives could be lost, he chooses to bang on about Brexit. Is there no one within the Conservative party right now who can tell the Foreign Secretary to shut up?

DAMIAN GREEN: Well I think nobody wants to avoid any kind of debate about what is one of the most important issues facing Britain for decades to come and you are quite right of course, the focus of the government and the party …

NP: I am going to take that as a no then, there is no one who can tell Boris Johnson including the Prime Minister, do you know what, on today of all days might you want to push that article back to next week, might you want to talk about that yet again we have a terrorist attack on the streets of London?

DAMIAN GREEN: As I say, the timing of an individual article is much, much less important than the ultimate result and everyone in government is actually working towards the best possible Brexit deal because that’s what will matter to people watching this programme, to the British people more generally. They will want to see at the end of this process that we’ve got a deal that enhances our prosperity, that keeps close links with our friends in other democratic countries in Europe but also enables us to strike trade deals with the rest of the world. That’s what’s important.

NP: So Boris Johnson is not a back seat driver of this Brexit process, he is not in the front seat fiddling with the satnav?

DAMIAN GREEN: The driver of this Brexit process is the Prime Minister, that’s her job and it is one of the significant tasks that is obviously set for her, for this government, that we have got to do the Brexit deal and we are all absolutely determined to make sure that is going to be the best deal that we can have and the Cabinet is absolutely united on that.

NP: I suspect that others might disagree with that. Damian Green, we do thank you for being with us, much appreciated.