Conservative Party chairman James Cleverly has insisted the UK will leave the EU on January 31 “do or die”.
Boris Johnson repeatedly pledged to deliver Brexit by October 31, but failed. He famously promised during the Tory leadership campaign he would meet that date “do or die” and “come what may”.
Several pro-Brexit Conservative MPs warned of dire consequences should the promise not be kept.
Michael Gove, the cabinet minister in charge of no-deal, warned the Conservative Party would “collapse”.
Mark Francois, a leading Brexiteer voice on the Tory backbenches, said the country would “explode”. He said Johnson had “looked him in the eye” and told him the UK would have left by the end of this month.
Andrew Bridgen, another eurosceptic Conservative, warned if the UK was still in the EU on November 1 it would be “the end of the Conservative Party”.
Speaking to the BBC’s Andrew Neil on Wednesday evening, Cleverly said “absolutely” Johnson would stick to the new exit date of January 31.
Asked if this promise would be kept “do or die”, Cleverly said: “Yes.”
He said the difference “this time” would be if the Conservative Party won a majority at the December election it would be able to push Johnson’s Brexit deal through parliament.
Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn are hitting the general election campaign trail as they trade blows in the run-up to the pre-Christmas poll.
The prime minister blamed his failure to live up to his “do or die” promise to deliver Brexit on Halloween on the Labour leader, while Corbyn hit out at the “corrupt” British system of doing business.