Boris Johnson news – live: Latest Brexit updates as EU rejects request to change NI protocol

A panel of experts scrutinised the prime minister’s boasts of the benefits of leaving the EU at an event by The Independent. John Rentoul reports on their analysis of his claims, the causes of labour shortages and gas price rises:

Arlene Foster, the former first minister of Northern Ireland, has officially left the Stormont Assembly.

The recent DUP leader had served as an MLA for 18 years, before being replaced by Deborah Erskine as the representative for Fermanagh and South Tyrone.

Since quitting politics earlier this year, Ms Foster has begun to contribute to media outlets, including GB News.

The government’s promise to “level up” the country will take 10 years to fulfil, a cabinet minister has said.

Speaking to The Independent, they said: “It will will take 10 years and there will be some pain along the way, particularly in the early part.

“A lot of it depends on building infrastructure – roads and railways and so on – and it takes time to complete and time for people to feel the benefit.”

Here’s our political editor Andrew Woodcock:

The Labour leader Keir Starmer has lambasted Boris Johnson’s conference speech yesterday, saying that his jokes are “wearing thin”.

Speaking to ITV’s Robert Peston, Mr Starmer said the public will judge the prime minister harshly for the cost of living crisis.

“The cost of living crisis I think is going to unfold as we go through the winter months, it’s going to hit millions of families very, very hard,” he said.

“And I think you know that the showman, the jokes are all very well but they’re going to wear thin when people are hit in their wallet and they’re going to be hit very, very hard in their wallet.”

An Opinium survey founded that 63 per cent of respondents endorsed the policies Mr Starmer mentioned in his party’s conference speech, while just 51 per cent approved of Mr Johnson’s message.

My colleague Adam Forrest has this report:

Council tax bills could jump by as much as 5 per cent to pay for social care reforms and other government policies, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has warned.

The research centre said that a minimum rise of 3.6 per cent was necessary over the next three years to keep services running.

Kate Ogden, a research economist at IFS, said: “The government has stepped up with billions in additional funding for councils to support them through the last 18 months, it is likely to have to find billions more for councils over the next couple of years if they are to avoid cutting back on services, even if they increase council tax by 4 per cent a year or more.

“The coming financial year is likely to be especially tough, with the likelihood of at least some ongoing Covid-19-related pressures, and a particularly tight overall spending envelope pencilled in,” she added.

The EU Commission will soon publish its proposed compromises to ease trade difficulties between Britain and Northern Ireland – but rejected the UK’s demand to renegotiate the protocol.

“We will not renegotiate the protocol as the UK requested,” the Commission’s vice president Maros Sefcovic told a virtual event on Thursday.

Boris Johnson’s government has threatened to use Article 16 to suspend the protocol if the EU refuses to substantially renegotiate the agreed deal.

“A lot has been said by UK politicians about triggering Article 16. I do not think this has been helpful…It does not help us find solutions.”

Sefcovic said EU proposals to ease trade barriers will be published by the “middle of next week” – predicting talks will continue with Brexit minister Lord Frost and his team throughout October.

We do not consider them take it or leave proposals,” he said. But the EU chief admitted that if the UK government rejects those proposals then “we have a problem”.

Prices will rise for consumers as higher costs continue to bite businesses after Brexit, an industry leader has said.

Andrew Large, director-general at the Confederation of Paper Industries, said firms will need to recoup higher outgoings by upping their prices.

“This is a hugely inflationary situation for the British economy, and members will clearly be in a position where they have to try to pass those costs on to consumers where they can,” he told the BBC.

Labour – and not the Conservatives – are the only party with a “pro-small business policy”, the Federation of Small Businesses has said.

Craig Beaumont, chief of external affairs at the group, told Times Radio: “Looking at this party conference season, there was one party of the two that came out with a pro small business policy.

“And I think, you know, the government should be looking at that and going: ‘Well, maybe we’ve taken this group a bit for granted’. So now, what is that small business offer? What is their response? And at the moment there isn’t much, so there needs to be a really strong response to the budget.”

Some economists have cast doubt on Boris Johnson’s claim that the UK will have a “high wage” economy due to a reduction in “uncontrolled immigration”.

Our economics editor Anna Isaacs takes a closer look: