Boris exit: '˜Carry-On Government'

“This is absolutely surreal,” he said. “The Leader of the House of Commons at the Dispatch Box talked about how the Conservatives were going to carry on governing. I made the point that he had been inadvertently honest in saying that we now have ‘Carry On’ government.

“I also highlighted that as he was so obviously proud of his role in the EU referendum and in giving us English votes for English laws, that he should marry those two positions with English votes for English exits. We now have a government party in the throes of a leadership election. The Prime Minister plunged himself and his government into crisis with the whole misadventure he had on a referendum for which he hadn’t rolled the dice properly at all.”

Mr Durkan said the Labour party was also in a state of flux with deep divisions exposed over recent days.

“And now we also have the opposition joining in with a crisis of their own,” he said. “Meanwhile the real questions of course should be about the crisis that the economy is teetering on – not least in Derry and throughout the North – and all of the uncertainty that now abounds.”