Sunday 02 June 2019 12:26 pm | Updated: Monday 17 June 2019 10:03 pm

Tory leadership hopeful Sajid Javid vows to renegotiate the backstop with ‘grand offer’ to Ireland

Home secretary Sajid Javid has set out a "grand offer" to avoid the need for the backstop by paying all the costs necessary to create a digitised border on the island of Ireland.

The Tory leadership hopeful said it was still possible to renegotiate the Irish backstop – the insurance policy designed to prevent a hard border in Ireland by keeping the UK in a temporary customs union with the EU – by making a "grand gesture" to Ireland to cover the costs of creating a digitised border.

"I will focus on the one Brexit deal that has already got through parliament and that is the withdrawal agreement with a change to the backstop," Javid told the BBC.

"I would make a grand gesture to Ireland, a grand offer that we would cover all their costs – the upfront costs and the running costs – of a new digitised border. I think it can be done in a couple of years, but we would cover their costs."

The EU has repeatedly ruled out a renegotiation to the withdrawal agreement and backstop.

Javid also ruled out a general election and extension to Article 50 – the mechanism that allows the UK to leave the EU – but could not rule out a no-deal Brexit, where the UK defaults on trading terms set by the World Trade Organisation.

He said he "passionately" wanted a deal but added: "You have to prepare for no deal."

Javid is just the latest Tory MP to set out his stall in the crowded race to replace Prime Minister Theresa May, who has announced she will resign on 7 June.

Health secretary Matt Hancock today unveiled a five-point plan to deliver Brexit by 31 October, the UK's scheduled exit date from the EU.

In an interview with the Sunday Times, Hancock said he would impose a time limit on the Irish backstop and secure a new free trade deal with the EU. This would be done by offering the EU a say over Britain’s border controls between Northern Ireland and the republic, and by giving each side £1bn.

Hancock, a Remainer in the Cabinet, vowed to rule out no deal, saying it was "not a policy option available to the next Prime Minister, whether they like it or not".

Meanwhile, Andrea Leadsom, the former leader of the Commons, called for a "managed exit" from the EU in which the UK would agree "sensible" measures with the EU to be put in place before 31 October, a hard deadline she said the UK must stick to.