BORIS Johnson has insisted Britain will make a “very good offer” in the next 48 hours when it hands over details of its new proposal to Brussels on securing a fresh Brexit deal.

The Prime Minister, expected to make a series of phonecalls to EU leaders in the coming days, noted that it would become clear by the weekend whether or not the UK Government’s proposal would be acceptable to the EU27 or not.

"Clearly, if there is no way of getting it over the line from their point of view, we will have to live with that," he said.

Mr Johnson dismissed suggestions that Britain wanted to simply move customs checks to centres away from the Northern Irish border or was seeking the EU to block an extension to Brexit.

And the Conservative leader, who will address his party’s conference in Manchester in his keynote speech tomorrow, said: "I say to all those who wish to see a return of the old generous-hearted, loving mayor of London and all the rest of it, that person has not gone away.

"I am a one-nation Tory but we are in a position where the only way we can take this country forward and unite our country again is to get Brexit done. That's what we need to do."

Overnight, it was suggested the UK Government was to put forward the idea of “custom clearance centres” being set up five to ten miles either side of the Irish border as a means of replacing the controversial backstop.

The idea for the customs posts are contained in the so-called 'non-papers' submitted by UK officials during recent technical discussions.

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But Simon Coveney, the Irish deputy premier dismissed the proposals out of hand, saying they were “utterly unworkable”.

He tweeted: "Non-Paper = Non-Starter. Time the EU had a serious proposal from the UK Govt if a #Brexit deal is to be achievable in October. NI and IRE deserves better!"

However, in a range of broadcast interviews this morning Mr Johnson was keen to stress that this was not the basis of the UK offer.

“That is not what we are proposing at all," he told the BBC, explaining it was "absolutely not" true that he wanted to simply move border checks away from the geographical border.

"There are very good reasons why that would not be a good idea...both for practical reasons and reasons of sentiment that we totally understand."

But the PM said it was a "reality" that some checks would be needed to create a "single customs territory" for the UK once it leaves the EU.

He stressed there was a risk people could "needlessly distort" what was being proposed.

"We do think there's a good solution. I very much hope that our European and EU friends in Brussels, in Dublin, in Germany as well, will want to take it forward," he declared.

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The party leader, who described himself as a "pro-European," insisted a "great deal of progress" had been achieved with Brussels since August, the Government was working "flat out" to get a deal and "we're hopeful we're going to get there".

It was also suggested Mr Johnson would, as part of the proposed deal, ask the EU to rule out any further extension to Article 50. If Brussels were to agree to Britain’s offer, it would then be presented to MPs as a straightforward choice: between consenting to the new proposed agreement or seeing the country crash out of the EU by October 31.

But the PM again said this was not the case and that he had not been encouraging European leaders to refuse an extension to the Brexit talks as a way of circumventing the Benn Act that calls on him to seek a further delay if there is no agreement by October 19.

"We haven't," he told the BBC. "In truth, we have not made any such request.

"My own view is that they want to get this done as much as we do and indeed the majority of the British public do, whether they voted for Leave or Remain."

Mr Johnson suggested the Brexit talks were now, with 30 days to go to the deadline, entering a critical phase.

“Clearly this is the moment when the rubber hits the road. This is when the hard yards really are in the course of the negotiations.

"The difficulty really is going to be around the customs union and to what extent Northern Ireland can be retained within EU bodies at all.

"We're going to make a very good offer, we are going to be tabling it very soon, but there is a difficulty if you try to keep Northern Ireland in a customs union because one of the basic things about being a country is you have a single customs perimeter and a single customs union."

On the issue of his attitude to women, the PM was asked if he had a "woman problem".

He replied: "I have always been a big champion of women at the top of every organisation I have worked in. Look at the way I ran City Hall; it was virtually half and half; it was more or less a complete feminocracy at City Hall; the same goes for what I did at the Foreign Office."

Asked about the claim he groped a female journalist, Mr Johnson replied: "I don't minimise the importance of such allegations, I don't minimise the importance of the issue; let's be clear about that. But it is not true and there is nothing more I can say about that."

In relation to suggestions that Remain MPs should be investigated for "foreign collusion", the PM there was a "legitimate question to be asked" about where the idea of holding emergency debates came from in Parliament.

"There is a legitimate question to be asked about the generation of this SO24 legislation.

"It is a very interesting situation. We have Bills and an Act - the so-called Surrender Act - that I'm afraid has a massive consequence for the people and economy of this country were it to be affected.

"We have no knowledge of how it was produced. It is not subject to normal parliamentary scrutiny. No-one knows by whose advice or legal advice it was drawn up.

"What I'm getting at is no-one knows how these Bills are produced. They are a constitutional novelty, to say the least," he said.