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Tag: Theresa May

  • Ex-British PM announces decision to quit UK parliament

    Ex-British PM announces decision to quit UK parliament

    Former British Prime Minsiter Theresa May has said she will not fight the next general election, bringing a 27-year career in the UK parliament to an end.

    May revealed her decision to stand down as MP for Maidenhead on Friday, saying she would focus on championing causes including the fight against modern slavery.

    In a statement to her local newspaper, the Maidenhead Advertiser, she said: “Since stepping down as prime minister I have enjoyed being a backbencher again and having more time to work for my constituents and champion causes close to my heart including most recently launching a Global Commission on Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking.

    “These causes have been taking an increasing amount of my time.

    “Because of this, after much careful thought and consideration, I have realised that looking ahead, I would no longer be able to do my job as an MP in the way I believe is right and my constituents deserve.”

    May, 67, has been a consistent campaigner on modern slavery and human trafficking, and launched her Global Commission in October, backed by the UK and Bahrain governments.

    She was first elected as MP for Maidenhead in 1997 and served as home secretary under David Cameron between 2010 and 2016 before succeeding him as prime minister.

    Her term in Downing Street lasted a turbulent three years and was dominated by wrangling over Brexit.

    A snap election in 2017 saw her lose her majority, but she remained at Number 10 thanks to a deal with Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) in the resulting hung parliament.

    Eventually, opposition to her proposed Brexit deal saw Conservative MPs hold a confidence vote in her leadership, and although she survived her authority was diminished, and she announced her resignation five months later.

    In her statement, May said it had been “an honour and a privilege” to serve as Maidenhead’s MP and vowed to continue working for her constituents until the general election, which is expected in the second half of this year.

    She added: “As I pass on the baton, I will be ready to work with my successor to secure a Conservative victory in Maidenhead.

    “I remain committed to supporting (current Prime Minister) Rishi Sunak and the government and believe that the Conservatives can win the election.

    “I would like to thank all those who chose me to represent them as their member of parliament.”

    Almost 100 MPs have announced they will not fight their seats at the next election, including 64 Conservatives and former Conservatives – the most Tories to retire from parliament since May entered the Commons in 1997.

    Labour Party chairwoman Anneliese Dodds said the number of Tories standing down ed “no confidence” in Sunak and the Conservative Party’s prospects.

    But Treasury minister Gareth Davies denied that was the case, telling Sky News he was “personally sad” to see May stand down.

    He added that it is “completely reasonable” for people to decide to leave parliament before an election.

    “Each one has made their own decision for personal reasons and I respect every single person’s decision to do so,” he said.

  • May congratulates Johnson, urges him to ‘deliver Brexit that works for whole UK’

    Prime Minister Theresa May congratulated Boris Johnson, her successor as Conservative party leader, and urged him to “work together to deliver a Brexit that works for the whole UK.”
    May, who is due to hand over leadership of the country to Johnson on Wednesday, also urged him to ensure the Conservatives “keep (opposition Labour leader) Jeremy Corbyn out of government.”
    “You will have my full support from the back benches (of parliament),” she added.
    Johnson will not take office formally until Wednesday afternoon.
    May will face her final prime minister’s questions in the House of Commons before tendering her resignation to the Queen.
    Johnson will then go to Buckingham Palace himself for his appointment to be confirmed – before being driven to Downing Street to give a speech in front of the black door of No 10.
    He takes charge at a perilous political moment.
    The Conservatives’ wafer-thin parliamentary working majority is expected to be eroded further next week – to just two – if the Liberal Democrats win the Brecon and Radnorshire byelection.
    Johnson has faced a furious internal revolt even before arriving in Downing Street, with several key cabinet ministers, including the chancellor, Philip Hammond, saying they will resign rather than serve under him.
    They have been alarmed by Johnson’s insistence that he is willing to countenance leaving the European Union without a deal on Oct. 31, rather than postpone Brexit once again – even if that meant proroguing parliament.

  • My regrets as UK Prime Minister – Theresa May

    Outgoing British Prime Minister, Theresa May, said she regrets allowing too much polarisation over Brexit and avoiding televised debates before a disastrous snap election in 2017, in an interview published on Friday.
    May resigned as leader of the ruling Conservatives in June after she conceded defeat in her two-year battle to persuade parliament to approve the deal she had agreed to with Brussels for Britain to leave the EU.
    “I did everything I could to get it over the line.
    “I was willing to sit down with (opposition Labour leader) Jeremy Corbyn, willing to sacrifice my premiership, give up my job!” May told the popular right-wing tabloid The Daily Mail.
    “I had assumed mistakenly that the tough bit of the negotiation was with the EU, that parliament would accept the vote of the British people (in the 2016 Brexit referendum) and just want to get it done.
    She said that people who’d spent their lives campaigning for Brexit would vote to get us out,” she said. “But they didn’t.”
    May agreed that she should have done more to halt “the polarisation between the language of soft and hard Brexit” that divided the Conservative and Labour parties, as well as British voters.
    She is expected to hand over the reins on July 24 to the victor in a run-off to succeed her as leader of the Conservatives and the country, after a vote by the party’s 160,000 members between strong favourite Boris Johnson and Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt.
    Johnson is backed by many of the “hard” Brexiteer Conservative lawmakers who strongly opposed May’s deal and played an important role in pushing May to resign.
    May said she also regrets her refusal to take part in televised debates before a disastrous snap election in June 2017.
    “I should have done the TV debates. I didn’t because I had seen them suck the life blood out of David Cameron’s campaign,’’she said, referring to her Conservative predecessor as prime minister, who resigned after losing the Brexit referendum.
    May called the 2017 snap election to ask voters to back her leadership and her Brexit plan, but she lost her majority in parliament, forcing her to rely on Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party to keep her in power.

    She previously expressed regret that her focus on Brexit prevented her from promoting plans to improve social cohesion in Britain.
    On Friday, she announced a new Office for Tackling Injustices to monitor progress by all government agencies in tackling social injustices.
    “Deep-seated societal injustice requires a long-term focus and cannot be eliminated overnight,” May said in a statement.
    She said she is “proud” of her efforts as prime minister to “make the UK a more just society.”
    The new office “will go further, using the power of data… to shine a spotlight on key injustices and provide the catalyst for better policy solutions,” May added.

  • Theresa May, EU leaders agree new Brexit extension to Oct 31

    Theresa May, EU leaders agree new Brexit extension to Oct 31

    British Prime Minister, Theresa May and EU leaders agreed on Thursday to a Brexit extension until Oct. 31 at the latest, narrowly averting a no-deal Brexit the following day.

    However, within minutes of finalising their decision at a special EU summit in Brussels, European Council President Donald Tusk hinted that there could be further reprieves down the road.

    “Our intention is to finalise the whole process in October,” Tusk said.

    “But I am too old to exclude another scenario. Everything is possible.”

    The flexible extension – which would allow Britain to leave the EU whenever its withdrawal deal is approved – grants Britain a further six months “to find the best possible solution,” Tusk wrote on Twitter.

    May needs the extra time to broker parliamentary approval on the withdrawal deal negotiated with Brussels, which lawmakers in the House of Commons have rejected three times.

    The embattled British premier had asked for a delay until June 30, but most EU leaders favoured a longer term, according to EU sources.

    The deadline has already been postponed once, from March 29.

    However, French President Emmanuel Macron dug in his heels during the eight-hour summit, insisting on a shorter extension so Brexit does not threaten the functioning of the EU.

    EU leaders set several conditions, notably requiring Britain to participate in European Parliament elections if it is still a member when they begin on May 23.

    Otherwise “the withdrawal will take place on June 1, 2019,” the 27 leaders wrote in a joint statement.

    However, May expressed hope that Britain would be out by then.

    “If we are able to pass a deal in the first three weeks of May, we will not have to take part in European elections and will officially leave the EU on Saturday June 1,” she said in Brussels.

    EU leaders insisted in their statement that during the extension, the withdrawal deal cannot be reopened.

    Britain is expected to act in a “constructive and responsible” manner until its departure, refraining from measures that could “jeopardize” EU objectives.

    They agreed to “take stock” of the situation at their regular June summit, however, this date “is not a cliff-edge,” Tusk insisted.

    Macron justified the Oct. 31 deadline by explaining that Britain would have left before the new European Commission takes up its work the following day, thus preventing London from hampering EU priorities.

    Across the Atlantic, U.S. President Donald Trump has complained the EU has been “so tough” on Britain.

    “Too bad that the EU is being so tough on the United Kingdom and Brexit,” Trump wrote on Twitter.

    The U.S. president also accused the EU of being “a brutal trading partner with the U.S., which will change.”

    He added: “Sometimes in life you have to let people breathe before it all comes back to bite you!”

    May has conceded that the weeks ahead would not be easy, noting that Britain faces “stark” choices.

    While rejecting the withdrawal deal, parliament has also failed to coalesce around any other option, prompting May’s Conservative government to hold talks with the opposition Labour Party in a bid to break the impasse.

    These negotiations – a rarity in British politics – are set to continue on Thursday.

    Labour’s key demand is that Britain remains in a long-term customs union with the EU, but this is anathema to many Conservative eurosceptics.

    Should the October deadline prove too tight, German Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested that the EU could grant yet more time if it means the withdrawal deal is adopted.

    “In our view, it doesn’t depend on the exact day,” she said.

  • Theresa May requests Brexit extension to June 30

    Theresa May requests Brexit extension to June 30

    British Prime Minister Theresa May seeks to delay Brexit until June 30 to avoid a chaotic withdrawal from the European Union in one week, but a key leader of the bloc suggested an even longer pause in the difficult divorce proceedings.

    The question over timing is vital because Britain is set to leave the EU without a withdrawal deal in place on April 12 unless an agreement is reached at a Brussels summit set to take place two days earlier.

    In a letter to European Council President Donald Tusk, May asked for an extension until June 30 and agreed to make contingency plans to take part in European Parliament elections on May 23-26 if necessary.

    Tusk proposed a longer time frame. He urged the 27 remaining EU nations to offer the UK a flexible extension of up to a year to make sure the nation doesn’t crash out of the bloc in a chaotic and costly way.

    British Prime Minister Theresa May seeks to delay Brexit until June 30 to avoid a chaotic withdrawal from the European Union in one week, but a key leader of the bloc suggested an even longer pause in the difficult divorce proceedings.

    The question over timing is vital because Britain is set to leave the EU without a withdrawal deal in place on April 12 unless an agreement is reached at a Brussels summit set to take place two days earlier.

    In a letter to European Council President Donald Tusk, May asked for an extension until June 30 and agreed to make contingency plans to take part in European Parliament elections on May 23-26 if necessary.

    Tusk proposed a longer time frame. He urged the 27 remaining EU nations to offer the UK a flexible extension of up to a year to make sure the nation doesn’t crash out of the bloc in a chaotic and costly way.

    Speaking on the sidelines of a Group of Seven foreign ministers’ meeting in the French Atlantic resort of Dinard, Hunt said a drawn-out exit would be “a bad outcome all round” for Britain and the EU.

    He said: “I don’t think the EU member states want a long extension. We certainly don’t want a long extension.”

    While acknowledging road blocks in the process, Hunt said “Britain is not dragging its feet” and that the impasse over the past few months was a function of the fact that no party has a majority in Parliament.

    The German government is welcoming Britain’s acknowledgement that a longer delay to Brexit would require the UK to participate in European Parliament elections.

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s spokesman, Steffen Seibert, wouldn’t comment on her government’s position on those proposals. But he said it is “important” May “recognises that, with such an extension to June 30 … Britain must make preparations to participate in the European election” in May.

    Outspoken Brexit advocate Jacob Rees-Mogg is suggesting that a long delay to Britain’s departure from the European Union would give Britain plenty of time to cause trouble for fellow EU members.

    In a tweet, Rees-Mogg said “if a long extension leaves us stuck in the EU, we should be as difficult as possible”.

    The Conservative Party lawmaker suggests using Britain’s position to veto any EU budget increases, block the establishment of an EU army, and make it impossible for French President Emmanuel Macron to push further EU integration.

    He tweeted after an EU leader suggested a long Brexit delay may be the best course.

    Brexit backer Nigel Farage also said he would campaign in European Parliament elections set for late May if Britain takes part, as he expects will happen.

    Two EU officials, who requested anonymity because they weren’t authorised to disclose information before it was made public, said that Tusk wants a one-year “Flextension” and get it approved at next Wednesday’s EU summit.

    Such a move would mean that the UK needs to take part in the May 23-26 European elections, something which the UK prime minister has long argued against.

    Any extension to the deadline will need unanimous approval from the 27 remaining EU nations. French President Emmanuel Macron has thus far seemed cautious about giving Britain more time, saying the EU cannot be held hostage by Britain’s political deadlock over Brexit.

    The complex maneuvering comes as Britain’s Parliament considers legislation designed to prevent a “no-deal” departure from the EU currently set for April 12.

    There are concerns that an abrupt departure could lead to economic slowdown and a breakdown in food and medical supplies as border checks and tariffs are added overnight.

    Britain’s upper House of Lords is set to resume debate on the measure Monday. It was endorsed earlier by the lower House of Commons by just one vote.

    EU leaders agreed late last month to prolong the Brexit date from March 29 until April 12, unless May could push their mutually agreed divorce deal through Parliament.

    The Europeans would prefer that Britain don’t take part in the European Parliament elections if it is going to leave. April 12 is the last day for Britain to signal whether it will field candidates.

    May said in her letter that Britain is reluctantly ready to begin preparations for the European elections if no Brexit deal is reached in the interim.

    She said she is making these preparations even though she believes it is not in Britain’s interest or the EU’s interest for Britain to take part in the elections because it is a departing member state.

    May says she “accepts” the EU position that if Britain has not left the 28-nation bloc by May 23 it will have a legal obligation to take part in the elections.

    The prime minister says she is still hopeful of reaching a compromise agreement that could take Britain out of the EU before that time.

    May says it is “frustrating” that Britain hasn’t yet resolved the situation. Her withdrawal plan, agreed with the EU over more than two years of delicate negotiations, has been rejected by Parliament three times, leading to the current political and legal impasse.

    She is now seeking a compromise in a series of talks with Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and his deputies with hopes of winning opposition backing for a new divorce plans.

    If that doesn’t work, May plans a series of votes in Parliament to see if a majority-backed plan can emerge.

    Ideas being discussed include keeping Britain in a customs union with the EU after it leaves the bloc, as well as the possibility of a second referendum.

    There is fierce opposition from Conservative Party Brexit-backer to these options.

    Britain voted by a 52 per cent to 48 per cent margin in 2016 to leave the bloc.

  • MPs reject Theresa May’s Brexit deal for third time

    Members of Parliament, MPs have rejected Theresa May’s EU withdrawal agreement for a third time.

    MP’s rejected the deal by 344 votes to 286, a majority of 58, throwing UK’s Brexit plans into more confusion, BBC reports.

    Mrs May said the vote would have “grave” implications and the “legal default” was that the UK would leave on 12 April.

    That meant there would not be enough time to get legislation through to avoid a no-deal Brexit, she said.

    Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn called for her to resign and call an election.

    Responding to the vote, European Council President Donald Tusk tweeted: “In view of the rejection of the Withdrawal Agreement by the House of Commons, I have decided to call a European Council on 10 April.”

  • Britain’s Theresa May asks EU to delay Brexit until June 30

    UK Prime Minister Theresa May has written to European Council President Donald Tusk to request to delay the UK‘s departure from the European Union by three months.

    The UK is currently due to leave on March 29, but the British parliament has twice rejected May’s divorce deal with the EU, prompting concerns that the UK could exit the bloc without a deal.

    On Monday, Speaker of the House John Bercow made a surprise decision to not allow a third “meaningful vote” on May’s Brexit plan, forcing the prime minister to seek an extension to allow time to revamp the deal.

    Addressing MPs on Wednesday, May said she does not want a long extension that would potentially involve the UK taking part in elections to the European Parliament in late May, as doing so would fail to honour the result of the 2016 Brexit referendum.

    In her letter to Tusk, May said she would seek to delay the UK’s departure until June 30. Last week, British MPs voted in favour of a short extension to the deadline.

    May wrote that she remained confident that British MPs would ratify the Brexit deal she negotiated with the bloc.

    “But this clearly will not be completed before March 29,” she added.

    May blamed Bercow and Parliament for failing to agree on a deal, saying Parliament had “indulged itself enough” on Brexit.

    According to reports, May’s decision to seek a shorter delay also followed “heavy pressure” from pro-Brexit MPs in her party.

    “If she’d gone to the EU and asked for a long extension, as indeed she’d said she was going to, she faced multiple resignations from her own cabinet,” Hull said.

    Later on Wednesday, Shadow Brexit Minister Keir Starmer applied for an emergency debate in parliament on May’s decision to request the three-month delay, Bercow said.

    Labour Party MP Starmer said the UK should use any delay to allow parliament to break the current impasse over Brexit, telling parliament he thought the responsible approach would be for May to “seek an extension to prevent no deal and provide time for parliament to find a majority for a different approach”.

    The debate is scheduled for Wednesday evening and could last up to three hours.

    The pound fell following May’s announcement, losing nearly one percent of its value on the day.

     

  • Theresa May faces heavy Brexit defeat in parliament, eurosceptics warn

    Theresa May’s Brexit deal faces a heavy defeat in parliament on Tuesday, the leaders of two major eurosceptic factions in parliament said on Sunday.

    According to parliament May has so far secured no major changes from the European Union.

    Just 19 days before the United Kingdom is due to leave the EU on March 29, May’s is scrambling, so far unsuccessfully, to secure last-minute changes to an EU exit agreement before a vote on Tuesday on whether to approve the deal.

    If she fails, lawmakers are expected to force May to seek a delay to Brexit that some fear could see the 2016 decision to leave the bloc reversed.

    Others argued that without a delay Britain faces chaos if it leaves without a deal on March 29.

    Nigel Dodds, the deputy leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) which props up May’s minority government, and Steve Baker, a leading figure in the large eurosceptic faction of her Conservative party, warned “the political situation is grim’’.

    “An unchanged withdrawal agreement will be defeated firmly by a size able proportion of Conservatives and the DUP if it is again presented to the Commons,” they wrote in the Sunday Telegraph.

    The Sunday Times said May was battling to save her job as aides were considering persuading her to offer to resign in a bid to get the deal approved.

    The newspaper also said cabinet ministers have spoken about whether to insist she goes as early as this week.

    Parliament rejected May’s deal by a record margin in January, prompting the British leader to return to Brussels in search of changes to address the so-called Irish backstop, an insurance policy designed to prevent the return of a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland.

    Many British lawmakers object to the policy on the grounds that it could leave Britain subject to EU rules indefinitely and cleave Northern Ireland away from the rest of the country.

    But, May’s attempts to get the clause rewritten have so far failed to yield any result, with EU negotiators unwilling to meet her demands, and Britain rejecting a compromise offer.

    Britain’s opposition Labour Party should support staying in the EU if there is a second referendum, the party’s Brexit spokesman, Keir Starmer, said on Sunday.

    “If there’s a public vote that would operate as a lock, if you like, on any deal that Theresa May get through. If that is the position, then in my view, the default ought to be ‘remain’’ Starmer told Sky News.

    However, Starmer said the party would not be seeking to secure support in parliament for a second referendum on Tuesday.

     

  • Brexit must not be frustrated -Theresa May

    UK Prime Minister Theresa May has said Britain’s exit from the European Union (EU) must not be frustrated.

    Local media reported that May also said that the government must focus on delivering it.

    May is trying to get changes to the Brexit package before putting it to another vote in parliament.

    If she fails, May will have to decide whether to delay Brexit or endanger the world’s fifth largest economy by leaving without a deal on March 29.

    “Our focus to deliver Brexit must be absolute.

    “We must not, and I will not, frustrate what was the largest democratic exercise in this country’s history.

    “In the very final stages of this process, the worst thing we could do is lose our focus,” May told Conservative Party activists on Saturday.

    Three British cabinet ministers have publicly indicated they will back plans to delay Brexit if lawmakers vote down May’s plan for a new deal with the EU.

    Business Minister Greg Clark, Work and Pensions Minister Amber Rudd and Justice Minister David Gauke signaled in a Daily Mail column that they would side with rebels and opposition parties to stop Britain leaving without a deal if necessary.

    May has promised that if she does not bring a revised deal back by Feb. 27, parliament will have an opportunity to vote on the next steps.

    Some lawmakers are expected to use that to try to wrest control of the process from the government.

  • Brexit: Theresa May survives no-confidence vote

    British Prime Minister Theresa May has survived as prime minister after weathering a dramatic no-confidence vote in her government, but was left scrambling to strike a Brexit compromise that could secure the backing of parliament.

    May announced after the vote on Wednesday night that she would invite Jeremy Corbyn and other party leaders for immediate talks on how to secure a Brexit deal, although Labour later said Corbyn would decline the invitation.

    A day after overwhelmingly rejecting her Brexit deal, rebel Tories and Democratic Unionist party (DUP) MPs swung behind the prime minister to defeat Labour’s motion of no confidence by 325 votes to 306 – a majority of 19.

    The prime minister immediately extended her invitation to opposition leaders, having pointedly declined to do so earlier in the day.

    “I would like to ask the leaders of the parliamentary parties to meet with me individually, and I would like to start those meetings tonight,” she said.

    Corbyn responded by urging May to take a no-deal Brexit off the table, while the Scottish National party’s leader in Westminster, Ian Blackford, said a second referendum must be on the table for talks to take place.

    With just five days to go before May must make a statement to parliament setting out her Brexit plan B, Downing Street continued to indicate that she was not ready to budge on her red lines, including membership of a customs union.

    Conservative politicians are deeply divided about how May should adapt her deal to win over hostile MPs.

    The South Cambridgeshire Tory MP, Heidi Allen, said: “I thought she was incredibly brave [after the Brexit defeat] and it felt like she got that we need to change. But today it was: ‘I’ll talk to people, but my red lines are still there.’ And that’s not going to work at all.

    “Maybe the prime minister needs a little bit longer but she has got to reflect: stop pandering to the hard right of my party and start talking to those of us who have been working across parties for months. We’re a functioning, collaborative body already. She just needs to tap into us.”

    Some cabinet ministers clearly indicated the need for flexibility, with the justice secretary, David Gauke, warning that the government should not allow itself to be “boxed in”, and Amber Rudd suggesting a customs union could not be ruled out.

    The DUP was quick to stress that without their 10 MPs, the government would have lost the confidence vote, and called on May to focus on tackling their concerns with the Irish backstop.

    “Lessons will need to be learned from the vote in parliament. The issue of the backstop needs to be dealt with and we will continue to work to that end,” said Nigel Dodds, the party’s leader at Westminster.