U.K. PM May to resign in early June amid Brexit mutiny

FAN Editor

London — Beleaguered British Prime Minister Theresa May announced on Friday that she will resign from the office on June 7, following a mutiny in her Conservative Party over her handling of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union. May met with the leader of a group of hardline Brexit supporters from her own party earlier Friday to agree a timetable to stand down and allow a successor to be chosen from amongst the Conservative ranks.

The leader of the party automatically becomes the prime minister.

May is expected to continue as caretaker prime minister until her party elects a new leader. That internal election process will begin in the days immediately following her resignation on June 7.

Speaking to the nation outside her office, May said she believed, “if you give people a choice, you have a duty to implement what they decide,” referring to the 2016 public referendum that saw the nation opt to leave the EU. “I have done my best,” she said. 

“I have done everything I can to convince MPs,” she said. “I tried three times… I believe it was right to persevere, but it is now clear to me that it is in the best interest of the country” for her to step down.

May said “I deeply regret” being unable to deliver on the Brexit commitment, and she chocked up as she said it had been an honor to serve as Britain’s second female prime minister, then left the podium and walked back into 10 Downing Street.

London Calling: British Prime Minister Theresa May’s future in doubt

The humiliating spectacle of the prime minister detailing her departure date followed a toxic response to the latest draft of her Brexit plan — her forth draft — this week from cabinet colleagues and fellow Conservative lawmakers.

May has previously said she would step aside once a Brexit deal had been passed by parliament, and launched a fresh bid on Tuesday for lawmakers to vote on it in early June, but the government postponed that vote.

MPs have already overwhelmingly rejected three slightly different versions of the EU divorce plan May’s government spent more than two years hammering out with European leaders. Her latest proposals, which included giving them the option of choosing to hold a new referendum on the deal, prompted a furious reaction among Conservatives.

Pressure intensified on May after Andrea Leadsom — one of the cabinet’s strongest Brexit backers — resigned on Wednesday from her post as the government’s representative in parliament. In her resignation letter Leadsom told the prime minister she no longer believed that her approach would deliver on the 2016 referendum result to leave the EU.

EU leaders and British Prime Minister Theresa May agree to Brexit extension

With the stalemate in Parliament, Britain’s originally scheduled EU departure date of March 29 was extended, first to April 12, and now to October 31 which, as CBS News contributor Simon Bates noted, is Halloween. Amid the political paralysis, the clamor for May to stand down has been growing, and it intensified after disastrous results for the Conservatives in the May 2 English local elections.

Britain’s last EU election?

The Conservatives are expected to fare similarly badly in this week’s European Parliament elections when the results are announced late Sunday.

As Bates reported in his “London Calling” segment this week Britain was forced to hold the elections that, per the 2016 Brexit referendum result, never should have happened. All European Union member states have been voting this week to send legislators to the European Parliament.

Technically Britain is still a member, so by law it has to take part, said Bates, even though the U.K. is slated to leave the EU in five months. 

The campaigning in Britain in the run-up to Thursday’s vote was rather strange, Bates noted, with many people using the EU election as a protest vote. The polling ahead of the vote showed support for May’s Conservative Party had all but collapsed. 

Way out in front in the polls was the newly formed Brexit Party, which has just one policy in mind: to get Britain out of the EU as soon as possible. In spite of its expected success in the EU parliamentary elections, however, public reaction to the party has highlighted the deep divisions within the U.K. over the decision to leave the EU.

Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage was doused with a well-aimed milkshake earlier this week, and then refused to leave his campaign bus at a subsequent stop as milkshake-wielding detractors loomed outside.

Free America Network Articles

Leave a Reply

Next Post

The Latest: China's Hikvision taking US concerns 'seriously'

article The Latest on trade tensions between the U.S. and China (all times local): Continue Reading Below 5:45 p.m. Chinese surveillance equipment maker Hikvision says it takes U.S. concerns about its business “very seriously” and is taking measures to ensure it complies with human rights standards. The statement Friday comes […]