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Various news outlets are reporting that the UK's prime minister, Theresa May, has called for a general election to be held on 8 June. The Conservative Party Web site has a transcript of her public statement, which can also be heard in a video.
The call for a snap election has now been backed by parliament.
May surprised allies and opponents [...] when she announced her plan to bring forward an election that was not due until 2020, saying she needed to avoid a clash of priorities in the sensitive final stages of the two-year Brexit talks.
After addressing a rowdy session of the House of Commons, May won the support of 522 lawmakers in the 650-seat parliament for an election on June 8. Only 13 voted against.
With May seen winning a new five-year mandate and boosting her majority in parliament by perhaps 100 seats, the pound held close to six-and-a-half month highs on hopes she may be able to clinch a smoother, more phased departure from the EU and minimise damage to the UK economy.
[...] The former interior minister, who became prime minister without an election when her predecessor David Cameron quit after last year's referendum vote for Brexit, enjoys a runaway lead over the main opposition Labour Party in opinion polls.
This is a notable change from the position taken over the last few months where May had said after the EU referendum, a "period of stability" was needed. "There isn’t going to be one. It isn’t going to happen. There is not going to be a general election," said the prime minister's spokesman less than a month ago.
Coverage (many of these are editorials):
- The Sun
- New Statesman
- New Statesman
- The Independent
- The Independent
- The Guardian
- The Telegraph
- The New York Times
- The Irish Times
- BBC News
- Daily Mail
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 24 2017, @03:48PM (3 children)
That's not how the british system works.
You have a few scenarios:
- the tories get a refreshed, strong majority. Brexit proceeds unchanged.
- the tories get a reduced majority. They're still the government, and Brexit proceeds (probably) unchanged.
- the tories don't get a majority, but get a plurality and manage to cobble together a pro-Brexit coalition. Brexit proceeds, with largely minor changes to the negotiating strategy.
- someone else wins an outright majority. (Note: with Labour being more useless than kitten in a catnip patch right now, I have no idea who this would be.) Brexit presumably continues, because the kick-off has already happened, but with desperate attempts to woo Europe into not hurting Britain too much.
- some non-tory coalition forms a government. (Liberal democrats and scottish nationals? With some labour around the fringes? I have no idea.) They probably try to stop Brexit, but at this point it's probably too late. Chances are, they offer Scotland another independence referendum, and oversee the dismantling of the UK.
Remember, Brexit has already been started. There are now two years of negotiations to come. What's largely happening right now is argument over who runs those negotiations. I wasn't a fly on the wall, but I'd be that one of May's chief concerns was her being undermined by a putative successor government holding shadow negotiations behind her back while she tries to wrap it up. This gambit reduces that threat.
(Score: 2) by turgid on Monday April 24 2017, @07:39PM
Very insightful, Mr/Ms AC.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by turgid on Monday April 24 2017, @07:47PM (1 child)
As for Scottish Independence, the Scottish government recently voted to have another independence referendum. The Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has formally asked the UK Prime Minister Theresa May for permission to have the referendum, but the Prime Minister has not given an answer yet as to the timing. It looks almost certain that Scotland will leave the UK this time. Northern Ireland and Gibraltar are other interesting cases.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by TheRaven on Tuesday April 25 2017, @10:35AM
sudo mod me up