May struggling to find way forward
Print Edition
BRITISH Prime Minister Theresa May was consulting opposition parties and other lawmakers yesterday in a battle to put Brexit back on track after surviving a no-confidence vote.
However, there was little immediate sign of a breakthrough from talks branded a “stunt” by the main opposition leader.
The UK Parliament rejected May’s Brexit withdrawal deal in a crushing defeat for the prime minister, who suffered the worst parliamentary defeat in modern British history.
The drubbing was followed by a no-confidence vote in the government, but May’s minority Conservative government survived with backing from its Northern Irish ally, the Democratic Unionist Party.
May said she would hold talks “in a constructive spirit” with leaders of opposition parties and other lawmakers in a bid to find a way forward for Britain’s EU exit.
The government confirmed that May will meet a Monday deadline to publish a Plan B, and that lawmakers will have a full day to debate it — and, crucially, amend it — on January 29.
But there was little sign of a breakthrough in uniting Parliament’s feuding Brexit factions, whose conflicting demands range from a postponement of Britain’s departure date to a new referendum on whether to leave the EU or remain.
Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the main opposition Labour party, said he wouldn’t meet with May until she took a no-deal Brexit “off the table.”
“To get a deal that can command a majority in Parliament, Theresa May has to ditch the red lines and get serious about proposals for the future,” Corbyn said.
Green Party lawmaker Caroline Lucas, who met with May yesterday morning, said the prime minister was “in a fantasy world” if she thought the deal could be transformed by Monday.
“Parliament is gridlocked,” she said.
May so far has showed little inclination to make major changes to her deal or lift her insistence that Brexit means leaving the EU’s single market and customs union.
Many lawmakers think a softer departure that retained single market or customs union membership is the only plan capable of winning a majority in Parliament.
They fear the alternative is an abrupt “no-deal” withdrawal from the bloc, which businesses and economists fear would cause turmoil.
As Britain flounders, the 27 other EU countries have stood firm, saying they won’t renegotiate the withdrawal agreement.
Throughout the Brexit negotiations, EU leaders accused Britain of trying to “cherry pick” benefits of membership in the bloc.
They said it was seeking to retain access to the EU’s single market while ending the free movement of European citizens into Britain and breaching other EU guiding principles.
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