PM May meets Northern Irish ‘kingmakers’

LONDON : British Prime Minister Theresa May neared a deal with a Northern Irish Protestant party to save her premiership on Tuesday but faced a tug of war over her Brexit strategy just days before embarking on formal divorce talks with the European Union.

After losing her parliamentary majority in a botched gamble on a snap election, May is so weakened that her Brexit strategy has become the subject of public debate inside her own party with calls for her to take a more business-friendly approach.

Seeking to avoid a second election that could deepen Britain’s worst political turmoil since last June’s shock vote to leave the EU, May edged closer to a deal to get support of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

She met DUP leader Arlene Foster, whose eurosceptic Northern Irish party has 10 parliamentary seats, for over one hour of talks in Downing Street. May and Foster later left through different exits. “Discussions are going well with the government,” Foster said. “We hope soon to be able to bring this work to a successful conclusion.”

A Downing Street spokesman declined to comment. But a deal with the DUP risks destabilising Northern Ireland by increasing the influence of pro-British unionists. They have struggled for years with Irish Catholic nationalists, who want the British province to join a united Ireland.

Former prime minister John Major said he was concerned May’s plan to govern with the support of the DUP could pitch the province back into turmoil by persuading ‘hard men’ on both sides of the divide to return to violence.