May accused of ‘bribing’ lawmakers to win support
LONDON: The opposition Labour party on Monday accused Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May of attempting to “bribe” lawmakers into supporting her Brexit deal, after she promised extra funds for economically deprived areas of England.
May announced a 1.6-billionpound ($2.1 billion) “stronger towns fund” for parts of northern and central England less than four weeks before Britain is scheduled to leave the EU on March 29.
Most of the initial 1 billion pounds will go to communities in the English north and Midlands, where many Labour-held parliamentary constituencies returned a majority for Brexit in the 2016 referendum.
Labour said the initiative “smacks of desperation from a government reduced to bribing MPS to vote for their damaging flagship Brexit legislation.”
May said economic prosperity in Britain had been “unfairly spread”for too long.
“Communities across the country voted for Brexit as an expression of their desire to see change - that must be a change for the better,with more opportunity and greater control,” she said. May has sought support among lawmakers from the biggest opposition party since she suffered a crushing defeat in a vote on her Brexit deal in mid-january.
She plans to hold a second vote on the deal next week after promising to seek changes to a controversial “backstop” arrangement to guarantee an open Irish border after Brexit.
“The reason our towns are struggling is because of a decade of cuts,including to council funding and a failure to invest in businesses and our communities,” said John Mcdonnell, Labour’s shadow chancellor. “No Brexit bribery; stable investment where it’s most needed,”mcdonnell said. Prime Minister Theresa May’s top lawyer will try to clinch a Brexit compromise with the European Union this week in a last ditch bid to win over rebellious British lawmakers before crunch votes that could delay the divorce for three months.
The United Kingdom is due to leave the EU on March 29 but May is hoping to win over at least 115 more British lawmakers by agreeing a legal addendum with the EU on the most controversial part of the deal - the so called Irish border backstop.
Concerns about the backstop, an insurance policy aimed at preventing a return to hard border controls between EU member Ireland and British-ruled Northern Ireland, helped prompt lawmakers to reject May’s deal on January 15 by 432 to 230 votes.
Attorney General Geoffrey Cox, Britain’s top government lawyer, is due back in Brussels on Tuesday and will seek legally binding changes to the Irish border backstop. — Reuters