May on shaky wicket as two top aides quit
london — The two top aides to British Prime Minister Theresa May resigned on Saturday, shouldering some of the blame for an election that proved a disaster for the Conservative Party, a headache for Britain’s exit from the European Union — and potentially a fatal blow to May’s premiership.
Joint chiefs of staff Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill formed part of May’s small inner circle and were blamed by many Conservatives for the party’s lacklustre campaign and unpopular election platform, which alienated older voters with its plan to make them pay more for long-term care. —
london — British Prime Minister Theresa May was fighting for survival on Saturday after a failed election gamble undermined her authority and plunged the country into a major political crisis, days before the start of talks to leave the European Union.
May’s bet that she could strengthen her hand by crushing what she believed to be a weak opposition Labour Party backfired spectacularly on Thursday as voters stripped her Conservative Party of a parliamentary majority.
The stunning outcome leaves May battling to unite different factions in her party and reliant on a handful of Northern Irish parliamentarians just nine days before Britain starts the tortuous process of negotiating its departure from the EU.
May’s two top aides, Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill, announced they had quit on Saturday, following sustained criticism of the campaign within the party.
Britain’s typically pro-Conservative press savaged May on Saturday and questioned whether she could remain in power, only two months after she started the clock ticking on the two-year EU divorce process.
The best-selling Sun newspaper said senior members of the party had vowed to get rid of May, but would wait at least six months because they feared a leadership contest could propel Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn into power.
“She’s staying, for now,” one Conservative Party source said.
The outcome risks upsetting the political balance in Northern Ireland by aligning London more closely with the pro-British side in the divided province, and increases the chance that Britain will fall out of the EU in 2019 without a deal.
May called the snap election to win a clear mandate for her plan to take Britain out of the EU’s single market and customs union, so she could slash immigration.
But her party is deeply divided over what it wants from Brexit and the result means British businesses still have no idea what trading rules they can expect in the coming years.
The British pound tumbled against the US dollar and the euro after the election result.
Elmar Brok, a German conservative and the European Parliament’s top Brexit expert, told the
Ruhr Nachrichten newspaper the talks would now be more complicated. “May won’t be able to make any compromises because she lacks a broad parliamentary majority,” he said.
If she is to succeed in delivering the wishes of 52 per cent of the public and take Britain out of the EU, she must find a way to secure the full support of her party to pass legislation preparing for and enacting the departure.
Anand Menon, professor of politics at King’s College London, said her lack of a majority made it far more likely that Britain would leave the EU without a deal.
“Imagine she survives until autumn of next year,” he said. “You will have a very fractious parliament. It is far from guaranteed to vote the deal through.”
A failure to get legislation through parliament could eventually result in the need for another election.
Party insiders are placing bets on how long May will last, less than a year after Britain’s surprise referendum decision propelled her into Downing Street.
“Theresa May is certainly the strongest leader that we have at the moment,” lawmaker David Jones told the BBC.
When asked about her future, senior Conservative lawmaker Owen Paterson said “Let’s see how it pans out”.
The Times newspaper’s front page declared “May stares into the abyss”. It said Britain was “effectively leaderless” and the “country all but ungovernable”. Its cartoon depicted May in a coffin with her feet sticking out and a speech bubble saying “Nothing has changed”, a line she repeated several times as she reversed a key policy on social care during the campaign.
“The Conservatives have not yet broken the British system of democracy, but through their hubris and incompetence they have managed to make a mockery of it,” it said in an editorial. “The task of restoring orderly government in order to make sense of Brexit is now a national emergency, and it falls to them.”
The Telegraph newspaper said senior Conservatives including Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, interior minister Amber Rudd and Brexit minister David Davis were taking soundings over whether to replace May. —
May won’t be able to make any compromises because she lacks a broad parliamentary majority. Elmar Brok Mary, a German conservative