Christmas election
Corbyn finally bows to Johnson’s demands for a vote to clear the Brexit impasse that has crippled politics
BRITAIN will go to the polls on Thursday Dec 12 after MPS finally answered Boris Johnson’s call to end Parliament’s “stasis” at the fourth time of asking.
Jeremy Corbyn caved in to pressure to accept an early election after Tory MPS said he had “run out of excuses” for opposing one.
Just 24 hours after the Commons rejected an early election, MPS voted by 438 to 20 in favour of the first December election since 1923. The 25-day election campaign will officially begin next week after Parliament is dissolved.
The Prime Minister said it was time for a “new and revitalised” Parliament that was able to deliver Brexit.
However, Conservative sources admitted that it would now be all but impossible for Britain to leave the EU before Jan 31 after the Government formally agreed to shelve its Brexit Bill until after the poll.
Mr Johnson saw off a Labour attempt to bring the election date forward to Dec 9 after he restored the whip to 10 Tory MPS who had been exiled after voting against the Government on Brexit. His unexpected move helped him defeat the Labour amendment by a majority of 20. Mr Corbyn suffered a huge rebellion as almost half of his MPS – including more than 10 frontbenchers – defied the whip by voting against the election or abstaining.
Among the 105 who abstained were Dawn Butler, the shadow equalities minister; Liam Byrne, the shadow digital minister; Tom Watson, the deputy leader; and Louise Haigh, the shadow policing minister. Eleven Labour MPS voted against the election, including Margaret Beckett, the former foreign secretary, and David Lammy, the former universities minister.
It came after the parties squabbled all day over whether to hold the election on Dec 9, 10, 11 or 12, as opposition parties claimed students could be “disfranchised” by a Dec 12 poll, a claim dismissed as a “complete red herring” by the Government.
The opposition parties also attempted to introduce last-minute amendments to lower the voting age to 16 and give EU citizens living in the UK the vote. Both attempts were rejected.
The Bill must now pass through the Lords before it can be granted Royal Assent, but Labour sources in the Lords suggested they would not try to reintroduce any amendments.
Bookmakers installed the Conservatives as favourites to win a majority, with William Hill quoting odds of 5-6 on, with Labour a distant 14-1 to gain a majority.
The Lib Dems, who yesterday claimed they could win 200 seats on the basis of their pledge to stop Brexit, were 33-1 outsiders to gain a majority.
Labour’s decision to vote in favour of an early election left the upper echelons of the party deeply divided.
Emily Thornberry, the shadow foreign secretary, has privately warned that the party will lose seats in Scotland and Wales.
Earlier, backbench Labour MPS tried to wreck the early election vote by tabling amendments that would have forced the Government to abandon it.
Mr Corbyn left Tory MPS baffled with his decision – and his reasoning – for changing his mind over the merits of a December election.
He told the shadow cabinet that the EU’S decision to extend Article 50 to
Jan 31 meant his precondition of a nodeal Brexit being “off the table” had been satisfied – even though the EU had already granted the extension before Monday’s vote.
Mr Corbyn was attacked by some of his backbenchers who claimed he had sided with his closest aides instead of shadow cabinet ministers.
Allies of Mr Corbyn denied claims he had been “cajoled” into the decision by Seumas Milne, his communications director, and Karie Murphy, his former chief of staff, insisting that he had made
the decision to finally back an election independently.
Having failed on Monday to gain the “super majority” of two thirds of MPS needed to amend the Fixed-term Parliaments Act to allow an election, Mr Johnson succeeded by tabling a onepage Bill that circumvented the FTPA. Mr Johnson won with a majority of 418.
The Prime Minister said an election was needed because the current “stasis” over Brexit was “seriously damaging to the national interest”.
Conservative sources said getting the Brexit Bill through Parliament and ratified by the European Parliament would now be nigh on impossible before the end of December. Under the terms of the three-month extension granted by the EU, Jan 31 would now be the most likely Brexit date.
Among those who had the Tory whip restored were former ministers Greg Clark, Alistair Burt, Caroline Nokes and Sir Nicholas Soames, but those still frozen out include Amber Rudd, the former home secretary, and Philip Hammond, the former chancellor.
It means there are now 298 Tory MPS – 22 short of a working majority – though 17 have indicated they will be standing down at the next election.
Attempts by opposition parties to amend the Bill to lower the voting age to 16 and to give the vote to all EU citizens living in the UK failed after Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the deputy speaker, refused to allow them.
Mr Johnson told backbench MPS the election would be “mega-tough” despite opinion polls putting the Tories 15 points ahead.
He told a meeting of the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers he would “take the fight” to Mr Corbyn on the NHS, schools and policing, as well as his core message of delivering Brexit.
Robert Halfon, the Tory MP, said: “We’re going to take the fight to Corbyn on domestic issues. Of course [Mr Johnson] said we have to have an election because we’ve got to get Brexit done and Labour will mess it up... but it was a King Henry V to Agincourt-type speech – very inspirational.”
Mr Halfon added: “He said forget about the polls, forget about everything you read, this is going to be an incredibly tough election. No one wants to do an election in December, it’s going to be mega-tough and it’s going to be one of the toughest elections we could ever do.”