Downing St ‘close to sealing deal with the DUP’
May hoping to agree terms with Northern Ireland party to give her Commons majority
DOWNING STREET was last night said to be confident of reaching an agreement with the DUP before close of play today, signalling an end to days of uncertainty over the future leadership of the country.
Sources close to negotiations were quoted as saying that “significant progress” had been made during talks with the party leaders yesterday afternoon, and a deal that would see Theresa May govern with the support of the DUP’s 10 MPs could be finalised within 24 hours.
The reports came as senior Tory figures warned the Prime Minister against entering into a formal alliance with the Northern Irish party, claiming it could put the peace process in the country at risk.
It also came amid speculation about what the DUP will demand in return for their support, with claims that this could include an increase to defence spending and greater investment in Northern Ireland’s infrastructure.
DUP leader Arlene Foster arrived at Downing Street shortly after noon yesterday to begin negotiations over a proposed “confidence and supply” arrangement with the Conservatives.
Mrs May first revealed her intention to work with the highly conservative party on Friday after her decision to call a snap General Election left her with no overall majority in the Commons.
The talks went on for several hours, with a brief pause while the Prime Minister was required in Parliament to mark the election of the Speaker.
Mrs May later left for Paris where after discussions with French President Emmanuel Macron she announced Brexit talks would start next week and the timetable remained on course.
It is understood that the DUP negotiations will continue today.
Commenting after her initial meeting with the DUP, Ms Foster told reporters she was optimistic of finalising a deal “sooner than later”. She said the two parties had “had some very good discussions” and both sides want to bring “stability to the UK Government”.
A Downing Street source added the talks had been “constructive” but refused to put a timescale on when they would conclude. However, individuals close to the process were quoted by Sky News yesterday as predicting that an agreement “should be wrapped up within 24 hours”.
It is understood that the Conservatives are seeking a “confidence and supply” deal that would see the 10 Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) MPs lend Mrs May their support for key votes. Speaking ahead of the Downing Street meeting, the former Prime Minister Sir John Major criticised the plans, claiming it could undermine the “fragile” Northern Irish peace process.
He said it was “fundamental” that the UK government remained “impartial between all the competing interests” in the country.
“The danger is that however much any government tries, they will not be seen to be impartial if they are locked into a parliamentary deal at Westminster with one of the Northern Ireland parties,” said Sir John, who was also among those debating what the DUP will ask for in exchange for their services. He suggested the key issue would be money, but any hint that the Tories were offering “cash for votes” could see the party lose votes “by the bucketload” at a subsequent election.
Others have stated that Ms Foster’s party will demand a commitment to spending two per cent of GDP on defence, which does not include non-military spending. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn yesterday accused Mrs May of embarking on a “coalition of chaos” with the DUP. He reportedly told the Parliamentary Labour Party to remain in campaign mode, adding: “We are now a government in waiting.”
(Both sides) want to bring stability to the UK Government. DUP leader Arlene Foster after her initial meeting with Theresa May.
A YORKSHIRE peer has joined fellow senior Conservatives in urging ministers to “keep all options open” on Brexit, as Theresa May faces mounting pressure to water down her plans for leaving the EU.
Speaking to The Yorkshire Post, the former MEP Lord Kirkhope suggested last week’s election failed to secure a mandate for the Government’s hard Brexit strategy and ministers should now “be careful” how they proceed.
His comments follow reports that Remain-supporting Cabinet members are preparing to work with Labour rivals to push for a “softer” exit from the EU that allows for greater access to European markets.
They also came as Lord Hague and Sir John Major became the latest Tory heavyweights to call on Mrs May to reassess her priorities, shifting the focus from immigration to economic growth.
Brexit Secretary David Davis caused a stir on Monday when he revealed formal talks will no longer begin on June 19.
It has been suggested that the delay was a result of the need to conclude negotiations with the DUP, but there is also concern that European leaders see Mrs May as lacking the mandate to press ahead with plans to leave the single market and end free movement.
Lord Kirkhope, who was a key player in drafting Article 50, agreed that the election result should prompt a rethink in Government policy.
He stated that young people in particular used last week’s vote to express their opposition to a hard exit, and suggested ministers need to “be careful” to reflect this in their revised approach.
“A lot of the information coming in on a regional basis from Yorkshire... is suggesting that the uncertainty about the future with Europe is costing us,” he said.
“It’s costing us economically and its also going to be very dangerous to us in terms of employment (in light of ) the question of immigration and the question of free movement
“The situation is not the same as it was a week ago. Things have changed, things have moved on... I think we may have to revisit the current Brexit arrangements.
“Bearing in mind the result that happened, and the way that politics is now looking, I think its absolutely essential that we keep all options open.”
The former Conservative Prime Minister Sir John Major echoed these views when he said that the Government should be “more generous” on immigration and urging his party to consider it would be “very wise” to consult on Brexit more widely.
Labour are already pushing for greater cross-party collaboration on Brexit, following Yvette Cooper’s calls for a new commission to oversee the talks.
Shadow Brexit minister Paul Blomfield yesterday told the YP that the “debate has opened up again” and encouraged Mrs May to reconsider membership of the single market, stressing that this would not necessarily mean accepting free movement in its current form.
“Labour’s view is that we should be seeking a negotiated departure... putting the economy and jobs first,” he said.
A LAME-DUCK government which faces risking the hard-won Northern Ireland peace process to secure the largesse of a party embroiled in scandal, a Brexit negotiation strategy seemingly in tatters days before talks begin and the prospect of a third Prime Minister in 12 months; the country now faces a scenario that not even the Remain campaign’s “Project Fear” could have dreamt up.
Theresa May’s dire miscalculation to call an unneeded General Election, and the hung Parliament that resulted from an appalling and arrogant campaign, has left the nation in an impossible position.
Mrs May is now a politician damned by her own words. She called an election in April, little more than a month after the Bill to trigger Article 50 was passed by Parliament without a single word being amended. She was essentially in an unopposed position to enter Brexit talks on the basis of her plan for the UK to leave the single market, scrap EU laws and end free movement.
But as she stood outside Downing Street on April 18 to announce the snap election, she uttered these unintentionally prescient words: “Division in Westminster will risk our ability to make a success of Brexit and it will cause damaging uncertainty and instability to the country.”
That precise situation has now come to pass and there seems little way out of the mess that has been created either for the Conservative Party or, by extension, the country it leads (in theory, at least).
Option A, another General Election, causes more uncertainty and wastes further months before Brexit negotiations can begin in earnest as the two-year deadline triggered by Mrs May ticks down.
Option B, a navel-gazing Conservative Party contest to replace Mrs May as Prime Minister, would also cause uncertainty, again delaying Brexit negotiations as rival candidates put forward their different visions of how the country’s future would look and result in another publicly unelected leader in charge of the country – leading to inevitable calls for that new leader to go back to Option A, calling another General Election.
Option C, Mrs May resigning and a new leader being chosen unopposed, leads inevitably again back to Option A.
That leaves the current reality that is Option D – an enfeebled Mrs May stripped of her trusted key advisers remaining as Prime Minister and running a government reliant on the support of the Democratic Unionist Party to achieve any of its policy objectives. Even putting aside DUP views on abortion, gay rights and climate change that repulse vast swathes of the voting public, this dangerous state of affairs clearly puts the Good Friday Agreement at risk.
The 1998 accord commits the British and Irish governments to demonstrating “rigorous impartiality” over differing political traditions in Northern Ireland. But Irish PM Enda Kenny has already indicated his concerns about the Conservatives’ ability to adhere to such a commitment if they are wedded to a parliamentary alliance with the DUP.
The stakes are raised even higher by the fact that talks to save the crisis-hit power-sharing arrangements in Northern Ireland are resuming this week. That crisis was triggered by the DUP’s involvement in a botched energy scheme that has landed taxpayers with an estimated bill of more than £400m.
In this context, it is worth returning again to Mrs May’s speech of April 18. The election, she said, was “all about leadership”. The country could not risk “weak and unstable coalition Government” that would “reopen the divisions of the referendum”.
But after refusing to take part in a debate with Jeremy Corbyn, persistently failing to answer questions beyond giving pre-prepared sound bites and avoiding encounters with the general public, the result of the election called by Mrs May has done almost exactly that.
No one can confidently predict what happens next but it is unlikely to be pretty.
From a country that had largely resolved to accept the result of last year’s referendum, old wounds have now been reopened.
On election night, George Osborne said Mrs May’s Brexit plans were in the “rubbish bin”; Remain campaigner Gina Miller claimed cross-party support would now be needed for a deal with the EU and Nigel Farage warned “they will be cheering in Brussels” at “the chance to crush a real Brexit”.
Whatever the truth of those statements, the fact is Mrs May’s personal credibility has been shredded as the country heads towards the EU negotiations that will determine all of our futures for years to come.
No one can confidently predict what happens next but it is unlikely to be pretty.
“Crush the saboteurs” was the controversial Daily Mail headline the day after Mrs May called the election. The extraordinary reality is that no Remain “saboteur” could have done as much damage to a successful Brexit resolution for the UK than the Prime Minister herself.