Pro-EU party win cuts into Johnson’s Parliament leeway
British Prime Minister LONDON — Boris Johnson’s Brexit-backing Conservative Party lost a special election Friday to a pro-EU opposition candidate, leaving Johnson with only a one-vote majority in Parliament as the U.K.’s departure from the European Union looms.
In the Conservatives’ first electoral test since Johnson became prime minister last month on a vow to complete Brexit “do or die,” the party was defeated for the seat of Brecon and Radnorshire in Wales by Jane Dodds of the Liberal Democrats. Dodds won 43% of the vote, against 39% for Conservative Chris Davies, who fought to retain the seat after being convicted and fined for expenses fraud.
Dodds urged the prime minister to rule out leaving the EU without a divorce agreement, saying “a no-deal Brexit would be a disaster” for agricultural areas like her constituency some 175 miles west of London.
Sheep farmers in Wales worry that, without a Brexit deal, steep tariffs on lamb exports will devastate their business.
Johnson won a Conservative Party leadership race by vowing that Britain will leave the European Union on Oct. 31, with or without a divorce deal. But he faces opposition from Parliament, and the by-election result makes it even harder for the government to pass laws and win votes in the 90 days before the Brexit deadline.
The outcome also reflects the seismic effect the U.K.’s decision three years ago to leave the 28-nation EU has had on the country’s politics, with voters increasingly split into pro-Brexit and pro-EU camps.
The centrist Liberal Democrats have seen their support surge because of their call for the U.K. to remain in the bloc. In European Parliament elections in May, the party took 20% of U.K. votes, trouncing both the Conservatives and the main opposition Labour Party, whose leadership is divided over Brexit.
Labour won just 5% of the votes in Brecon. The Liberal Democrats made a pact with two other pro-EU parties, which did not run to give Dodds a better chance.
The Conservatives, meanwhile, lost support to the Brexit Party led by longtime euroskeptic figurehead Nigel Farage, which took 10% of the votes.
The Conservatives lack an overall majority in the House of Commons, and rely on an alliance with 10 lawmakers from Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party. The loss of the Brecon seat leaves the governing alliance with 320 of the 639 voting lawmakers — the bare minimum needed to carry votes.
The loss illustrates the risks of Johnson’s hard-line stance on Brexit. It comes after a week that saw the new prime minister booed by pro-independence protesters in Scotland, criticized by Welsh farmers and accused by Northern Ireland politicians of destabilizing the economy and the peace process with his willingness to opt for a no-deal exit.
Johnson insists that he wants a Brexit deal, but is demanding that the EU make major changes to the divorce agreement it struck with his predecessor Theresa May, which was rejected three times by Britain’s Parliament. The EU is adamant that it won’t renegotiate.
Johnson argues that a no-deal Brexit will be “vanishingly inexpensive” if Britain prepares properly. This week the government set aside 2 billion pounds ($2.4 billion) for no-deal measures.
Economists say no amount of preparation can eliminate the shock if Britain crashes out the EU’s single market without a transition period or framework of new trade rules.