May makes ‘last chance’ appeal to Labour’s Corbyn to back Brexit deal
BRITISH Prime Minister Theresa May made a final appeal yesterday to opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to back her deal for Britain to leave the EU, as she faces a likely fourth defeat in parliament.
May told Corbyn in a letter that she had shown in a revised Brexit deal that she was “willing to compromise to deliver Brexit for the British people”.
A Withdrawal Agreement Bill, scheduled for a vote in parliament next month, “is our last chance to do so”, May wrote.
“I ask you to compromise too so that we can deliver what both our parties promised in our manifestos and restore faith in our politics,” she said.
Speaking late on Tuesday, following May’s speech on her revised Brexit plan, Corbyn told the BBC he would still oppose her deal.
“We cannot support this bill, because it’s basically a rehash of what was discussed before,” Corbyn said.
“I can’t see how it can get through parliament.”
Labour’s Brexit spokesman Keir Starmer told the broadcaster yesterday that May “needs to, today, accept that what she announced yesterday isn’t going to work and pull the vote”.
Other opposition lawmakers and many in May’s Conservatives said they would vote against the revised deal.
Former foreign secretary Boris Johnson, the favourite to succeed May as Conservative party leader, said he would vote against it.
The compromises – particularly the promises of a post-Brexit customs union with the EU and a parliamentary vote on holding a second Brexit referendum – run “directly against our (Conservative) manifesto,” Johnson tweeted. |