Five-week campaign for prime minister begins in U.K.
Johnson pushes Conservatives
LONDON — Prime Minister Boris Johnson told British voters on Wednesday that they have to back his Conservatives if they want an end to Brexit delays, as he tried to shake off a rocky start to the governing party’s election campaign.
Speaking outside his No. 10 Downing St. office on the first official day of Britain’s five-week campaign, Johnson said the political impasse over Britain’s departure from the European Union made him want to “chew my own tie in frustration.”
“I don’t want an early election, and no one much wants to have an election in December, but we have got to the stage where we have no choice,” he said.
Johnson, trying to set the stage for a people-versus-Parliament campaign, said lawmakers were “refusing time and again to deliver Brexit and honor the result of the referendum.”
In fact, lawmakers approved Johnson’s EU divorce deal in principle last month, but asked for more time to scrutinize it. Johnson then withdrew the bill and pushed for an early election instead.
Johnson also slammed his main rival, left-wing Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, comparing him to former Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and — erroneously — claiming he had sided with Russian President Vladimir Putin over a nerve-agent attack on British soil.
All 650 seats in the House of Commons are up for grabs in the Dec. 12 election, which is coming more than two years early. Some 46 million British voters are eligible to take part in the country’s first December election in 96 years.
Johnson urged voters to deliver a Conservative majority so Britain could “put uncertainty behind us.” With that support,
Johnson vowed he would get Parliament to ratify his Brexit deal and the country would leave the EU as scheduled on Jan. 31.
Brexit was supposed to happen on Oct. 31, but with Britain’s politicians deadlocked, the bloc granted the U.K. a three-month delay.
While unofficial campaigning has been ramping up for weeks, the campaign formally began when Parliament was dissolved Wednesday. Johnson went to Buckingham Palace to notify Queen Elizabeth II of that and was heading off to his first campaign rally, an evening event in central England.
The Conservative campaign has had a bumpy start. Just minutes before Johnson spoke Wednesday, Cabinet Minister Alun Cairns resigned over allegations about a former aide’s role in a rape trial.
Cairns said he was quitting as Welsh secretary because of “speculation” surrounding the “very sensitive matter,” which is under investigation.