After weeks, Brexit talks collapse
Parties trade blame; May eyes Parliament votes
LONDON — Talks between Britain’s Conservative government and the opposition Labour Party seeking a compromise over Brexit broke down without agreement Friday, plunging the country back into a morass of uncertainty over its departure from the European Union.
Each side blamed the other for the collapse. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said the talks with Prime Minister Theresa May’s government had “gone as far as they can.”
“We have been unable to bridge important policy gaps between us,” Corbyn said in a letter to May.
And with May set to announce her timetable for stepping down within weeks, Corbyn said divisions within the ruling Conservative Party meant “it’s a government that is negotiating with no authority and no ability, that I can see, to actually deliver anything.”
But May said divisions within the Labour Party had contributed to the breakdown.
“In particular, we have not been able to overcome the fact that there isn’t a common position in Labour about whether they want to deliver Brexit or hold a second referendum, which could reverse it,” she said.
The two sides have held weeks of negotiations to try to agree upon terms for Brexit that can win support in Parliament. The talks began after British lawmakers rejected May’s divorce deal with the EU three times.
The Conservatives and the left-ofcenter Labour differ on how close an economic relationship to seek with the EU after the U.K. leaves the bloc. Labour wants to stick close to EU rules to guarantee seamless trade, while the government wants a looser relationship that would leave Britain freer to strike new trade deals around the world.
Britain was due to leave the EU on March 29, but amid the political impasse in the country, the EU extended the Brexit deadline until Oct. 31.
That deadlock has deepened this week with the breakdown of the cross-party talks and intensifying pressure on May from within the Conservative Party to quit.
The prime minister said she was considering a series of votes in Parliament on different Brexit options to see if any can gain majority backing.
May also plans a fourth attempt to get lawmakers’ backing for Brexit terms by putting a withdrawal agreement bill to a vote during the week of June 3. She says that if it passes, Britain could leave the EU in July, well before the October deadline set by the bloc.
May said Friday that British lawmakers “will be faced with a stark choice: that is to vote to … deliver Brexit, or to shy away again from delivering Brexit with all the uncertainty that that would leave.”