British Prime Minister Theresa May yesterday was to ask Queen Elizabeth for permission to form a government after an election that saw her Conservative Party lose its parliamentary majority days before talks on Britain’s EU departure are due to begin.
May had called the snap election to boost her hand in the EU divorce talks, but in one of the most sensational nights in British electoral history, a resurgent Labour Party denied her an outright win as no clear victor emerged.
EU leaders said that May’s loss of her majority would delay the Brexit talks, due to begin on June 19, and raise the risk of negotiations failing.
Photo: AFP
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, once written off by his opponents as a no-hoper, said May should step down and that he wanted to form a minority government.
However, May said she was determined to hang on.
A spokesman for her office said she was to go to Buckingham Palace to ask Queen Elizabeth for permission to form a government — a formality under the British system.
Sky News reported that Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) would back her, allowing the Conservatives to reach the 326 seats needed for a parliamentary majority.
The DUP declined to comment.
With 649 of 650 seats declared, the Conservatives had won 318 seats and Labour 261.
The DUP, which took 10 seats, was considering an arrangement that would involve it supporting a Conservative minority government on key votes in parliament, but not in a formal coalition, Sky said.
If “the Conservative Party has won the most seats and probably the most votes, then it will be incumbent on us to ensure that we have that period of stability and that is exactly what we will do,” May said after winning her own parliamentary seat of Maidenhead, near London.
With the EU exit talks looming, it was unclear what their direction would be and if the so-called “hard Brexit” taking Britain out of a single market could still be pursued.
After winning his own seat in north London, Corbyn said May’s attempt to win a bigger mandate had backfired.
“The mandate she’s got is lost Conservative seats, lost votes, lost support and lost confidence,” he said. “I would have thought that’s enough to go, actually, and make way for a government that will be truly representative of all of the people of this country.”
Chief among Labour’s potential allies would be the Scottish National Party, which suffered major setbacks, but still won a majority of Scottish seats.
“We need a government that can act,” EU Budget Commissioner Guenther Oettinger told German broadcaster Deutschlandfunk. “With a weak negotiating partner, there’s a danger that the [Brexit] negotiations will turn out badly for both sides.”
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