British Parliament backs PM’s call for June general election over ‘Brexit’

A two-thirds majority of MPs must agree to a move that will shorten the lifespan of a parliament.

It’s this prospect of a so-called “hard Brexit” that has mainly anxious businesses in Britain, many of which trade intensely with the European Union, the biggest destination for British exports.

She passed the required minimum needed of 434 MPs in support, after opposition MPs, mainly from Labour and the Liberal Democrats, voted in favor of an election. By comparison, ahead of the 2015 general election, which the Conservatives won, polls showed the two parties were roughly level.

May called the surprise vote on Tuesday to bolster her position going into negotiations on pulling Britain out of the European Union, which are due to begin shortly after the election.

“It’s a real shame that they’ve sided with the Tories on this and will plough ahead with Brexit without giving people the final say”.

The election announcement caused a rally in the pound, which had fallen since the Brexit vote, amid speculation that May will be returned with a stronger mandate. The choice before us is clear: “to trust the people and then let the public decide”.

She will likely get it, since Labour has welcomed the early election. May has been insisting until days ago that she had no intention of calling an early election.

Conservative Party chairman Patrick McLoughlin said it was “yet more evidence of chaos” from the Labour leadership.

Green Party co-leader Caroline Lucas said Mr Corbyn was letting down Britain by refusing to back a second referendum.

Mr Verhofstadt added that many in Brussels believed the chances of a deal were being eroded by Mrs May’s “tough negotiating red lines” and a lack of “political room for manoeuvre” domestically.

Britain will go to the polls on June 8 after MPs cleared the way for an early general election in a House of Commons vote praised by Theresa May as “the right decision” in the national interest.

Mrs May is, after all, a seasoned politician who has managed to rise to the very top in British politics by seizing the opportunities which have come her way.

“To have a new government before the beginning of the official negotiations I think is good not only for the United Kingdom but also for us because we will have for the next years the same prime minister, the same ministers, the same negotiator”, Tajani told reporters in London, following a meeting with May in Downing Street. “The result is not certain”, she said in a speech at a GlaxoSmithKline factory in her electoral area of Maidenhead, west of London. Polls give the Conservatives a double-digit lead over Labour, and May is gambling that an election will deliver her a personal mandate from voters and produce a bigger Conservative majority.

At an appearance with her party’s MPs outside Westminster, Ms Sturgeon said the Prime Minister was guilty of political opportunism for using the election to “crush the parliamentary opposition” to a hard Brexit.

Corby, on Thursday also said that Labour was the only party that would “focus on the kind of country we want to have after Brexit” – dismissing May’s election campaign as an “ego trip about her own failing leadership”, reports the BBC.