Atlantic Sentinel

Tag: Conservative Party (UK)

  • How Johnson Lost the Confidence of Tory Lawmakers

    Boris Johnson
    British prime minister Boris Johnson leads his Latvian counterpart, Arturs Krišjānis Kariņš, up the stairs of 10 Downing Street in London, England, March 14 (Valsts kanceleja)

    At least 54 British Conservatives want Boris Johnson to go. That was the minimum — 15 percent of lawmakers — needed to trigger a vote of confidence. The prime minister needs to convince a majority of 180 of his colleagues to keep him in office. The vote will be held tonight.

    The immediate cause of the rebellion is an investigation that found Johnson broke COVID-19 lockdown rules by attending and hosting multiple parties and other social events in 10 Downing Street, his London residence, through 2020 and 2021.

    Other reasons given by Johnson’s internal critics to push him out are: raising taxes on energy companies, when Conservatives are supposed to be the party of low taxes; sending asylum seekers to Rwanda while their applications are being processed in the UK; and threatening to pull out of an agreement with the EU that has kept the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland open.

    Not only did the prime minister break the rules; he repeatedly breaks his word. (more…)

  • Pressure Mounts on Boris Johnson to Resign

    Boris Johnson
    British prime minister Boris Johnson chairs a cabinet meeting in London, England, September 30, 2020 (10 Downing Street/Andrew Parsons)

    Boris Johnson may be remembered as the prime minister of Brexit and COVID parties.

    British media have revealed a series of parties were held at the prime minister’s residence when the rest of the United Kingdom was in pandemic lockdown. Each week seems to bring fresh allegations and criticism. Three of Johnson’s predecessors have reprimanded him. Conservative backbenchers and party donors have urged him to step down. Labour has taken a 7- to 10-point lead in the polls. Yet Johnson continues in office.

    The government first tried to defend the parties with what have been called “brazen” and “unbelievable” excuses. One involving wine, cheese and loud music was called a “work event”. A birthday party was defended as the prime minister being “ambushed by a cake.” (more…)

  • Boris Johnson’s Blue Wall Starts to Crack

    Boris Johnson Angela Merkel
    British prime minister Boris Johnson and German chancellor Angela Merkel pose for photos at the G7 in Carbis Bay, Cornwall, June 11 (10 Downing Street/Simon Dawson)

    British Conservatives woke up Friday morning to the news that a once-safe seat in Parliament was no longer blue.

    Liberal Democrat Sarah Green overturned a majority of 16,000 in Chesham and Amersham, bordering the London Green Belt, with a remarkable 25-point swing away from the Conservatives. It is one of the largest swings away from the ruling party since the early 1990s, when Tony Blair launched New Labour.

    Extrapolating from a by-election is risky. Britain has had many by-elections which were heralded as the dawning of a new political era that never arrived. But a center-right party losing the suburbs after lurching to the populist right sounds like a familiar story. (more…)

  • British Conservatives Shouldn’t Root for Trump

    Theresa May Donald Trump
    British prime minister Theresa May speaks with American president Donald Trump the Oval Office of the White House in Washington DC, January 27, 2017 (10 Downing Street/Jay Allen)

    Like in 2016, there are those on the British right who are rooting for Donald Trump’s reelection.

    Like in 2016, they are deluding themselves if they think the Republican will be better for Britain than his Democratic challenger, Joe Biden. (more…)

  • Conservatives Learned the Lesson of the 2017 Election

    Boris Johnson
    British foreign secretary Boris Johnson answers questions from reporters at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, June 18, 2018 (UN/Jean-Marc Ferré)

    Britain’s Conservative Party learned the lesson of the 2017 election, when then-Prime Minister Theresa May lost her majority on the back of some rather limp campaigning.

    This year, under the more charismatic, if perhaps less reliable, Boris Johnson, the Conservatives have been in an optimistic mood, emphasizing hoped-for possibilities of economic, political and social renewal after Brexit.

    The mantra of their campaign was to “get Brexit done” after three years of back-and-forth negotiations with the EU. The calculation was that this would appeal to working-class Labour voters in constituences that want to leave the EU. The exit poll released by the three major broadcasters after polling places closed on Thursday night appears to bear this out. (more…)

  • Stakes Are High in British Election, But Outcome Is Up in the Air

    Elizabeth Tower London England
    Elizabeth Tower of the Palace of Westminster in London, England, February 23, 2017 (Unsplash/Kate Krivanec)

    In a month, Britain will have its third election in four years. Once more the reason is Brexit, or rather the lack of Brexit.

    I’ve argued before that Britain’s departure from the EU is accelerating a breakdown of the two-party system. The upcoming election is like a kaleidoscope. Every time you shake it, a new pattern appears.

    Yet the stakes are simple enough. For the Conservatives, all that matters is winning a majority. The other parties merely have to stop this from happening to claim victory.

    Already we can say the new Parliament will be more partisan and less experienced. Sixty lawmakers with 750 years of combined legislative experience are not seeking reelection. Many blame the coarse political discourse of recent years. (more…)

  • After Week of Turmoil, What Next for British Politics?

    London England
    Aerial view of Big Ben and Westminster Abbey in London, England (Unsplash/Ricardo Frantz)

    Tuesday was an historic night in British politics, and one whose outcome could reverberate through the coming months and years.

    Lawmakers voted 328 to 321 to take control of the parliamentary agenda from the government in order to demand that Boris Johnson, the prime minister, ask for an extension of Britain’s exit from the European Union if no withdrawal agreement is in place by October 17.

    Johnson, who currently has a 100-percent loss rate in Parliament, and is the first British prime minister since William Pitt the Younger in 1793 to lose his first vote, refuses to delay Brexit and called for an early election instead.

    But that too failed. Under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, a two-thirds supermajority is required to call an early election. Many opposition lawmakers, who fear an early election is a government trap to bring about a no-deal Brexit, abstained. (more…)

  • Even Parliament Must Make Way for Brexit

    Elizabeth Tower London England
    Elizabeth Tower of the Palace of Westminster in London, England, February 23, 2017 (Unsplash/Kate Krivanec)

    To its supporters, Brexit is all that matters. If it means plunging the country into deep uncertainty, undermining the public’s trust in institutions, trashing Britain’s alliances, causing Northern Ireland and Scotland to leave the United Kingdom, even destroying the Conservative Party — so be it.

    The latest victim of this obsession is parliamentary democracy.

    In the battle between popular and parliamentary sovereignty, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has sided with the former and suspended Parliament, so it will have almost no time to prevent the United Kingdom from crashing out of the European Union without an exit agreement. (more…)

  • Conservatives Put Party Before Country. They’ve Harmed Both

    Mariano Rajoy
    Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy looks out the window of a cable car in Sóller, Majorca, June 22, 2016 (PP)

    Center-right leaders in Britain, Spain and the United States have put the interests of their parties ahead of the good of their countries. Both their parties and their countries have suffered as a result. (more…)

  • Election of Britain’s Next Prime Minister Feels a Little Ridiculous

    Theresa May Donald Trump
    British prime minister Theresa May speaks with American president Donald Trump the Oval Office of the White House in Washington DC, January 27, 2017 (10 Downing Street/Jay Allen)

    The contest to succeed Theresa May as Conservative Party leader and prime minister of the UK is about halfway through. A field of more than two dozen candidates has been whittled down to two by parliamentarians. The final contenders are Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt.

    The entire thing has an air of ridicule to it. Many in the country have watched the televised debates between the candidates setting out their policies on not just Brexit but controversial domestic issues, such as social care and high-speed rail. But out of millions, only 150 to 160,000 party members have a vote.

    On top of this, to spend the better half of two months choosing a new leader, who will be the new prime minister by default, when the country faces perhaps its greatest crisis in half a century seems rather like rearranging the deckchairs on a sinking ship — futile and even a little insulting to those who suspect more could have been done with the six-month Brexit extension granted by the EU in April. (more…)

  • Boris Johnson and the Brexit Ultras Deserve Each Other

    Boris Johnson
    British foreign secretary Boris Johnson answers questions from reporters at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, June 18, 2018 (UN/Jean-Marc Ferré)

    When Boris Johnson’s last bid for the Conservative Party’s leadership failed, I argued here that the former mayor of London’s many flipflops had finally caught up with him.

    “You can only change your mind so many times before people start to see you for the political opportunist you are,” I wrote.

    My mistake was to think the British right cares about principle and integrity. (more…)

  • Johnson Warns Brexit Delay Will Benefit Labour

    Boris Johnson has finally put his head above the parapet and launched his bid to become Britain’s next prime minister.

    At a well-orchestrated event on Wednesday, which saw the former foreign secretary joined by a number of Conservative Party heavyweights, Johnson warned that his party faces an existential crisis if it fails to deliver Brexit.

    “Delay means defeat, delay means Corbyn,” he warned.

    Britain is due to leave the EU on October 31. (more…)

  • Brexit Is Tearing Britain’s Conservative Party Apart

    Theresa May
    British prime minister Theresa May attends a NATO summit in Brussels, July 11, 2018 (Shutterstock/Alexandros Michailidis)

    In last month’s European elections, Britain’s Conservative Party outdid expectations that it would perform poorly by performing terribly. It placed fifth with just 9 percent support, the party’s worst result since 1832.

    This is a humiliation for a party that prides itself on being Britain’s “natural party of government”. Theresa May promptly announced she would step down as prime minister and party leader. Twelve candidates are vying to replace her, including the former mayor of London, Boris Johnson.

    A fresh face won’t be enough avert the next electoral disaster, though. The Conservatives have lost their reputation for competence and prudence during the Brexit process and the issue of Europe — which has brought down every Conservative prime minister since Ted Heath — is unlikely to go away. (more…)

  • Local Elections Highlight Political Fragmentation in United Kingdom

    Bideford England
    Bideford, England seen from the River Torridge (Shutterstock)

    The outcome of local elections in the United Kingdom last week painted a stark picture for the country’s two major political parties.

    The ruling Conservatives were expecting to lose around 800 of their 5,521 seats. They ended up losing 1,330 and with it control of 44 councils.

    Labour, who were expecting gains, ended up losing 84 seats and control of six councils.

    The clear winners were the Liberal Democrats, who more than doubled their seats, from 658 to 1,351, with 19 percent support. The Greens also won.

    It is tempting to write up the result to those parties’ pro-EU message, but there is actually more at play. (more…)

  • Brexit Is Restructuring British Politics

    British parliament London
    Westminster Palace in London, England (Unsplash/Matt Milton)

    Friday was meant to be Brexit Day, but it wasn’t. Instead, after two “meaningful votes” about leaving the EU, a third was held in Parliament, which — like the previous two — did not succeed.

    On Monday, Parliament will continue its indicative voting to see what, if any, resolution to the crisis can command a majority in the House.

    Meanwhile, British politics continues its Brexit-themed realignment. (more…)