British election: Brexit next for Boris Johnson juggernaut

Boris Johnson’s landslide paves the way for the British parliament to trigger a long-delayed split with the EU.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his partner Carrie Symonds in front of 10 Downing Street in London on Friday. Picture: AP

Boris Johnson’s landslide marks a stunning victory for the Brexit cheerleader and paves the way for the British parliament to trigger a long-delayed split with the EU.

The Prime Minister said his government “has been given a powerful new mandate to get Brexit done”.

Describing the election as historic, he said it “gives us now, in this new government, the chance to respect the democratic will of the British people, to change this country for the better and to unleash the potential of the entire people of this country”.

The scale of the victory all but ensures that Britain will leave the EU at the end of next month, completing a divorce that was backed by voters in a 2016 referendum but that has been bogged down in the House of Commons for more than three years.

It also suggests a once-in-a-generation realignment of Britain’s electoral map, with scores of long-held working-class seats in England and Wales switching to the Conservatives.

That puts Britain in line with a host of other Western countries, including the US, where shifting voter loyalties since the financial crash of 2008 have changed the political landscape.

Mr Johnson also promised extra government spending to ­reverse some of the effects of a ­decade of public belt-tightening since the financial crisis. But his triumph came largely on the back of a simple message that a vote for the Conservatives would “get Brexit done”.

That Brexit appeal flipped electorates long considered Labour bastions. In a confirmation of the shift, the first electorates to declare showed big drops in the ­Labour Party’s share.

For its first gain of the evening, Mr Johnson’s party took the Blyth Valley, a former coalmining area in England’s northeast, from the opposition.

“Brexit has dominated. We thought other issues could cut through, but they haven’t,” said Labour deputy leader John McDonnell.

The leader of the pro-EU ­Liberal Democratic Party, Jo Swinson, lost her seat in Scotland to the Scottish National Party.

GRAPHIC: Overview of the UK election results

The vote marked a remarkable turnaround for Mr Johnson, who in the space of five months renegotiated a Brexit divorce deal with the EU and rallied his divided party and Britain’s exasperated voters behind it.

His commanding majority also allows him greater leeway in parliament to steer future trade talks with the EU in any direction he chooses.

Since the 2016 Brexit referendum, Britain’s political system was pushed to breaking point as traditional party allegiances ­melted over the issue of Brexit. MPs repeatedly refused to endorse a divorce deal with the EU negotiated by the government — while also making sure Britain didn’t leave the bloc without a deal.

Mr Johnson’s EU deal covers divorce issues needed to unwind Britain’s 45-year membership in the EU, including the rights of their respective citizens, a settlement of the debts the UK owes the EU and an arrangement to prevent a border arising in ­Ireland. But its ratification wouldn’t end the Brexit odyssey: The next challenge is to negotiate future ties ­between Britain and the EU.

Mr Johnson’s government will have to unmoor an economy tightly integrated to the trade bloc while minimising the immediate damage to Britain’s business ­interests. Only after future ties with the EU are settled will it be possible to delve into negotiations to tighten trade ties with other ­nations, including Australia and the US.

Once Britain leaves the EU, it will enter a transition period in which trade and other relations don’t change.

Mr Johnson has repeatedly said he wants this transition period to finish at the end of next year, when a trade deal he hopes to negotiate over the course of 2020 would kick in. After that, he has said he wants Britain to be free to diverge significantly from EU rules and regulations.

However, many trade experts say that timetable is likely over­ambitious and suggest Mr Johnson extend the transition period until the agreed limit at the end of 2022 to give him more time for ­negotiations with the EU over future relations.

The big electoral win gives Mr Johnson a freer hand in those talks, making him less vulnerable to rebellions by Conservative ­Eurosceptics in parliament who want a bare-bones trade deal with the EU and a fast exit from the transition period. It would allow him more freedom — if he wants it — to extend negotiations over ­future ties and strike a deal that maintains deep economic ties to the bloc.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn tried to frame the election around inequality and the need to invest in public services. But he failed to ­define a clear stand on Brexit, calling instead for a second referendum that would include the possibility of staying in the EU. He refused to say which side he would back in such a vote.

The Wall Street Journal