As Snap Election Hopes Fade, Boris Johnson Shifts Focus to EU Deal
Around three years ago, the United Kingdom used to be one of the world’s leading economies and was all set to grow for the foreseeable future. However, the Brexit referendum changed all that, as the people of the country voted to leave the European Union. The referendum plunged the country into economic and political turmoil. The British Pound has been volatile for the past three years and two Prime Ministers have resigned from the position already. Boris Johnson, the current Prime Minister, assumed office recently and promised that he is going to get the country out of the EU by October 31st. The past week was a total disaster for the Prime Minister as he failed to get his measures through Parliament and in addition to that, his brother Johnson resigned from his post as an MP.
Hopes of a snap election on the Brexit plank are quashed and now Johnson is looking to focus on the EU so that an exit deal could be secured. In this regard, it needs to be pointed out that previous Prime Minister, Theresa May had come back with a series of deals from Brussels, but all of those deals were rejected by the Parliament. That being said, the fact that a catastrophic ‘no deal’ Brexit has been taken off the table should come as a massive relief for the citizens as well as business in the United Kingdom. Such a deal would have seen the country bombing out of the EU without a deal and that would have inevitably led to an economic meltdown of epic proportions.
The Prime Minister has repeatedly stated that his sole intention is to engineer an exit for the country by October 31st and he is not looking for an extension to that deadline. It has been a week of massive political developments in the UK and one of the things that became abundantly clear was that all is not well within the Tory Party. As many as 21 MPs were expelled by Johnson for having rebelled against the Prime Minister’s proposals. The coming weeks are going to be even more hectic. However, it is believed that tying up a deal with the EU is the way forward for Johnson. One expert stated,
Johnson’s best hope now is probably to go back to trying to getting a Withdrawal Agreement signed with the EU on October 17.
