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Karla Adam
London correspondent covering the United Kingdom
LONDON – The minister charged with helping Britain leave the EU, Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab abruptly resigned Thursday morning from Prime Minister Theresa May's government, saying he could not not support the withdrawal agreement approved by the Cabinet the night before.
It was a scathing setback for May. The resignation at the highest level has provoked shivers in London and Brussels, evoking the possibility that May does not have the support necessary to continue his agreement on a sweeter and slower Brexit, a plan loaded with compromise that few Britons like .
In his letter of resignation, Raab wrote: "I can not reconcile the terms of the proposed agreement with the promises we made to the country in our manifesto in the last election."
Specifically, Raab stated that he could not support May's plan as he treats the future trade and customs relations of Northern Ireland with the European Union in a way that "represents a very real threat to the integrity of the United Kingdom".
The resignation caused an immediate derision on the part of Pro-E.U. voices in Brussels who deplored the Brexit decision. Many Europeans have grown weary of the British chaos over Brexit, where May's own government is in constant crisis over her plans to leave.
"Who still negotiated these British conditions …? Surely the #Brexit The minister has nothing to do with that and learned the conditions yesterday …..? Oh, wait, wrote Marietje Schaake, a Dutch member of the European Parliament, on Twitter.
Raab's shocked resignation followed that of Shailesh Vara, a minister from Northern Ireland, who also left the government on Thursday morning. In her letter of resignation, Vara, a pro-European, said that this deal left Britain in a "transitional house" with no "time limit to determine when we would finally be a sovereign nation".
An hour after the departure of Raab, Esther McVey, UK Minister of Labor and Pensions, also announced his resignation from the cabinet. In his letter, McVey said that the agreement "does not honor the result of the referendum".
"We have gone from no agreement better than a bad deal, to any agreement is better than any agreement," she wrote.
May is scheduled to speak in Parliament on Thursday at what will likely be a hectic session. Political opponents reacted quickly, with some predicting its demise.
Paddy Ashdown, the former leader of the Liberal Democratic Party, tweeted: "With Raab gone, May becomes a gonner. With May gone, the Tories will not be able to find anyone to unite behind. And so begins the great denouement. "
It was "an incredibly serious situation," tweeted Keir Starmer, Labor Party secretary of the Brexit opposition. "The Prime Minister's agreement on Brexit has come to the fore."
May's supporters have long suspected that his plan for Brexit could result in some minor resignations from his firm. But his Brexit secretary? This one hurt him.
On Wednesday evening, after a five-hour meeting with her cabinet and months of struggle and delay, May came out of 10 Downing Street to announce that her ministers had "collectively" approved her plan for Brexit.
The draft agreement, negotiated by British and European Union officials, is a decisive step towards the finalization of Britain's departure from the European Union in March.
This agreement, which has been compared to the most complex divorce settlement in the world, defines the billions of euros that Britain will pay to leave, the rights of Europeans living in Britain after the Brexit and the operation of a transition period of 21 months.
The agreement also promises a solution to the thorny challenge of avoiding a hard border between Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and the Republic of Ireland, which will remain in the United Kingdom. ;European Union.
The plan still needs to be approved by European leaders this month, which should be relatively easy. It will be followed by a much more difficult vote in December in the British Parliament, where many members decry the draft agreement as a weak capitulation that does not satisfy anyone.
[A BBC reporter replaced his Brexit analysis with exasperated noises, and now he’s a hero]
The approval of the May package by the government marks the end of a remarkable 24 hours in British politics: a real cliff exchanger, with social media and the airwaves bursting with speculation about the survival of the deal and May she -even.
Even as May was preparing to speak, British political journalists were tweeting that a challenge to his leadership could be in progress.
May has barely won a disastrous election in 2017, getting just enough votes to govern, as long as his conservative party aligned with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) of Northern Ireland, which must support its minority government.
Sammy Wilson, a DUP MP, told TalkRadio on Wednesday that the May plan "is not so much an agreement as a double bottom".
Jeffrey Donaldson, leader of the DUP in Westminster, said the May plan at mid-entry and half-exit "does not give the entire UK the opportunity to enter into free trade agreements and take charge of your own future. "
The Prime Minister looked exhausted in front of the cameras on Wednesday night in front of her official residence. Rather than celebrate a hard-won run in her fight to get a good Brexit deal, she looked dark.
"It's a decision that will be scrutinized, but the decision was to build a future for our country or return to square one and fail on the promise of the referendum," said May, without giving more details on the treat.
She described a "long, detailed and passionate debate" within her cabinet, whose ranks are balanced between those who, like May, voted against Brexit two years ago and those who campaigned for the Brexit two years ago. get – ministers such as Michael Gove and Liam Fox, who are engaged Brexiteers.
In the past two years, the biggest Brexit debate has not been between Brussels and London, but in May's fractional conservative party.
The uncompromising Brexiteers have called for a decisive split of European bureaucrats and courts, rules and regulations, while others, led by May, have sought a softer Brexit, a compromise that further aligns Britain with Europe to better protect the UK economy.
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