Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, has excluded to resign in the event of a defeat, but these results are likely to accentuate the climate of distrust within the majority.
Le Monde
The conservatives, in power, underwent two heavy defeats during local parliamentary elections, Friday, June 24. “We cannot continue as if nothing had happened,” decided the president of the Conservative Party, Oliver Dowden, announcing his resignation shortly after his results.
These defeats “are the last of a series of very bad results for our party,” Dowden wrote in a letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson, adding that “someone must take responsibility”.
My letter of resignation to the prime minister. https://t.co/xd5mtm2o3n
At the end of the elections that were held Thursday, the Liberals Democrats Centrists overthrew the conservative majority to win Tiverton and Honiton, district of southwest conservative since its creation in 1997. The Labor Party , the main opposition party, recovered the district of Wakefield, in the north of England, a traditionally Labor stronghold but delighted by the Tories during their triumph of December 2019.
These elections were organized after two resignations of former conservative deputies. Wakefield’s election had been launched by Imran Khan’s resignation, sentenced to eighteen months in prison for the sexual assault of a teenager. In Tiverton and Honiton, the 65 -year -old deputy, Neil Parish, presented his resignation after admitting to watch pornography on his phone in Parliament.
“Loss of confidence”
In speeches welcoming their victories, the two newly elected deputies said that the United Kingdom had lost faith in Boris Johnson and urged him to resign.
The head of the opposition, Keir Starmer, who plans to replace Mr. Johnson as Prime Minister after the next general elections planned in 2024, claimed that Wakefield “could be the birthplace of the next Labor government” . “Wakefield has shown that the country has lost confidence in the Tories,” he said in a statement. “This result is a clear verdict for a conservative party which is short of energy and ideas.”
The leader of the Liberals Democrats, Ed Davey, said that his party had entered “political history with this amazing victory” and that it was an “alarm clock for all these conservative deputies who support Boris Johnson”. “The inhabitants of Tiverton and Honiton spoke in the name of the country,” he added. “The public is tired of the lies and violations of Boris Johnson’s law, and it is time for conservative deputies to do what it takes and refer it.”
refusal to resign
m. Johnson spent months fighting for his survival after a series of controversies, including “partygate” – these evenings organized despite containment measures – which has started its legitimacy as a party leader. The Prime Minister excluded Thursday, while he was in Rwanda for a Commonwealth summit, to resign in the event of a defeat. But two weeks after having survived a vote of distrust in the wake of “partygate”, these results are likely to accentuate the climate of distrust within the majority.
Even before the controversy has fun, in December, the 58 -year -old Brexit architect had lost two seats formerly safe in by -elections last year. He then obtained a very bad score during the local elections of May.
A few weeks later, dozens of conservative deputies sparked a vote of distrust against Mr. Johnson, and more than 40 % of them turned their back on their leader in difficulty. The context is not very favorable for his government, with inflation at the highest for forty years – exceeding 9 % – at the origin of a massive railway worker strike, and the recent failure of a very criticized attempt to Expel migrants to Rwanda.