By Canadian Press

December election? UK ponders early, Brexit-dominated vote

Oct 29, 2019 | 9:02 AM

LONDON — Britain appeared on course Tuesday for an early general election that could break the country’s political deadlock over Brexit, after the main opposition Labour Party said it would agree to the government’s request to send voters to the polls in December.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson is pushing for a Dec 12 election in hopes of breaking the Parliamentary stalemate that blocked his plan to take Britain out of the European Union this month. Earlier this week, the EU granted Britain a three-month Brexit extension until Jan. 31.

Johnson — who has had to abandon his vow to lead Britain out of the EU on Oct. 31 “do or die” — accused his opponents of wanting to prolong the Brexit process “until the 12th of never.”

He told lawmakers in Parliament on Tuesday there was no choice but “to go to the country to break free from this impasse.”

“There is only one way to get Brexit done in the face of this unrelenting parliamentary obstructionism, this endless, wilful, fingers crossed, ‘not me guv’ refusal to deliver on the mandate of the people — and that is to refresh this Parliament and give the people a choice,” Johnson said.

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For weeks, opposition parties have defeated Johnson’s attempts to trigger an election. But now that Brexit has been delayed, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said his opposition party would vote in favour of an early election because the prospect that Britain could crash out of the EU without a divorce deal had been taken off the table.

“I’ve said consistently, when no-deal is off the table we will back an election,” Corbyn said. “Today, after much denial and much bluster by the prime minister, that deal is officially off the table, so this country can vote for the government that it deserves.”

Labour’s shift means the U.K. is likely headed for its first December election since 1923. As it stands, Britain is not scheduled to hold a general election until 2022.

On Monday, Johnson proposed a Dec. 12 election under a different procedure that required a two-thirds majority in the House of Commons but lawmakers voted it down — Johnson’s third such defeat.

The House of Commons was scheduled to vote later Tuesday on a government bill calling for a Dec. 12 election. Unlike Monday’s vote, it only needs a simple majority to pass. Corbyn’s support means it’s likely to succeed, although opposition politicians could press the government to alter the date by a day or two.

The Liberal Democrats and Scottish National Party have proposed an earlier election date of Dec. 9 to reduce the possibility that Johnson could try to pass his EU divorce bill — which would allow Britain to leave the bloc and hand Johnson a major political achievement — before the campaign begins.

“It cannot be the 12th,” said Liberal Democrat lawmaker Chuka Ummuna, who suggested his party could accept a compromise date of Dec. 10 or 11.

“We will see what else they come forward with,” he said. “We have got to break the gridlock.”

A last-minute obstacle emerged when opposition parties announced plans to try to amend the terms of an early election to lower the voting age from 18 to 16 and expand the voting base to include citizens of the 27 other EU nations who are living in Britain.

It’s unclear whether those amendments will be put to a vote. But the government said if they were, and they passed, it might withdraw its bill altogether.

Johnson took office in July vowing to “get Brexit done” after his predecessor, Theresa May, resigned in defeat. But the Conservative leader, who said just weeks ago that he would “rather be dead in a ditch” than postpone the Oct. 31 Brexit date, was forced by Parliament to seek the extension in order to avoid a no-deal Brexit, which would damage the economies of both Britain and the EU.

Johnson plans to campaign as a leader who has a viable, strong Brexit plan for the country but who has been stymied by an anti-democratic opposition and a bureaucratic EU.

On Tuesday, he accused opponents of betraying voters’ decision to leave the EU. He declared that without an early election, the British government would be like the cartoon character Charlie Brown, “endlessly running up to kick the ball only to have Parliament whisk it away.”

An election is a risk, though, not only for Johnson’s Conservatives but also for Labour. Opinion polls currently give Johnson’s Conservatives a lead over Labour, but there’s a strong chance that an election could produce a Parliament as divided over Brexit as the current one. And the last time a Conservative government called an early election, in 2017, it backfired, and the party lost its majority in Parliament.

Voters are weary of politicians from all sides after more than three years of Brexit drama, and all the parties are worried about a backlash from grumpy voters asked to go to the polls at the darkest, coldest time of the year.

“We all know that a poll in December is less than ideal,” said Pete Wishart, a lawmaker with the opposition Scottish National Party. “But it is worth that risk in order that we remove this prime minister.”

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Follow AP’s full coverage of Brexit and British politics at https://www.apnews.com/Brexit

Danica Kirka And Jill Lawess, The Associated Press