UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has agreed to resign [Archive]

Teh One Who Knocks

07-07-2022, 09:55 AM

By Brie Stimson | Fox News

https://i.imgur.com/z8V0MK6l.jpg

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson plans to announce his resignation on Thursday.

A 10 Downing Street source confirmed to Fox News that Johnson is expected to announce his resignation by the afternoon London time.

Several people, including his two latest cabinet appointments, have called on him to step down amid ethics scandals and dozens of ministers in his government have resigned this week.

British Treasury chief Nadhim Zahawi - one of Johnson's closest allies - told him to resign on Thursday for the good of the country just two days after he was appointed by the prime minister.

"Prime Minister: this is not sustainable and it will only get worse: for you, for the Conservative Party and most importantly of all the country," Zahawi said in a letter to Johnson. "You must do the right thing and go now."

Education Secretary Michelle Donelan, who was also appointed on Tuesday following the resignation of her predecessor, announced her resignation Thursday morning.

Both were appointed to their brief positions after their predecessors resigned.

A group of Johnson’s most trusted Cabinet ministers visited him at his office in Downing Street Wednesday, telling him to stand down after losing the trust of his party. But Johnson instead opted to fight for his political career and fired one of the Cabinet officials, Michael Gove, British media reported.

Five cabinet ministers had quit by Thursday and more than 50 officials have left since the latest scandal broke. Johnson is accused of lying about not knowing about groping allegations against a man whom he appointed as a senior government minister.

"We are... past the point of no return. I cannot sacrifice my personal integrity to defend things as they stand now," Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis said in his resignation letter.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Teh One Who Knocks

07-07-2022, 04:04 PM

Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you. It is clearly now the will of the parliamentary Conservative party that there should be a new leader of that party and therefore a new prime minister. And I’ve agreed with Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of our backbench MPs, that the process of choosing that new leader should begin now and the timetable will be announced next week. I’ve today appointed a Cabinet to serve, as I will, until a new leader is in place.

So I want to say to the millions of people who voted for us in 2019, many of them voting conservative for the first time. Thank you for that incredible mandate. The biggest conservative majority since 1987, the biggest share of the vote since 1979. And the reason I have fought so hard in the last few days to continue to deliver that mandate in person was not just because I wanted to do so, but because I felt it was my job, my duty, my obligation to you to continue to do what we promised in 2019.

Of course, I’m immensely proud of the achievements of this government from getting Brexit done to settling our relations with the continent for over half a century, reclaiming the power for this country to make its own laws in Parliament. Getting us all through the pandemic. Delivering the fastest vaccine rollout in Europe, the fastest exit from lockdown. And in the last few months, leading the West in standing up to Putin’s aggression in Ukraine.

And let me say now to the people of Ukraine that I know that we in the UK will continue to back your fight for freedom for as long as it takes. And at the same time in this country we’ve been pushing forward a vast programme of investment in infrastructure and skills and technology, the biggest in a century. Because if I had one insight into human beings, it is the genius and talent and enthusiasm and imagination are evenly distributed throughout the population, but opportunity is not. That’s why we must keep levelling up, keep unleashing the potential of every part of the United Kingdom. And if we can do that in this country, we will be the most prosperous in Europe.

In the last few days, I’ve tried to persuade my colleagues that it would be eccentric to change governments when we’re delivering so much and when we have such a vast mandate and when we’re actually only a handful of points behind in the polls, even in mid-term, after quite a few months of pretty relentless sledging. And when the economic scene is so difficult domestically and internationally, and I regret not to have been successful in those arguments.

Of course, it’s painful not to be able to see through so many ideas and projects myself. But as we’ve seen at Westminster, the herd instinct is powerful. And when the herd moves, it moves. And my friends, in politics, no one is remotely indispensable, and our brilliant and Darwinian system will produce another leader equally committed to taking this country forward through tough times, not just helping families to get through it, but changing and improving the way we do things. Cutting burdens on businesses and families and yes, cutting taxes, because that is the way to generate the growth and the income we need to pay for great public services.

To that new leader, I say, whoever he or she may be, I say, I will give you as much support as I can. And to you, the British public. I know that there will be many people who are relieved and perhaps quite a few who will also be disappointed. And I want you to know how sad I am to be giving up the best job in the world. But them’s the breaks.

I want to thank Carrie and our children, and all the members of my family who have had to put up with so much for so long. I want to thank the peerless British civil service for all the help and support that you have given our police, our emergency services and of course are fantastic NHS who at critical moment helped to extend my own period in office as well as our armed services and our agencies that are so admired around the world and our indefatigable Conservative party members and supporters whose selfless campaigning makes our democracy possible. I want to thank the wonderful staff here at No. 10 and of course at Chequers and are fantastic protection force detectives. The one group, by the way, who never leak.

Above all, I want to thank you, the British public, for the immense privilege that you have given me. I want you to know that from now on, until the new Prime Minister is in place, your interests will be served. And the government of the country will be carried on. Being Prime Minister is an education in itself. I’ve travelled to every part of the United Kingdom, and in addition to the beauty of our natural world, I find so many people possessed of such boundless British originality and so willing to tackle old problems in new ways that I know that even if things can sometimes seem dark now, our future together is golden. Thank you all very much.