Prime Minister Boris Johnson will suspend the UK parliament more than a month before Brexit, raging opponents and increasing the stakes in decades of the most severe political crisis in the country.
Johnson, cheered on by U.S. President Donald Trump, initiated his boldest step to withdraw the nation from the European Union by October 31 with or without a divorce agreement by setting a fresh deadline for the opening of a parliamentary state.
The official event, known as the Queen’s Speech, will take place on October 14 and be preceded by a House of Commons suspension, meaning that Parliament will not sit between mid-September and mid-October.
The move, which Queen Elizabeth had to approve, limits the time that opponents have to derail a disorderly Brexit, but also increases the likelihood that Johnson might face a vote of no confidence in his government and potentially an election.
It also risks dragging the politically neutral, 93-year-old queen into the controversy. Johnson’s scheme so incensed were opposition party leaders that several wrote to the monarch requesting a meeting to convey their concern.
The queen acts on the advice of her prime minister. Her office refused to make a comment. Her speech at the opening of the parliament is written by the government, outlining its legislative plans.
“There will be ample time in parliament for MPs (members of parliament) to debate the EU, to debate Brexit and all the other issues, ample time,” Johnson told reporters.
When asked if he was attempting to prevent parliamentarians from delaying Britain’s exit from the EU, he answered: “That is completely untrue.”
While suspending parliament ahead of a Queen’s speech is the historic standard in Britain, the decision to restrict parliamentary scrutiny weeks before decades into the country’s most controversial policy choice spurred an instant outcry.
“Make no mistake, this is a very British coup,” John McDonnell, the Labor Party’s second most strong person, said. An internet petition to object was signed by more than half a million individuals, and the pound dropped significantly.
Cries of “Shame on You” and “Stop the Coup” from the walls of the parliamentary estate it could be heard that a few hundred demonstrators gathered near the banks of the Thames River to wave EU flags and demonstrate their disgust.
“Democracy is so important. It’s taught from such a young age as such a vital thing about being a British person and today just completely ruins that, tramples it and throws it out,” said 17-year-old student Dylan Butlin, one of the protesters.
In a sign that the move by Johnson marked a major escalation in the long-running conflict, a group of cross-party lawmakers requested a legal injunction and the parliament speaker said the democratic process of the nation was at stake.
The Church of England said that a chaotic Brexit would hurt the poor and further harm the broken nation.
But Brexiteers, including Trump, an early supporter of Britain’s exit from the EU, welcomed Johnson’s gamble. According to him, “Boris is exactly what the U.K. has been looking for, and will prove to be ‘a great one!’ Love U.K.”
When questioned about the British parliamentary suspension, a spokeswoman for the European Commission said it was a matter for Britain to reply.
More than three years after the United Kingdom voted 52 to 48 percent to leave the European Union, it remains uncertain how the second biggest economy of the bloc will leave the club it entered in 1973.
With just 65 days to the day of departure, parliamentarians are struggling to avoid the prime minister from guiding the nation out of the EU without a transition agreement, pitching one of the most stable nations in Europe into uncharted land.
The representatives of the opposition parties in Britain decided on Tuesday to try to use parliamentary procedure to force Johnson to ask Brussels for a delay to Brexit beyond Oct. 31. Now they might attempt to get him down.
Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn said when the time was due, he would call a vote of no confidence.
With Johnson keeping only one seat operating majority in the 650-seat legislature, his party members who oppose a no-deal Brexit will have to decide where their loyalties lie.
In the conditions, pro-EU Conservative Party lawmaker Dominic Grieve said he would find it hard to “keep confidence in the government,” while former finance minister Philip Hammond said pro-EU leaders required to intervene now.
Media reports said Ruth Davidson, who led a revival for the Conservatives in Scotland, had chosen to leave in a sign of the pressure building across the political system.
Reporters said her resignation was not triggered by the suspension, anticipated to be announced on Thursday, but had come for several months because of family pressures and disagreements with Johnson’s strategy. She sits in Edinburgh’s Scottish Parliament, not Westminster.
As investors took the news as a sign that a no-deal Brexit was more probable, Sterling dropped significantly, losing about a cent against the U.S. dollar and the euro.
However, Johnson asserted that the move was intended to enable his government to continue its national agenda.
He says he intends to agree with Brussels on a divorce agreement, but he needs the bloc first to modify his position on a main sticking point around neighboring Ireland. A leading campaigner in the 2016 Brexit referendum, he also said that Britain had to leave the EU in order to preserve the faith of the nation in politics.
Dean Turner, an economist at UBS Wealth Management, said their basic situation continued that on October 31 a no-deal Brexit would not take place and that an election would follow.
“It forces the hand (of Johnson’s opponents), compelling them to act sooner and more decisively if they wish to do so,” he said.
Parliament returns from its summer break on Sept. 3 before typically splitting up two weeks later to allow its annual conferences to be held by political parties. Returning on October 14 would leave for just over two weeks until Britain leaves the EU on October 31.
Those lawmakers who oppose a no-deal Brexit are likely to have to move next week to prevent running out of time.