UK votes for Boris Johnson's Brexit narrative

UK votes for Boris Johnsons Brexit narrative
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Highlights

The United Kingdom has decided firmly this time to do its 'Brexit' at the call of Boris Johnson. His re-election with a landslide victory which wiped...

The United Kingdom has decided firmly this time to do its 'Brexit' at the call of Boris Johnson. His re-election with a landslide victory which wiped out Labour strongholds across the country is remarkable. It is significant because Boris Johnson has placed 'Brexit' at the top of the agenda during his electioneering.

The majority trusted in his wisdom and voted to re-elect him wiping out Labour strongholds across the country, it seems. Speaking after he was re-elected in Uxbridge, West London, with a slightly higher majority, Johnson said: "It does look as though this One-Nation Conservative government has been given a powerful new mandate to get Brexit done."

Speaking at his election count in Islington North, where he was re-elected with a reduced majority, Corbyn said Labour had put forward a "manifesto of hope" but "Brexit has so polarised debate it has overridden so much of normal political debate". Labour Party stares at one of the worst election results now since World War II.

Some traditional Labour constituencies, such as Darlington, Sedgefield and Workington, in the north of England, will have a Conservative MP for the first time in decades - or in the case of Bishop Auckland and Blyth Valley - for the first time since the seat was created.

A row has already broken out at the top of the Labour Party, with some candidates blaming Jeremy Corbyn's unpopularity on the doorstep and others blaming the party's policy of holding another Brexit referendum. In Scotland, the picture is quite different.

The Scottish National Party (SNP) has come close to sweeping the board - gaining seats from all their rivals. SNP leader and Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said it had been an "exceptional night" for her party. She said Scotland had sent a "very clear message" that it did not want a Boris Johnson Conservative government and the Prime Minister did not have a mandate to take Scotland out of the European Union.

With the Conservatives securing an outright majority in Westminster, the SNP is unlikely to play a major role in deciding the fate of Brexit now. The only reason his party had selected Boris Johnson as Prime Minister this year was that he was capable of winning any future election.

The results might have surprised even the staunchest Boris believers. When he first took over as leader of the Conservative Party this summer, the consensus was that a gridlocked Parliament made an election inevitable.

Many believed that it would return another hung Parliament, and that the only way to break the Brexit deadlock was to hold a second referendum. That, it now seems, won't be necessary. Boris Johnson has taken care of that. Johnson has defied the odds ever since becoming the Prime Minister. He was told he couldn't get a new Brexit deal. He did.

He was told Parliament would block his attempts to hold a general election. It eventually didn't. And he was told that betting the house on "Getting Brexit Done" would divide the nation further. It hasn't. Bold narratives of leaders are winning elections everywhere.

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