The landslide victory of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister Boris Johnson in the snap parliament election in the UK was widely anticipated. But still, there are at least two surprises. First, it wasn't a simple but triumphal electoral victory. The Conservative Party and Boris Johnson got a huge majority in the new parliament, much more than enough for "Get the Brexit done", as Boris Johnson's side touted in their campaign slogan. For the first time in many decades, this party won the parliamentary election with such a vast difference to other political parties. And second, it wasn't a simple but catastrophic disaster for the Labor Party. Since 1935, this party has never been defeated as heavily and painfully as this time. The political landscape in the UK has profoundly changed.
| UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson |
The game aiming at clinging to power is over for Boris Johnson, with the final result putting him in such a powerful position to govern and lead this country at his will, and of course, to get the Brexit done first of all. Therefore, the game is over for Brexit, too. Boris Johnson will certainly get the UK out of the EU at the latest on January 31 next year. The election results have made Brexit irreversible. There is no possibility any more for the UK to remain in the EU, at least for now. For the EU, the game with the UK to keep this isle kingdom within the bloc is over, too.
The Conservative Party and Boris Johnson owe this victory to the growing impatience and disappointment of British voters over the way the political class has been dealing with Brexit since 2016. They wanted to get the Brexit done quickly and definitely and didn't care much any more about which kind of Brexit. With "Get Brexit done," Boris Johnson chose his very proper electoral slogan. He won because he was more convincing than his political rival Jeremy Corbyn of the Labor Party to the British voters in his argument on Brexit. He won not because his was the best choice for British voters but because he was the lesser of the two evils. For British voters, the game related to Brexit is now over.
But for the UK as a whole, the game is not over yet. After officially having left the EU, it will have only 9 months to finalize its new comprehensive arrangements with the EU. Only after reaching them, everybody can know it is a hard or a soft Brexit. And for the UK at the same time, another game begins with paying the real prices for Brexit, facing its consequences and impacts and with Scotland and North Ireland's pushing again to depart from the UK.
