British PM May fights plotters as Johnson declares Brexit red lines

Bloomberg

UK Prime Minister Theresa May needs to boost her appeal and win over young voters at her party’s annual conference next week in a push to revitalise her flagging premiership after a disastrous election in June. May is trying to persuade critics inside her Conservative Party to let her stay on as leader, as her allies fear she faces plots from supporters of cabinet rivals including Brexit Secretary David Davis and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who on the eve of the big event delivered new warnings about Brexit.
As she heads to Manchester this weekend, May knows that she has ground to make up after her gamble on an early vote cost the Conservatives their majority in Parliament and put Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn within striking distance of power.
In a sign of the seriousness with which she is treating the Labour threat, May will directly challenge Corbyn’s plans and seek to win over younger voters who overwhelmingly backed the radical socialist at June’s election. Labour is “simply not fit to govern” and will hit working people with “higher taxes and fewer jobs,” she said.
“I understand the concerns raised, particularly by young people, during what was a disappointing election for my party,” the prime minister said in comments released by her office on Saturday.
“The social contract in our country is that the next generation should always have it better than the last. Conservatives have a plan to make that a reality.”
The Conservative Party’s annual conference comes against a backdrop of recriminations over May’s failed election gamble and divisions within her cabinet over Brexit policy. Tory lawmakers and ministers privately warned in the aftermath of the June vote that May would not be allowed to lead the party into the next election in 2022. She has since insisted she will stay on and has begun to fight to keep her job.
Johnson delivered his latest surprise on the eve of the conference, warning in a Sun interview that he had four “red lines” for May on Brexit. The transition should be two years and “not a second more,” the U.K. should stop accepting new EU rules or court decisions during the transition and stop paying for access to the single market after the period ends, he said in the interview.
At weekends and during the recess, May has launched what’s becoming known as her Chequers charm offensive—inviting Tories to her 400-year-old official country residence 64 kilometres outside London for canapes, sparkling wine and home-made chocolates.
The prime minister has her work cut out. Tories remain angry about the organisational failures that led to the election, while an undercurrent of squabbling at the highest levels is hampering the business of government. One cabinet aide, speaking on condition of anonymity because the subject is sensitive, likens the party to ferrets fighting in a sack, and compares the mood to the dying days of former Tory Prime Minister John Major’s administration, when rows over Europe dominated the agenda.

Battle to host London-based EU agencies after Brexit
Bloomberg

The contest among more than 20 European Union cities to host the bloc’s drugs regulator and banking authority, which are being forced from London by Brexit, heated up on Saturday with an official assessment of the bids.
The evaluation of applications by 19 cities ranging from Stockholm to Bucharest seeking to lure the European Medicines Agency and of eight offers for the European Banking Authority (EBA) sets the stage for deliberations by EU governments in October and a final decision in November. The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, published the assessment based on criteria including accessibility, availability of schools and healthcare for staff families, and an assurance of operational readiness when Britain leaves in March 2019. The commission stopped short of a ranking, leaving more scope for political bargaining by the UK’s 27 EU partners.
“The assessment is fully based on the information sent by the member states,” the Brussels-based commission said in a statement on its website. “The agencies have also been consulted in the process.”
Besides Dublin, Paris and Frankfurt, the bidders for EBA include Brussels, Prague, Luxembourg, Vienna and Warsaw.