Oral d’anglais Theresa May

Following the resignation of David Cameron, Theresa May became Britain's first female Prime Minister since Margaret Thatcher. Her mission was clear : to lead the country out of the European Union after its historic Brexit referendum, which was held in June 2016. But the fact is that she failed. Indeed, During her mandate from July 2016 to July 2019, Theresa May has not succeed in getting the United Kingdom to definitively leave the EU.

So during this présentation we will ask to ouserveles how to explain the failure of Theresa May government in managing the country during the Brexit process.

The answer to this problem is divided in 3 parts. First, I will explain the context of her arrival to power. Then i will focus on the reasons of her failure and finaly on the consequences of her mistakes.

1. Context

So, to beggin with the first part When Theresa May came to power in July 2016, she was not in a comfortable seat.

Indeed, On 23 june 2016, 51.9% of British people voted to leave the European Union. No one expected this result, including the prime minister himself david cameron. That’s why he resigned. Theresa May, his former home secretary , succeeded him. While she was in favor of keeping her country in the Union during the referendum campaign, she received the challenge to negotiate its departure. In other words, She, who did not support “Leave” during the referendum, must make it realistic.

1. Reasons.

Now, We will identify her most significant strategic mistakes

The first was to act at the start as if the only people who mattered were the 52% of british who backed Brexit. She did’nt take into account that the probrexit won by a narrow majority. She kept saying that brexit is the will of democracy and that she is only applying this will

Where she might have attempted to bind together a fractured nation, her language and approaches have further polarised the country and radicalised opinion on both sides.

Secondly, She triggered Article 50 of the lisbon treaty without making any plan explained. By the way Article 50 is the plan for any country that wishes to exit the EU.  she hadn’t a clear and direct approach towards the Brexit as she appeared to have mixed views on the issue  and supported the “soft exit”

Thirdly, Her decision to call an early general élection in june 2017 is described as the biggest error TheresaMay has done during her premiership. The Conservatives had a comfortable lead in the surveys and electoral success would have allowed Theresa May to give more power to her approach to Brexit. However, after a difficult campaign general election resulted in the loss of her Conservative Party's Parliamentary majority. Thats why she had to form an alliance with the Northern Irish party DUP democratic unionist party which strongly weakened Theresa May's power in Parliament because all of her decisions were influenced by this alliance.

Her last mistake has been the conduct of the endgame. Once it was very apparent her withdrawal agreement was neither popular in parliament nor attractive to the public, she

persisted. Her obstinacy to compromise has led her government to downfall. Durable leaders are successful because they also understand when it is necessary to flex. The rigidity of her personality has been a key component of her failures.

1. Conséquences of her mistakes

To contextualize, in november 2018 Theresa May reached a treaty with the European Union. However, the agreement did’nt satisfy her camp. In fact, several members of her cabinet resigned and neither the Hard Brexiters nor the Irish Unionists supported her. Indeed, from January to March 2019, the British Parliament refused three times to ratify the negotiated agreement of november.

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