British PM suffers another major defeat as parliament rejects early election

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson after voting in the British Parliament on whether to approve an early election or not on September 10. Photo: Reuters

According to the New York Times, September 9 was a day of failure for the new British Prime Minister. The vote by Parliament to reject Boris Johnson's request for an early election took place on the same day that a new law preventing Johnson from pursuing a "no-deal" Brexit plan officially came into effect.

This is also the second time in a week that British MPs have rejected Boris Johnson's request for an early election to break the current deadlock over Brexit.

The UK Parliament is currently suspended until mid-October (October 14th, to be specific) following a political delay initiated by Mr Johnson. The future of the Brexit process is now quite vague and uncertain.

However, by the end of Monday (September 9), it seemed clear that Mr Johnson would find it difficult to carry out his alleged intention of deliberately preventing parliament from intervening in the no-deal Brexit roadmap.

Thus, with parliament rejecting the request for an early election, the new British prime minister, who has pledged to take Britain out of the European Union with or without a deal, will be forced to seek a different strategy in steering the "Brexit ship".

Hours after the new law preventing a no-deal Brexit came into effect, Boris Johnson announced he would not ask for a further extension to Brexit, Reuters reported.

The news agency also said that it seemed that Mr. Johnson had lost control of the issue of taking Britain out of the EU. Because with the law that just came into effect on September 9, unless Mr. Boris Johnson reached an agreement, he would have to find more time to delay Brexit and could not directly take Britain out of the bloc as he had promised on October 31.

Meanwhile, EU leaders have repeatedly said they have not received any concrete proposals on Brexit ahead of the EU summit on October 17 and 18. This is also the time when Mr. Johnson expressed hope that a final agreement on Brexit could be reached.