Boris Johnson has thanked the first-time Tory voters who have handed him an “overwhelming mandate” to get Brexit done, and offered an olive branch to those who opposed him.
Speaking on the steps of Number 10 Downing Street, the modest official residence of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Johnson related that he had been formally invited to form a new government by Queen Elizabeth II, and pledged that he would lead a “people’s government”.
“I’m proud to say that members of our new One Nation government, a people’s government, will set out from constituencies which have never returned a Conservative MP for a a hundred years,” he said, in reference to his broadly centre-right, neoliberal party’s astonishing incursion into the Labour party’s working-class heartlands.
Johnson said that his “overwhelming mandate to get Brexit done” — he has won the biggest Conservative parliamentary majority since Margaret Thatcher’s last election in the 1980s — would provide a “moment of national resolution” in a country which has been mired in Brexit squabbling from almost the moment the people voted for it, in defiance of the political establishment.
“I want to speak directly to those who made it possible and to all those who voted for us for the first time, and all those whose pencils may have wavered over the ballot,” Johnson said, recognising that the gains which made his victory possible came in areas where few voters are natural Tories — indeed, where the Tories have been largely despised for generations.
“I say: thank you for the trust you’ve placed in us, and in me, and we will work round the clock to repay your trust and to deliver on your priorities with a parliament that works for you,” he pledged.
“[And] to those who did not vote for us, or for me, and who wanted and perhaps still want to remain in the EU… I want you to know that we in this One Nation Conservative government will never ignore your good and positive feelings of warmth and sympathy towards the other nations on Europe,” he added in a gesture of magnanimity.
“Because now is the moment, precisely as we leave the EU, to let those natural feelings find renewed expression in building a new partnership, which is one of the great projects for next year, and as we work together with the EU as friends and sovereign equals, tackling climate change and terrorism, in building academic and scientific co-operation… I frankly urge everyone one either side of [an] increasingly arid argument, I urge everyone to find closure and to let the healing begin,” he said.
“What is he going to do with his extraordinary majority?” Johnson thought new voters may ask after his victory.
“We are going to unite and level up… bringing together the whole of this incredible United Kingdom… taking us forward, unleashing the potential of the whole country,” he vowed.
“[A]fter five weeks, frankly, of electioneering, this country deserves a break from wrangling, a break from politics, and a permanent break from talking about Brexit,” the Prime Minister wrapped up.
“I want everyone to go about their Christmas preparations happy and secure in the knowledge that here in this people’s government the work is now being stepped up to make 2020 a year of prosperity and growth and hope, and to deliver a parliament that works for the people,” he said.
“Thank you all very much, and Happy Christmas”
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