May says UK Cabinet backs Brexit deal amid wide opposition

British Prime Minister Theresa May said Wednesday that her Cabinet supported a draft agreement laying out the terms of Great Britain’s divorce from the European Union, setting the stage for a battle royale within her Conservative Party and the House of Commons.

“This is a decisive step which allows us to move on and finalize the deal in the days ahead,” said May, who spoke in front of 10 Downing Street following a five-hour Cabinet meeting. “I firmly believe, with my head and my heart that this is a decision which is in the best interests of the United Kingdom,” she added.

May referred to her Cabinet’s support as a “collective agreement,” but multiple reports indicated that at least 10 Cabinet ministers spoke against the deal. That’s a worrying indicator for May, who will likely require support from opposition Labour members of Parliament to win final approval of the agreement.

Pro-Brexit lawmakers in May’s Conservative Party say the agreement will leave Britain tethered to the EU after it departs and unable to forge an independent trade policy. In a warning to her opponents, May said the choice was between her deal, “or leave with no deal; or no Brexit at all.”

Former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who resigned earlier this year amid disagreements with May about Brexit strategy, told ITV News Wednesday that the draft agreement was “vassal state stuff.”

“We are going to be kept in a kind of economic and political captivity, unable to shape EU legislation and regulation, but having to accept it,” Johnson said. ” … I cannot see how, in a month of Sundays, that can be acceptable to anybody who campaigned for Brexit. I can’t see how it would be acceptable to anybody who believes in self-government for this country, let alone the Union between Great Britain and Northern Ireland.”

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