May promises £1.6bn fund for regions ahead of Brexit vote

British Prime Minister Theresa May has unveiled plans to boost UK regions with £1.6bn of funding in what some MPs have labelled a “bribe” to win support for her Brexit deal.

The spending is being designated over seven year, the housing and communities secretary, James Brokenshire, later said. Earlier reports had suggested it would be over four years.

The plan, named the Stronger Towns Fund, will focus £1bn of spending on poorer cities in England, with over half going to towns across the north of the country, plus an additional £600m available for communities to bid for.

The distribution has been allocated as follows:

• North-west England: £281m
• North-east England: £105m
• Yorkshire and the Humber: £197m
• West Midlands: £212m
• East Midlands: £110m
• South-west England: £33m
• South-east England: £37m
• East England: £25m

“Communities across the country voted for Brexit as an expression of their desire to see change; that must be a change for the better, with more opportunity and greater control,” May said in a statement on Monday.

“These towns have a glorious heritage, huge potential and, with the right help, a bright future ahead of them,” she added.

Labour’s shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, labelled the plan “Brexit bribery” and other Labour MPs said it would not buy their support.

“This towns fund smacks of desperation from a government reduced to bribing Members of Parliament to vote for their damaging flagship Brexit legislation,” McDonnell said in a statement.

The £1bn in allocated funds is the same amount May agreed to provide over five years to Northern Ireland as part of the confidence-and-supply deal struck with the DUP in 2017.

Critics also said that the money would not boost towns only make up for what was lost as a result of government spending cuts in recent years as part of the government's harsh austerity programme.

Britain is due to leave the bloc at the end of the month but May’s deal with the EU still has to be approved by the British parliament in a second meaningful vote on 12 March.

In January, MPs rejected the withdrawal deal she has reached with the EU by 230 votes, the biggest defeat for a sitting government ever.

On the meaningful vote, McDonnell also said the Labour party would whip its MPs to back a second referendum as he believes the party would never be forgiven if it allowed Brexit to harm people’s jobs and wellbeing and the country’s economy in general.

On the other hand, those MPs seeking a harder Brexit could back the PM after she conceded to have a vote on a possible delay of Brexit if the deal was not passed by 29 March. This means they could be forced into taking whatever divorce terms are offered or risk no Brexit at all.

LITTLE BREXIT PROGRESS

In other news on Monday, May's attorney general, Geoffrey Cox, moved onto a new line of attack having abandoned the government's plan to get the EU to agree a firm end date to the Irish backstop or unilateral exit mechanism, the Telegraph reported. This had been a key demand of the Tory party's eurosceptics.

Cox was said to have redirected his focus on securing an enhanced “arbitration mechanism” that allows either side to call for a formal end to the backstop.

The government is aiming to negotiate a softening in the EU's position for Cox to be able to tell MPs that “on the balance of probability” the backstop is not indefinite.

Some members of the cabinet told the Telegraph they are not optimistic about winning the second meaningful vote as changes secured by Cox are not felt likely to win round hard-Brexit supporters in the party.

Brexit analysis by the Eurasia Group suggested May might need to go further to persuade more Eurosceptics to back her deal, such as by promising to stand down this summer, but felt it is more likely than not that May's deal will be successful in parliament next week.

"Some ministers privately think May only has a slim chance of winning through this month, but might have a stronger one in June if she can frame the choice as one between her deal and no deal (in a way she cannot now do this month). All the same, Labour MP Yvette Cooper’s bill blocking no deal would be revived. So May’s ability to play the no-deal card MPs might depend on whether EU would grant a second extension," Eurasia's Mujtaba Rahman wrote.