LONDON (Reuters) – Theresa May became Britain’s prime minister on Wednesday with the task of leading it out of the European Union, and quickly named leading ‘Brexit’ supporters including former London mayor Boris Johnson to key positions in her new government.

The former Conservative interior minister, 59, said after being appointed by Queen Elizabeth that she would champion social justice and carve out a bright new future for Britain after last month’s shock referendum vote to quit the EU.

“We will rise to the challenge. As we leave the European Union we will forge a bold new positive role for ourselves in the world, and we will make Britain a country that works not for a privileged few, but for every one of us,” she said outside 10 Downing Street, vacated hours earlier by David Cameron.

Cameron stepped down after Britons rejected his entreaties to stay in the EU, a decision that has set back European efforts to forge greater unity and created huge uncertainty in Britain and across the 28-nation bloc.

May faced immediate pressure from EU leaders to serve  formal notice of Britain’s withdrawal and set the clock ticking on a two-year countdown to its final departure.

In phone calls with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande, May said she needed time.

“On all the phone calls, the prime minister emphasized her commitment to delivering the will of the British people to leave the European Union,” a spokeswoman for May said.

“The prime minister explained that we would need some time to prepare for these negotiations and spoke of her hope that these could be conducted in a constructive and positive spirit.”

Just over an hour after entering her new office, she started  naming ministers, appointing the steady and experienced foreign minister Philip Hammond to take charge of the finance ministry. He replaces George Osborne, whose determination to balance Britain’s books made him synonymous with austerity.

In a major surprise, May named Johnson, a leading eurosceptic who had until recently been seen as her main rival for the prime minister’s job, to take over as foreign secretary.

Other prominent ‘Leave’ campaigners were also rewarded. One, David Davis, took the key role of Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union. Another, Liam Fox, was named to head a new international trade department.

May herself had sided with Cameron in trying to keep Britain inside the EU, so needed to reach out to the winning Leave side in order to heal divisions in the ruling party and show her commitment to respecting the popular vote. “Brexit means Brexit” has quickly become her new mantra.

By awarding such a senior job to Johnson, she also showed a conciliatory side. The two had clashed over policing in London while Johnson was serving as mayor. And since last month’s vote, for which he campaigned vigorously, Johnson had suffered widespread criticism and ridicule for failing to present a clear Brexit plan and swiftly dropping out of the leadership race.

With his unkempt blonde hair, bumbling humor and penchant for Latin quotations, the man known to Britons simply as ‘Boris’ will be the government’s most colorful figure, but a controversial choice for conducting sensitive diplomacy with world leaders.

Asked by a reporter whether he would apologize to U.S. President Barack Obama for controversially saying the “part-Kenyan” president was biased against Britain because of “an ancestral dislike of the British empire”, Johnson said: “The United States of America will be in the front of the queue.”

The quip was a reference to a comment by Obama during Britain’s EU referendum campaign that the country would be at the back of the queue for trade deals if it voted to leave the bloc.

Among other appointments, rising star Amber Rudd switched from the energy ministry to take May’s old job as Home Secretary.

‘BURNING INJUSTICE’

May is Queen Elizabeth’s 13th prime minister in a line that started with Winston Churchill. An official photograph showed her curtseying to the smiling monarch.

She is also Britain’s second female head of government after Margaret Thatcher.

Seen as a tough, competent and intensely private person, already being compared to Germany’s Angela Merkel, she must now try to limit the damage to British trade and investment as she renegotiates the country’s ties with its 27 EU partners. She will also attempt to unite a fractured nation in which many, on the evidence of the referendum, feel angry with the political elite and left behind by the forces of globalization.

In comments addressed to ordinary Britons, she spoke of the ‘burning injustice’ suffered by large sections of society: poor people facing shorter life expectancy; blacks treated more harshly by the criminal justice system; women earning less than men; the mentally ill; and young people struggling to buy homes.

Acknowledging the struggles faced by many, May declared: “The government I lead will be driven not by the interests of the privileged few, but by yours. We will do everything we can to give you more control over your lives.”

She spoke of the “precious bond” between the nations of the United Kingdom, implicit recognition of the tensions generated by the referendum in which England and Wales chose to quit the EU, but Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to stay, raising the possibility of a new Scottish vote on independence.

Outside Downing Street, a group of demonstrators chanted: ‘What do we want? Brexit! When do we want it? Now!’

The United States congratulated May and said it was confident in her ability to steer Britain through the Brexit negotiations.

“Based on the public comments we’ve seen from the incoming prime minister, she intends to pursue a course that’s consistent with the prescription that President Obama has offered,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

May’s predecessor Cameron, appearing earlier in Downing Street with his wife Samantha and their three children, delivered his parting remarks to the nation after six years dominated by the Europe question and the aftermath of the global financial crisis.

“It’s not been an easy journey and of course we’ve not got every decision right,” he said, “but I do believe that today our country is much stronger.”

In his last parliamentary session as leader, Cameron took the opportunity to trumpet his government’s achievements in generating one of the fastest growth rates among western economies, chopping the budget deficit, creating 2.5 million jobs and legalizing gay marriage.

Yet his legacy will be overshadowed by his failed referendum gamble, which he had hoped would keep Britain at the heart of a reformed EU.

(Additional reporting by Kate Holton, Estelle Shirbon, William Schomberg, Karin Strohecker, Michael Holden, Paul Sandle, Andy Bruce, Steve Addison and Ana Nicolaci da Costa; Editing by Mark Trevelyan, Philippa Fletcher, James Dalgleish and Guy Faulconbridge)

The post Britain’s new PM May gives Johnson big job, says needs time before Brexit talks appeared first on Ubiq TV | English News Channel.

LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister David Cameron published his tax records on Sunday in an attempt to draw a line under questions about his personal finances raised by the mention of his late father in the Panama Papers for setting up an offshore fund.

The revelations have led to demands for Cameron’s resignation and handed ammunition to opposition lawmakers who questioned why he was reluctant to detail his financial connections with his father.

Cameron took the unorthodox step of releasing the normally confidential details after saying he should have handled the scrutiny of his family’s tax affairs better.

The documents from RNS Chartered Accountants – which cover six years – show Cameron paid tax of 75,898 pounds ($107,198) on income of 200,307 pounds in the 2014-2015 financial year, the most recent one included.

His income comprised his 140,522 pound salary, taxable expenses of 9,834 pounds, 46,899 pounds from half of the share of rent from his family home in London and 3,052 pounds in interest on savings, according to the record.

Scores of politicians and business figures have been implicated in the Panama Papers, including the prime minister of Iceland who has since stepped down. The 11.5 million documents leaked from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca detail the creation of more than 200,000 companies in offshore tax havens.

While Cameron is not accused of doing anything illegal, he made four different statements over four days about his late father’s inclusion in the documents.

He said on Thursday he once had a stake in his father’s offshore trust and had profited from it.

He said the unit investment trust was not set up to avoid tax but to invest in dollar-denominated shares and that he had paid all taxes due on his own investment, which was worth “something like 30,000 pounds” when he sold out in January 2010, before he became prime minister.

TAX TASKFORCE

Cameron’s admission of fault comes after a torrid period for his Conservative government. It is divided over a June 23 referendum on whether to remain in the European Union, has been forced to backtrack on welfare cuts and has been accused of not protecting Britain’s steel industry.

Seeking to further take back the initiative, Cameron also announced on Sunday a new taskforce, jointly led by Britain’s tax authority and National Crime Agency, to build on the work Britain has done to tackle money laundering and tax evasion.

When Britain hosted a G8 summit in 2013, Cameron put tackling tax avoidance at the heart of the agenda. Some of Britain’s former colonies increasingly rely on revenues from shell companies and trusts that often hide wealth.

“The UK has been at the forefront of international action to tackle the global scourge of aggressive tax avoidance and evasion, and international corruption more broadly,” Cameron said in a statement.

“There is clearly further to go and this taskforce will bring the best of British expertise to deal with any wrongdoing relating to the Panama Papers.”

The government said it had tracked down 2 billion pounds  ($2.82 billion) from offshore tax dodgers since 2010, and authorities were already investigating 700 current leads with links to Panama.

The taskforce will receive 10 million pounds of funding to start work, the government said.

 (Reporting by Paul Sandle; Editing by Alison Williams)

The post PM Cameron releases tax records after ‘Panama Papers’ storm appeared first on Ubiq TV | English News Channel.