Addressing the nation from Downing Street for the first time as PM, Mrs May stressed that the full name of the Tory party included the word “unionist” and she meant to try to keep the country together after a clear majority of voters in Scotland and Northern Ireland rejected withdrawal from the European Union in the referendum.
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The decision to name Johnson, the eccentric former mayor of London, to the high-profile post of foreign secretary is likely to cause controversy.
May swept to her party’s leadership, when her final opponent, the pro-Brexit Andrea Leadsom, dropped out this week after making controversial comments about motherhood.
The new Prime Minister praised her predecessor for leading the economy out of crisis, but said her quest against inequality was a continuation of his mission, saying his “true legacy is not about the economy but social justice”.
Theresa May is officially the Prime Minister of Britain, according to Buckingham Palace.
‘Under David’s leadership the Government stabilised the economy, reduced the budget deficit and helped more people into work than ever before.
Mr Key, in Rome after meeting with Italian PM Matteo Renzi, congratulated the long-serving home secretary on her elevation and said he hoped to speak to her in the coming days.
He said he wanted to end speculation that “somehow I don’t love Larry”.
After presenting herself as the unity candidate, the incoming leader is expected to offer plum posts to leading figures from both camps in the European Union referendum.
Well she certainly has done that, wasting no time in announcing the most senior jobs in her cabinet, the first appointment only an hour or so after she walked in.
“I think around the cabinet table yesterday the feeling was that we have our Angela Merkel”, said Jeremy Hunt, health secretary in Cameron’s team which met for the last time on Tuesday.
May, who had supported Britain’s continued European Union membership, moved quickly to heal divisions sparked by the referendum by appointing leading “Leave” campaigner Johnson to a senior cabinet post.
Cameron bid farewell to 10 Downing Street and headed to Buckingham Palace to offer his resignation to Queen Elizabeth II on Wednesday afternoon. But Tony Travers of the London School of Economics said May would likely not rush to trigger Article 50 of the European Union constitution, which starts a two-year countdown to a final exit.
“David Cameron has led a one-nation government, and it is in that spirit that I also plan to lead”, she said.
Removal vans were seen on Tuesday as Mr Cameron, wife Samantha and children Nancy, Arthur and Florence, packed up at their home since 2010 and prepared to return to a life outside the gates to Downing Street.
On her first full day in office, May dismantled Cameron’s affluent metropolitan clique, dubbed the “Notting Hill set” after the former prime minister’s trendy West London neighborhood.
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“The number one challenge is to stabilize the economy, send signals of confidence about the future, the plans we have for the future, to the markets, to businesses, to global investors”, Hammond told Sky News.
