UK PM seeks early election on June 8

It was totally unexpected, but what you've got to realise is that she came in as Prime Minister without a general election mandate and a small majority so you can look at it and say she's taking advantage of a weak opposition.

She said: "At this moment of enormous national significance".

He explains why an election is unnecessary and how it may accelerate the break-up of the Union - all while deepening divisions over Brexit.

May's Conservative party now has a parliamentary majority of 17. The United Kingdom is still a part of the European Union and the formal exit is predicted to take at least two years.

Charlie Flanagan said he raised the issue in a phone call with Northern Ireland Secretary of State James Brokenshire following the shock announcement that the United Kingdom would go to the polls on June 8.

The guidelines are due to be adopted by the European Council on April 29, paving the way for its chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier to begin formal negotiations with Britain at the end of May.

"The fact that May stated that she wants an election to ensure strong leadership that will deliver on Brexit may quell some related jitters in the short term", Otunuga added, while cautioning that "longer-term bears could exploit the potential political uncertainty to drag sterling lower". It also strengthens her hand with regard to Europe.

But May said Tuesday she had "reluctantly" changed her mind.

"We need a general election and we need one now", May said outside 10 Downing Street.

Britain joins a list of western European countries scheduled to hold elections this year. "They are wrong", May said yesterday.

Under Britain's Fixed-Term Parliaments Act, elections are held every five years, but the prime minister can call a snap election if two-thirds of lawmakers vote for it. Were the vote to install a Prime Minister who opposed Brexit, it is highly unlikely as a political matter, even if not technically permitted as a legal matter, that the European Union would object to the revocation of Article 50. He says he "welcomes the Prime Minister's decision to give the British people the chance to vote for a government that will put the interests of the majority first" - meaning Labour will back the PM's parliamentary motion to hold a general election. But even that basic framework - which spelled out that Britain would leave the EU's single market - caused divisions in her party and involved several rounds of deliberations before a coherent plan could be presented.

Polls give May's Conservatives a double-digit lead over Labour, which could have its worst election showing in decades.

A general election will nearly certainly change the parliamentary arithmetic but it is very hard to see how it will unite the country on a question on which it remains so fundamentally divided.

Beyond Brexit, May can also now respond to those who claim her domestic policy agenda (think grammar schools) lacks a mandate.

The main opposition Labour Party is still in a state of civil war under its leader Jeremy Corbyn who remains estranged from many of his own MPs.

The Scottish National Party will expect to hold most, if not all, of the 56 seats out of 59 that they took in 2015.

The British currency dropped ahead of May's surprise announcement, but it reversed course and entered positive territory as she spoke.