Last week’s UK general election gamble paid off for Boris Johnson. For the Conservatives it was the largest majority achieved in parliament since 1987 and for Labour, the worst performance since 1935. The Conservative party have redrawn the political map in England, erasing Labours traditional dominance in the Midlands and North of England. As in 2017 the UK polling company Survation proved to be the most accurate again, projecting an 11% lead for the Conservatives against an actual result of 11.5%.

From here Johnson has sounded that he will begin the process to push his withdrawal agreement bill through parliament as early as this coming Friday. The next big question will be the deadline imposed to complete a trade agreement with the European Union. At present the UK is due to leave the EU on January 31^st  2020 but stay in the EU customs union until December 31^st 2020, with a future trade agreement to be negotiated in this time. Johnson will seek to use legislation to prevent any extension past December 2020, effectively giving the UK and EU a year to complete an agreement. Due to this deadline, the risk of a no deal Brexit if a deal is not reached is seen by many to be back on the table.

As the election results were announced Sterling surged against the US dollar hitting $1.35 but most of these gains have been wiped out with levels returning to $1.31. This is mainly seen as down to the uncertainty ahead on how the UK and EU will fare in achieving a trade deal by the end of 2020.

With such a large majority and many of the pro European MPs now gone from the Conservative ranks, Johnson has a much stronger negotiating position with the EU, who will want to avoid a hard Brexit. Some commentators have pointed out that it took Canada a decade to achieve a trade deal with the EU but the UK is in a very different situation as it is already a member and effectively working in reverse.

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