UK Parliament to break up ahead of election day with pomp, ceremony and hard-nosed politics

By JILL LAWLESS
Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s lawmakers will leave Parliament on Friday for the last time before an election is held in six weeks. Parliament will be prorogued, or formally suspended, in a ceremony featuring hat-doffing, lords in ermine-trimmed robes and commands in Norman French. Before that there will be a flurry of last-minute legislation. But Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s surprise decision to call a summer election means that some key pieces of legislation will have to be abandoned. They include his flagship plan to ban tobacco sales to future generations. The opposition Labour Party, meanwhile, got the news that former leader Jeremy Corbyn plans to run against Labour as an independent. Corbyn was suspended from the party over his reaction to antisemitism allegations.