Given the challenges of the Brexit negotiations, new agitation for independence in Scotland, anxiety about the Irish border and a Trump administration, Mr. Hague argued
that she and her government would be in a much stronger position “if they had a large and decisive majority in the Commons and a new full term ahead of them.”
An election “would catch the Labour Party in its worst condition since the early Thirties,
and with its least credible leader ever,” Mr. Hague wrote, referring to Jeremy Corbyn.
Mr. Hague pointed to the complexity of Brexit, saying
that “any deal is bound to be full of compromises which one group or another in Parliament finds difficult to stomach.” And “as British law needs to be amended countless times to take account of leaving the E. U.
treaties, the government could face many close votes, concessions or defeats as it tries to implement Brexit.”
And that perceived weakness, he judged, “will embolden the E. U.
negotiators, and makes an agreement that is good for the U. K. harder to achieve.”
Gordon Brown, when he took over as Labour Party prime minister from Tony Blair in 2007, hesitated
to call an early election to take advantage of his honeymoon popularity and win a fresh mandate.