Sign up here to receive the daily news briefing in your inbox every morning with exclusive insight from the BrexitCentral team Polling stations open for the ‘Brexit election’ Some voters reported queues of people ready to vote this morning as Theresa May issued an eve-of-poll rallying call last night to ‘reignite the British spirit’. She called on Labour supporters to back the Tories in the national interest and for the country to get behind her over Brexit.Pledging a nation built on fairness and security, the Prime Minister said she would use the opportunity of leaving the EU to create the greatest meritocracy in the world. – Daily Mail Theresa May’s final election plea for votes to deliver Brexit Theresa May today warns that Jeremy Corbyn would ‘sell out’ Britain in Brexit talks as she warns him becoming PM would cause ‘unthinkable’ harm to the country. The impassioned eve-of-election appeal, comes with polls still showing the race is nail-bitingly close. Some surveys have shown the Conservatives just one point ahead of Labour – not enough for an overall majority. The Tory leader sets out her positive vision for a ‘strong, fairer more prosperous’ Britain outside the Brussels club. – Daily Mail In the final hours of campaigning, both leaders returned to their core campaign messages. “If we get Brexit right, we can build a Britain that is more prosperous and more secure, a Britain in which prosperity and opportunity is shared by all,” May said in a last appeal to voters to trust her to “knuckle down and get the job done”… Basing her campaign on the slogan of “strong and stable leadership”, she has said she alone could face the 27 other EU leaders and clinch a deal that would give Britain control over immigration policy while ensuring favourable trading terms. – Reuters On eve of election, May tries to put focus back on Brexit – Reuters Poll claims 9/10 voters reject idea election is about Brexit- Independent Chatham House Says Brexit Hasn’t Featured as Debate Topic – Bloomberg Theresa May tells ‘patriotic’ Labour voters: back me, your country needs you Theresa May today urges “patriotic” Labour supporters to abandon the party and vote Conservative for the sake of the nation’s future as she says: “Your country needs you.” Writing in today’s Daily Telegraph, the Prime Minister asks voters to remember “in the privacy of the polling booth” that they must choose a leader with “the ability to knuckle down and get the job done” on Brexit. She says the prospect of Jeremy Corbyn in Number 10 is “unthinkable” because: “Rarely can a candidate for high office have been so singularly ill-equipped for the task.” Brexit vote ‘burst the dam’ of loyalty for lifelong Labour voters, says Green – Guardian Together we can build a stronger Britain – Theresa May for The Telegraph (£) Theresa May appeals to ‘patriotic’ Labour voters in last-ditch dash – Guardian Jeremy Corbyn most tweeted-about leader on campaign trail, analysis reveals – PA May plans post-election offer on citizens’ rights Theresa May has ordered up a Brexit olive branch. The British prime minister has asked her country’s civil servants to prepare a “big, generous offer” on European citizens’ rights, ready to be presented shortly after the general election (assuming she wins). The move, according to senior Whitehall aides familiar with the plan, reflects a desire to get Brexit negotiations off to a good start and reset relations following a six-week election campaign in which May has used the EU as a convenient punching bag — saying she would “not let the bureaucrats of Brussels run over us.” “We have been asked to prepare a big offer for the week following the election,” one government official said. – Politico UKIP leader Paul Nuttall claims: I’ll fight for ‘real Brexit’ UKIP leader Paul Nuttall has focused his final pitch for votes on fighting for what he calls “real Brexit”. Campaigning in the East of England, he said his party was committed to lowering immigration and ensuring the UK does not pay an EU “divorce bill”. But he denied UKIP was a single-issue party, saying it wanted to slash foreign aid and instead invest more money in the NHS. He predicted there would be “a number of places” where UKIP will win seats. He told the BBC: “If you want to go out and ensure you vote for a party that wants real Brexit, I mean a Brexit whereby we reduce immigration, where we don’t pay a divorce bill… don’t vote Tory – vote for the real deal, which is UKIP. “We’ll tell it how it is and we’ve still got to be the guard dogs of Brexit.” – BBC Nicola Sturgeon says ‘difficult’ Theresa May will struggle in Brexit talks Nicola Sturgeon has claimed Theresa May’s “difficult” character will lead her to struggle in Brexit negotiations. Scotland’s first minister said the Prime Minister was a “very difficult person to establish rapport with” but that she didn’t know her well enough to know “whether I like her or not.” The SNP leader also claimed Ms May sounded like she was “reading from a script” in one-on-one conversations with her, a frustration she claimed the public was now starting to witness in Ms May’s communications. “You literally go into a one-to-one with her and it’s like she’s reading from a script than having a conversation,” she told The Guardian. – Independent Eric Pickles reveals Theresa May is ‘the worst person in the world to do a deal with’ – Daily Mirror EU fears nightmare scenario of hung parliament and Brexit delays It was not supposed to be like this, a veteran Brussels diplomat said at the start of this week. Only last month senior European Union figures had expressed support for the prospect of an increased majority for Theresa May that, they hoped, would make it easier for her to ride out the political flak from a Brexit compromise that they believed she was ready to make. That prospect has now receded and Brussels is braced for walkouts or even the collapse of negotiations as a weak prime minister uses EU-bashing to try to stamp her authority on a more fractious and Eurosceptic Tory party…There is, to top it all, a “nightmare” scenario of Jeremy Corbyn as prime minister. – Times (£) Little evidence of tactical voting, says Oxford analyst Several groups have encouraged people to vote across party lines against the Conservatives, or pro-Brexit candidates or, north of the border, the Scottish National Party. Gina Miller, the businesswoman who defeated the government in the Supreme Court over Article 50, raised more than £400,000 for a tactical voting drive and endorsed 36 candidates. A Labour-dominated group called Progressive Alliance is trying to unite Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green voters in 31 constituencies. Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservatives leader, has called on pro-union voters to help her party stop Nicola Sturgeon.- Times (£) City analysts predict what Tory majority, hung parliament and shock Labour win would mean for Brexit A slim Tory majority would bring about a Hard Brexit analysts predict. Brooks, of City Index, said: “A slim majority of eight seats, as predicted by YouGov, is likely to arouse fears of a hard Brexit, as the 50 or so Eurosceptic MPs in the Conservative party could sway the negotiations. This could spook GBP traders.” And UBS’ Turner believes: “A less than stellar performance by the Conservatives which resulted in little change to the current parliamentary arithmetic could increase concerns about the possibility of a disorderly Brexit.” – City A.M. UK stands aside as EU boosts defence It’s been an article of faith for decades that the U.K. opposes any form of EU defense cooperation. Regular headlines in many pro-Brexit tabloids before last year’s referendum accused the European Commission of hatching plans to create an EU army, something regularly rebuffed by frustrated officials in Brussels. How times have changed. On Wednesday, the Commission launched an unprecedented initiative to boost the EU’s defense industry by offering billions of euros to companies working on the development of military technology. – Politico Trump and Brexit give momentum to EU defence push – Daily Mail Furious backlash against Brussels as EU unveils military ambition – Express Theresa May: Together, we can build a stronger Britain …If you strengthen my hand, I can get a Brexit deal that delivers for Britain. Taking back control of our money so that we spend it on our priorities, our borders so that we control immigration and ensure the system serves our national interest, and our laws so that we bring the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in Britain to an end. Building a new, deep and special partnership with the EU based on security and economic cooperation too.With your support, we can build a truly global Britain. Forging new relationships with old friends and new allies across the globe, and acting as the strongest advocate of free trade as we do. – Theresa May for The Telegraph (£) David Davis: Brexit is the defining issue of our age. The choice today to lead us through it is May or Corbyn At the start of this campaign, I knocked on the door of a house in Barrow and met two women, both lifelong Labour supporters who voted to remain. They told me they were both planning to vote for Theresa May on June 8. Partly because they did not trust Jeremy Corbyn, but also because Britain had voted for Brexit, and they thought that Theresa May was the woman to deliver the best deal for them. It’s a conversation that has been repeated many times as I have campaigned across the country. In Coventry, in Bishop Auckland – even in the one-time constituency of Commissioner Mandelson, Hartlepool. Throughout this long, and sometimes difficult campaign, voters I have met have never lost sight of what this election has been about – who is the best person to get the job done. – David Davis MP for ConservativeHome James Forsyth: The path to Brexit is finally clear… now the real work must begin The hopes of those who want Britain to stay in the EU have been dashed by this election. There has been no Brexit backlash. The party that wanted to overturn the result, the Liberal Democrats, have had a minimal impact on the campaign. By the time Britain next goes to the polls in a general election, the deed will have been done: this country will have left both the EU and the single market. Straight after the referendum last year, some Leavers feared victory would be snatched from them. They worried that a general election could lead to a parliament that was prepared to go back on the result. Instead, this election has served to confirm that Brexit is happening. It now has the endorsement not only of a referendum, but of a general election too. There is no way for its opponents to stop it any more. – James Forsyth for The Spectator Daniel Hannan: Don’t let Labour muck it up Lord Bell said all came down to two messages: “Time for a change” versus “Don’t let the other lot muck it up”… Just imagine what would happen if, instead of Brexit leading to a more global, more deregulated, more free-trading Britain, it became an opportunity for what Stalin used to call “socialism in one country”. Try to picture the international reaction if, as we left the EU, the British government was distracted with raising corporation tax, discouraging investment and seizing large tracts of the economy. We’d learn, just like the Venezuelans, how quickly a prosperous country can be reduced to penury. For once, Lord Bell’s aphorism, even in the saltier version, is precisely apposite. – Daniel Hannan MEP for ConservativeHome Brexit comment in brief The European Commission is still trying to shield its sinners – Lee Rotherham for CapX You don’t have to accept an extreme Brexit that will wreck your future – Vince Cable for the Times (£) Why no deal is better than any deal – Professor Patrick Minford for World Commerce Review Corbyn would have no free hand in Brexit negotiations – Letters page in The Guardian The Brexit catastrophe is only just beginning – Jenni Russell for The Times (£) Brexit news in brief Euro sinks as European Central Bank set to admit its policies are failing – Express ‘History haunts this place’: how Brexit is fuelling Ireland’s sectarian debate – Guardian France in talks with up to 50 asset managers on post-Brexit plans – Reuters UK economic performance set to slow as prospect of hard Brexit causes confidence jitters – City A.M. UK elections aside, hedge funds bet pound to fall anew on Brexit – Reuters From Europhile to Europhobe: what’s become of the Brexit election? – FT (£) LCH urges EU to avoid forced relocation of euro clearing – Reuters PM’s attack on human rights laws aims to take attention off police cuts says Labour – Guardian Brexit threatens to darken UK current account clouds: McGeever – Reuters SNP braced to lose up to 12 seats amid anti-independence backlash – Guardian