Britain’s EU Commissioner Steps Down After Brexit Vote

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“But what is done can not be undone and now we have to get on with making our new relationship with Europe work as well as possible”, Lord Hill said.

A timetable for a Conservative party leadership election is to be announced on Monday, with former London mayor Boris Johnson – who spearheaded the Brexit campaign – in the lead.

“There is urgency. There is no time to lose”, said French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault.

“There is a clear plea from the majority of member states to speed this process up”, he added.

Juncker said he had tried to persuade Hill to stay – even taking him to lunch to plead his case, a source told AFP – as the European Union and Britain squabbled over how and when to begin what promises to be torturous exit negotiations.

Speaking on his way into the meeting, France’s foreign minister called on the European Union to move ahead quickly to seal the terms of a British exit from the bloc, arguing that the other 27 members needed to give the EU new objective or else risk populism taking hold.

EU chiefs want to be rid of Britain as soon as possible, if a statement from the European Council released in the wake of the UK’s shock Brexit is anything to go by. “Any delay would unnecessarily prolong uncertainty”.

European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker said Saturday that the British had voted to leave, and “it doesn’t make any sense to wait until October to try and negotiate the terms of their departure”. But, he said, “there’s no way of predicting all the political consequences of this event”.

Tusk was keen to stop the rot spreading to other countries: “Today, on behalf of the twenty seven leaders I can say that we are determined to keep our unity as twenty seven”.

If none is allowed, European Union law would automatically cease to apply to Britain after two years.

Tim Allan, a 28-year-old British national serving as a press attache inside the hulking glass structure of the European Parliament, told AFP he was awaiting the outcome with cautious optimism.

His resignation comes a day after Prime Minister David Cameron resigned from his position. United Kingdom Independence Party leader, Nigel Farage, gestures as he arrives to cast his vote in Biggin Hill, south eastern England, Thursday, June 23, 2016, as voters head to the polls across the UK in a historic referendu.

At a two-day summit of the 28 European Union leaders opening Tuesday, Cameron will be asked to leave the room at some stage so they can assess their future without Britain.

A two-year clock would start ticking, and Britain would automatically be out at the end of that time, whether it had second thoughts or not.

Ratings agency Moody’s downgraded its outlook for Britain, saying its creditworthiness was now at greater risk as the country would face substantial challenges to successfully negotiating its exit from the bloc.

Senior officials have said they may leave the European Union service, however, since career moves into the higher grades in Brussels requires political patronage from European Union member governments. “You can check out anytime but you never really leave”.

Whatever decisions are taken, the coming weeks and months will be frantic and uncertain, according to analysts.