In Facts, the website which nobly attempted to inject a clear dose of reality into That Campaign, has raised an interesting point about the government's potential responses to the legal challenge to Brexit.
With merciful concision and clarity, it points out that the most compelling legal argument in the government's defence is that it CAN trigger Article 50 because in doing so it doesn't take away any rights; that is the basis for the legal challenge, but it is also only true if the government acknowledges that Article 50 can be revoked. That would mean that the invocation itself would not deprive any citizen of any rights.
However, in making this acknowledgement, argues InFacts editor Hugo Dixon, Theresa May would incur an unbearable backlash from the Brexiters, who would instantaneously smell treachery, this time without a smile on its face, and threaten to overturn her apple-cart, so recently arranged with many of the rotten ones apparently near the front, and here we would find ourselves once again in 1996, a Tory government led by a hard-working but hapless leader in tatters because of the frothing madness of the Europhobes.
Dixon's argument is clear, and it allows us to hope that the government might reveal itself a little in the coming weeks and months as it responds to the appeal. Were Mrs May to permit the presentation of a defence along these lines, acknowledging the reversibility of Article 50, we may begin to hope. Of course we still have her strident rhetoric to leave us quaking in our boots that she may drag us out anyway. But as we've posited before, for Theresa May, this could all come down to hard-nosed pragmatic choices about the impact of all this on us, our families, our households. As the economic misery builds up, and we approach the first full quarter since 23 June, she may reasonably calculate that Brexit is destined, in the end, to become an unpopular choice which we are itching to reject.
13 October 2016
10 October 2016
Faint hope
1. Theresa May is not a convinced Brexiteer. She campaigned for Remain.
2. But she was a bit lukewarm. So we can deduce a) that she does not favour Brexit, but that she is pragmatic about her support for Remain.
3. She landed in Number 10 in August or whenever it was, and her immediate action was to start repeating "Brexit means Brexit" all over the shop.
4. She didn't trigger Article 50 straight away even though she could have. She put three Brexiteers in charge of Brexit. These are both very pragmatic choices. She doesn't seem to be the world's No 1 Brexit fan.
5. And going on about "Brexit means Brexit" steadied the economy, her party and everything else for a bit. So I think she was firstly concerned not with Brexit, which is years away, but with stability. And she achieved it.
6. By the end of the summer we were all getting a bit antsy because "Brexit means Brexit" means frog all. Did she return from the recess and trigger A50? Nope.
7. So while she has successfully kept a lid, so far, on the mouth-frothing lunatics in the Tory party, she has also done nothing substantive to make Brexit happen.
8. Meanwhile, some of what she has done has created the conditions for Brexit to be stopped. She has now given a date for triggering Article 50, but she has allowed time for the view that this is reversible to gain traction. She has continued to show that she is committed to delivering what the Leavers wanted, but that includes some very ugly consequences which are likely to become very awkward. She has axed the £350m commitment giving those who promoted it nowhere to hide.
9. Lastly she was very emphatic that the Union (UK) is important to her and there's been no doubt that Brexit could splinter the Union.
10. So it's entirely conceivable that she imagines a future in which a second vote, or some other occurrence which makes Brexit obviously undesirable (such as the end of the UK, economic disaster, food price hikes, etc etc) is rejected by the public and she can say: "I did everything I could to deliver on that referendum result. This is what you asked for, and I did it. It's not my fault if you now realise that you voted for a bucket of sick and have changed your minds."
2. But she was a bit lukewarm. So we can deduce a) that she does not favour Brexit, but that she is pragmatic about her support for Remain.
3. She landed in Number 10 in August or whenever it was, and her immediate action was to start repeating "Brexit means Brexit" all over the shop.
4. She didn't trigger Article 50 straight away even though she could have. She put three Brexiteers in charge of Brexit. These are both very pragmatic choices. She doesn't seem to be the world's No 1 Brexit fan.
5. And going on about "Brexit means Brexit" steadied the economy, her party and everything else for a bit. So I think she was firstly concerned not with Brexit, which is years away, but with stability. And she achieved it.
6. By the end of the summer we were all getting a bit antsy because "Brexit means Brexit" means frog all. Did she return from the recess and trigger A50? Nope.
7. So while she has successfully kept a lid, so far, on the mouth-frothing lunatics in the Tory party, she has also done nothing substantive to make Brexit happen.
8. Meanwhile, some of what she has done has created the conditions for Brexit to be stopped. She has now given a date for triggering Article 50, but she has allowed time for the view that this is reversible to gain traction. She has continued to show that she is committed to delivering what the Leavers wanted, but that includes some very ugly consequences which are likely to become very awkward. She has axed the £350m commitment giving those who promoted it nowhere to hide.
9. Lastly she was very emphatic that the Union (UK) is important to her and there's been no doubt that Brexit could splinter the Union.
10. So it's entirely conceivable that she imagines a future in which a second vote, or some other occurrence which makes Brexit obviously undesirable (such as the end of the UK, economic disaster, food price hikes, etc etc) is rejected by the public and she can say: "I did everything I could to deliver on that referendum result. This is what you asked for, and I did it. It's not my fault if you now realise that you voted for a bucket of sick and have changed your minds."
7 October 2016
Every silver lining has a dark cloud
Optimistic possibility: Theresa May, having decided that stability and purpose are the most needed qualities in government at the moment--whether needed by her, her party, or the country--has decided to allow a pathway to Brexit to develop. She will be supportive, Brexiteers will lead on the detail, and either Brexit will become a reality or not. She may hope not, or she may be sanguine about it, simply wanting to hold on to power beyond the moment when a decision either way is finally made.
Personally, I don't think it's beyond the realms of possibility. Of course I hope for such an outcome, but I'm encouraged that little Theresa May has done seems to suggest that she really wants to follow a course other than this: she could have activated Article 50 by now. She could have come out openly against Brexit by purging Johnson, Fox and Leadsom from her Cabinet rather than installing them near the top.
Another reason to suspect that this could be the game plan is to see the world from May's perspective: she is a politician, and politicians usually try to navigate their way through whatever waters are ahead. She probably feels she can live with Brexit if it happens, even though she believes politically that it's best not to quit the EU.
Even if we indulge this view, there is an increasing worry. May may seek to offer decisiveness, security, optimism, but the referendum unleashed forces and views in British society that, while they may not result in the kind of revolution we've prided ourselves on avoiding by comparison to the Continent, are certainly damaging our social cohesion.
Amber Rudd's disappointingly stupid proposal to list foreign workers is one. This news, that the Government has decided not to listen to 'foreign' academics, is another. Even if we believe that Theresa May's course will allow us to retain EU membership, to fight the madness of Brexit and win, the journey will leave us damaged, exhausted, a shade of the country--and the society--we were.
Tony Blair's legacy was overshadowed by Iraq, inevitably. Inevitably, David Cameron's legacy--those positive steps for which he was rightly praised, in the end, by Jeremy Corbyn, such as equal marriage--all that will be eclipsed utterly by the lost gamble of 23 June 2016, which failed to save the Tory Party and on which date our divisions finally cut so deep that we may reasonably fear that they may never heal.
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