Brexit, the Hard Way

Britain’s electorate has put a Rubik’s Cube puzzle into the lap of the Westminster politicians, as Andrew Gamble outlines very persuasively in this issue. The aim of the puzzle is to get a majority in parliament not only so that the Queen’s government can be carried on but also in order to negotiate a satisfactory route to Brexit. Solving a complicated puzzle is always hard, but it’s harder when most of the participants and half of the spectators are not always giving truthful directions or honest advice. So a few questions.

Why did the Tories lose?

All those of us who were wrong—and I predicted a Tory majority of fifty to seventy or more—knew before the vote all the reasons as to why the Tories under Theresa May might be defeated. It’s understandable that you might not believe me, but you can check my honesty by going to this link where I outlined them a week beforehand: Briefly the reasons were:

(1) A snap election over seven weeks left too much time for accidents to happen and for the focus on Brexit as an issue to be lost. That duly happened with two major Islamist terrorist atrocities in Manchester and London.

(2) Because the Tories thought their opinion poll lead was unassailable, they produced a manifesto containing three “responsible” attempts to control public spending by cutting social benefits to the elderly and imposing a “dementia tax” to finance social (that is, geriatric) care on them too. Tory support among the elderly plummeted.

(3) May reversed the “dementia tax”—she had no choice—but that retreat destroyed her own image as a “strong and stable” leader.

(4) The Manchester and London bombings created a pervasive sense of unease throughout Britain at the failure of officialdom to propose serious solutions to terrorism. Writing before the second bombing, I pointed out that Theresa May was vulnerable on such grounds because she had been the Home Secretary in charge of counter-terrorism for the previous six years.

And (5) Jeremy Corbyn and Labour ran a very effective campaign.

Jeremy Corbyn, the IRA’s friend in the House of Commons, how so?

Yes, Corbyn scored in the high sixties with the eighteen-to-thirty-five voters by offering the outright bribe of cancelling their student debts at the very moment when the Tories were alienating older voters. Corbyn had been campaigning in favour of “free stuff” paid for by the rich for his entire political life, and he had learned to put it to music—music to the ears not only of students but also of their parents. His supportive involvement with the IRA, on the other hand, was ancient history to young voters. Besides, hadn’t the Queen shaken hands with the IRA’s Gerry Adams? Finally, ordinary voters responded favourably to his courtesy and good manners. As a result positive support for him rose from 28 to 40 per cent in the course of the campaign. Meanwhile Theresa May personally was simply a bad candidate—dull, repetitive, lacking spontaneity, accident-prone, unable to respond to questions.

That being so, why did you continue to think May would win?

Given that the Tories had brought together a national majority largely on the basis of Brexit, we thought she had more than enough room to blunder and still win. But we hadn’t noticed something: almost alone on the Labour front bench Corbyn and John McDonnell, Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, largely neutralised Brexit as an issue by supporting its clearest expression: leaving the single market. Voters pocketed this pledge and turned to other issues—notably, the economy where the Tories offered nothing distinctive such as lower taxes.

Quite the contrary. The Tory manifesto was a leftish document offering the largest minimum wage in Europe, attacking selfish individualism, and stating (quite absurdly) that “Conservatives abhor inequality.” With all these qualifications we still thought it was more or less impossible for her to lose the election to a candidate as flawed as Jeremy Corbyn. That negative confidence was reinforced by all the polls except the one on election night: her average lead was 7 per cent.

But you were wrong.

Strictly speaking, we were right. The Tories won the largest share of the popular vote (42 per cent), the largest number of parliamentary seats (318), and the right to form a government because they can muster (with the support of Ulster’s Democratic Unionist Party) a majority of MPs to sustain one in the House of Commons. These are all the traditional tests of victory in a parliamentary election.

But can a minority Tory government, with or without the support of the Democratic Unionist Party, stay in power for more than a few months?

On the morrow of the election the sentiment on all sides was: No, it couldn’t do so. That fuelled the demand for May’s immediate resignation or defenestration. But as a young parliamentary correspondent in the 1970s, I watched Jim Callaghan’s government survive for two years after it lost its majority in April 1977. And when Callaghan left office after his defeat at the hands of Mrs Thatcher, he did so amid general respect. What that and earlier examples suggest is that a minority government might fall tomorrow or last for a full parliament. The problem is: you don’t know which one in advance.

Tory ministers and MPs woke up to this ambiguous reality in a short time. That explains why by the Monday evening after defeat the cabinet had been reshuffled, talks with the DUP were taking place, and the 1922 Committee (which is the forum for Tory backbenchers) had given the Prime Minister a warm reception once she had humbled herself (“I got us into this mess and I will get us out”). It is not inconceivable that Mrs May could serve as Prime Minister for a full parliament and lead the Tories into the next election.

But it’s very unlikely. She is regarded by most Tories as unelectable in any future contest. And since a contest could occur at a moment not of the government’s choosing—following, for instance, a breach with the DUP—Mrs May is not a dead woman walking but an accident waiting to happen. The disposition of most of her colleagues—and, most significantly, the leading officials of the 1922—will be to allow her a little time in Downing Street during which the party will arrange an orderly leadership election and a smooth transfer to a new Prime Minister. She might be less resistant to this if leadership contenders make it clear that she would be welcome in the new cabinet. Former prime ministers such as A.J. Balfour and Ramsay MacDonald both served in cabinets led by their successors (not always of the same party), and this civilised tradition might be revived for Mrs May’s benefit as the anger against her dissipates. That done, the new leader could take over, run the government for some years, and call an election in more favourable times.

Surely, however, Jeremy Corbyn is surfing an irresistible wave of popular support—he now leads in the polls; he got a standing ovation from the House of Commons on his return—that will deprive the Tories of seats in by-elections and propel Labour into office?

Corbyn leads in the same polls that a week before showed a landslide for Theresa May; there won’t be an election very soon; and he is sixty-eight-years old. Granting him the standing ovation, I will stick my neck out again and predict that he won’t ever be prime minister. Today was the high-water mark of his rise. Sure, he did well to win a net thirty-one extra seats from the Tories. But at the finish he was still fifty seats behind them. Talk of Corbyn’s “victory” is part fantasy and part ploy to de-legitimise the new government politically and psychologically. As May’s reception by the 1922 showed, it’s not working.

Some surprising people are encouraging the fantasy, however. They include anti-Brexit Tories who want the government to switch to a “soft Brexit” and moderate Labour MPs who want both Remain and resistance to the leftwards drift of Labour. Present “Corbyn in Downing Street” as the only alternative to a “soft Brexit”—that is, continuing membership of the EU single market—and you are halfway to persuading the crowd to go your way.

But isn’t a more moderate Brexit what the electorate voted for?

That’s the impression one gets from reading and viewing much of the media. In fact, however, 85 per cent of the voters chose parties that promised not merely Brexit but in particular an exit from the single market—and that includes Labour and the Scottish Conservatives. Pro-Remain parties got creamed. Corbyn and McDonnell have both reiterated this pledge since the election. If any Conservative thinks it might be a smart move to “choose economics over control of immigation”, as the cant phrase has it, he might consider how Labour’s new leadership would skewer them unmercifully as the party that had betrayed the voters yet again, this time on open borders!

Surely, though, a soft Brexit is the right thing to do?

Well, since experts are all the rage among Remainers, here’s one formidable expert, Martin Howe QC, on the topic. The reality is that there is no “soft Brexit”. It does not exist as a serious or credible option. Halfway house arrangements in which we are subject to EU rules but have no say in setting them are the worst of all worlds, which would continue to subject us to all the disadvantages of EU membership but not give us the freedom and opportunities of leaving the EU in shaping our laws, controlling our borders and taking advantage of global trading opportunities. The only softness is in the heads of the people who advocate such half-baked and ill-thought-out notions.

Let the games begin.