Signs of a no-deal Brexit are going from bad to worse
HOW bad can it get? There is no way, the National Audit Office, warned us this week, that Britain’s ports will be ready for a no-deal Brexit by next March, by which time we could be crashing out of the European Union.
Out of the 12 IT computer targets the Border Force has set itself, 11 will not be met in time.
Thousands of staff need to be trained, standards are bound to be lowered to keep traffic flowing and, the Government watchdog said, organised crime will be quick to take advantage. The National Crime Agency issued a similar warning on the ability of UK police forces to tackle serious and organised crime under a no-deal Brexit.
Then it was revealed that in Cabinet ministers are preparing to requisition ferries and lorries to keep supplies of food and medicines flowing past the blocked ports.
Transport Minister Chris Grayling admitted it would cost £35million to prepare motorway laybys for Dover and lorry operators warned that a simple 30-second check on documents would, over the course of a day, cause a 17-mile tailback to the port.
Anyone out there still think this is a good idea?
And yet, the Government, the Parliament, appears locked in the tractor beam of Brexit.
Over 700,000 marched for a second referendum, a people’s vote, in London last weekend but the practicalities and the divided toxic politics of a re-run would make life even less bearable.
What is needed are political leaders deft and strong enough to take the Commons and the country with them, on a journey that skirts us away from what Nicola Sturgeon rightly described as the biggest policy disaster of our lifetimes.
Don’t look to Jeremy Corbyn, he wasn’t on the march, he doesn’t back Remain.
How he must wonder, with the Tories in back-stabbing shambles they are in, are Labour five points behind in the polls?
Yes, Theresa May is beating him hands down. That’s how bad it can get.