Saboteurs are driving us to no-deal chaos
SO what exactly is Labour’s Brexit strategy? We ask this question because the endless contradictions, U-turns and mixed messages coming from the party’s leading players have created a fog of confusion.
Jeremy Corbyn says Brexit was voted for by the people and can’t be stopped. His shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry says the people were duped – and it can.
Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell says no second referendum should include the option of staying in the EU. Shadow Brexit Secretary Keir Starmer says ‘nobody is ruling out Remain as an option’.
But it’s not just the leadership which is in disarray. Two thirds of Labour MPs represent constituencies that voted Leave, yet most want to scupper Brexit altogether.
Meanwhile, to confuse the issue still further, Gordon Brown popped up yesterday with the bizarre suggestion that Brexit delivery should be left to a ‘people’s Royal Commission’ (whatever that may be).
And what is Labour’s vision for postBrexit Britain? Mr Starmer’s much vaunted six-point manifesto is little more than a farrago of myth and self-delusion.
His key demand is that Britain must retain the ‘exact same benefits’ we currently have within the customs union and single market. Good luck with getting that one past Michel Barnier.
The truth is the Parliamentary Labour party wants to overturn the referendum but its leader emphatically doesn’t – not least because EU state-aid rules would scupper his ruinous re-nationalisation plans.
So while it’s true the Prime Minister may be fighting an uphill battle within her own party to secure an orderly Brexit, the idea that Labour offers a viable alternative is ludicrous.
Yet it has been disappointing to see so many Tory MPs playing into Mr Corbyn’s hands by undermining their leader even before any deal has been struck.
She is negotiating in good faith, against stubborn intransigence from Brussels. Her own colleagues should be supporting her in that struggle, rather than actively trying to subvert her.
Yes, the Chequers plan is imperfect, but with time rapidly running out, it’s the only proposal on the table. The alternative is no deal – and chaos.
The UK has made a remarkable economic recovery in the decade since the crash, with employment soaring, wages now growing again and export order books bulging. Will the Tory saboteurs, on both sides of the argument, really risk throwing all that away?
Signals from Brussels yesterday suggest an agreement is tantalisingly close. Shouldn’t the rebels pay Mrs May the courtesy of at least reading it, rather than blindly rejecting it out of hand?