NICK FERRARI
THE CAMPAIGN might be less than a week old, but already the parties, and indeed the whole General Election itself, are riven with more splits than a chorus of ballerinas from the National Ballet. True, no one should have expected an easy ride given the feverish, toxic and highly charged atmosphere affecting most of the country at this time, but this is regrettably shaping up to be as ugly and unsavoury as anyone might have feared.
So much for Jeremy Corbyn’s pledge for a “kinder, gentler politics” as he repeatedly smears Boris Johnson as a liar. The Prime Minister behaves little better, likening Corbyn to Josef Stalin and, presumably not wishing to be left out, Nigel Farage describes the PM as a dodgy second-hand car salesman.
And they tell us we need to show restraint!
Let’s stay with Mr Farage and examine his performance to date. Without a doubt, Britain would never had had the opportunity to vote for Brexit let alone try to achieve it without his skilful and doughty campaigning. It is his innate sense of the populist mood that serves to underscore just how far removed most of our politicians are from real people and their lives, dreams and fears.
Given that, his decision not to stand this time round was a shocker. Yes, his tactics of wanting to make the entire country his turf as opposed to one particular constituency can be seen to have merit.
Yet while Boris Johnson isn’t sitting on the greatest of majorities in Uxbridge and Jo Swinson is under threat in East Dunbartonshire, they’ve both seen fit to run a party as well as a personal campaign.
AMONG other comments he made last week, Jacob Reesmogg told me he felt it regrettable Farage couldn’t savour the victory he had engineered and allow the country to Brexit. He might well be right. The Remain side announced an alliance on Friday that will see the Lib Dems, Greens and Plaid Cymru stand aside to allow just one candidate to run in 60 constituencies. That should surely set alarm bells ringing for anyone on the Leave side of the equation.
There is a very real danger that the Conservatives and the Brexit party will split the vote to such a devastating extent they will both come up short. take a closer look at a few of the potentially totemic seats held by some Labour heavy-hitters. Projections in the seats for Yvette
Cooper and Ed Miliband show a united Tory/ Brexit party vote would cruise to victory, and yet if they both contest it, the sitting MPS are returned.
If that was repeated across the country, Nightmare on Downing Street could be a chilling reality and Mr Corbyn would be heading to see The Queen to confirm he was ready to become prime minister – and the nation would be run by a party referred to the Equality and Human Rights Commission over multiple claims of antisemitism, and one that openly proclaims Marxist policies, many of which have led to the catastrophic collapse of venezuela.
It is plain how this can be avoided, but that is to ignore the incredible self-belief that both Johnson and Farage possess and which, candidly, means they don’t play well with others. They’re both singleminded to the point of occasional pigheadedness, they’re perfectly happy to be – or preferably create – the eye of any storm and they are both prepared to stick to their views, however controversial.
It is beyond irony that the two men who, three years ago, were responsible for persuading a nation to take the leap of faith of leaving the EU, could be the ones who deny us taking even the first step.