‘Unless the Remainers see sense, and pull back from the brink, all bets are off ’
The rebels must now see sense, put democracy first and begin planning for a constructive no-deal
Will a radicalised faction of Tory Remainers choose to destroy their own party? Will they collude with their pro-eu comrades on the opposition benches to thwart Brexit, triggering an explosive showdown with their Eurosceptic colleagues and formally splitting their party? Are they willing to facilitate a rabidly anticapitalist, anti-western calamity of a Labour government, while defying centuries of democracy, humiliating 17.4 million voters and thumbing their noses at Tory supporters? Do they love their failing, hostile, technocratic EU so much that they are willing to sacrifice every other principle they supposedly stand for on its altar? Really?
These are now the essential Brexit questions: how they are answered will determine whether or not we leave the EU. Forget last night’s irrelevant confidence vote. As a result of Theresa May’s staggering incompetence, the future of our country lies in the hands of around 20 Conservative born-again Remainers, including members of the Cabinet. It is they who must decide how to proceed, and who will bear responsibility for what comes next.
All signed up to a manifesto pledge to leave the single market and customs union, agreeing that “no deal is better than a bad deal”; all have reverted to type. Their big opportunity is that the Corbynistas hate free trade, and are uninterested in regaining the right to set our own tariffs, creating a confluence of interests. The plan is for “Parliament to seize control” and for MPS to form a Labour-lib Demsnp-tory Remainer pact to keep us imprisoned in a permanent customs union. In a development that at any other time would be astonishing, Philip Hammond is openly backing a version of this plan, in his case to supposedly “take a no-deal off the table”, contradicting his own Government’s policy, as we reveal today in an incendiary transcript of a phone call with big business CEOS.
Under the Remainers’ plans, our current trading arrangements in manufactured goods with the EU wouldn’t change much, to the delight of the CBI and economists with bogus models that imply it is pointless to try to trade more with far-flung nations; but in return we would be unable to join the Asia-pacific trade agreement, or to sign a deal with Canada or India or anybody else, or cut tariffs to reduce the price of food.
There would be some downsides and no upside to Brexit. Ever since the 1990s, Thatcherite Eurosceptics have campaigned for a global Britain that fights for free trade and for a reorientation of our economy towards faster-growing markets outside the EU. Their rage at seeing their dream dashed would be uncontrollable: remaining part of the customs union is even more unacceptable to them than membership of the single market. The Tory party and the Government wouldn’t survive the week. The ERG and others would, at the very least, abstain come the next confidence vote, forcing a general election.
I hope and pray that enough Remainers see sense: it is their hands that are on the nuclear button. It may well be in their gift to betray Brexit, thanks to the support of John Bercow, a Speaker who has disgraced his office and who could facilitate a parliamentary “coup” against the executive, but only at the cost of triggering the sort of catastrophic Tory split last seen after the Corn Laws were repealed in 1846.
Remain ultras are right to fear some temporary disruption from a no-deal Brexit; but no Tory could possibly believe that this would be worse than the economic shock of prime minister Corbyn and chancellor Mcdonnell. Will it come to that? Or is there still some third way, a compromise that could keep the Tories together?
The European nomenklatura could conceivably undergo an epiphany, and make the UK a better offer. Yet such a volte-face looks vanishingly unlikely: the European machinery, still advised by fanatical-pro EU British “grandees”, has drawn the opposite conclusion from May’s calamitous defeat. If there is any change in position, it will be to seek an even softer Brexit, inevitably one in which Britain is robbed of an independent trade policy.
There is no support for a reheated version of May’s deal: Tory Brexiteers won’t change their minds. Labour will continue to vote against it. Some Brexiteers could live with an EEA/ EFTA Norway-style model without a backstop or customs union, as a temporary stepping stone to a Canada-style free trade deal: yet that would require remaining in the single market, including immigration. For most, it’s a compromise too far.
The choice is therefore either no deal or no Brexit, either de jure if Article 50 is cancelled or de facto if we sign up to the scandalously misnamed Norway Plus or Common Market 2, which (of course) include a customs union as well as the single market and even the backstop. A second referendum would only delay this intractably binary decision.
Which brings us back to the fundamental fault line within the Tory party. Remainers say they will never countenance a no-deal Brexit and would rather bring down the Government. Brexiteers won’t tolerate a Brexit in name only. To avoid mutually assured destruction, one side must surrender, and the Brexiteers correctly won’t back down as they won the referendum and have legitimacy, right and a manifesto promise on their side. They are also far more numerous than the ultraremainers, and are supported by the overwhelming majority of party members and Conservative voters.
So here is my plea to Remainers: please put democracy and the survival of capitalism first. You could embrace a scorched earth policy, destroying your party and opening the door to the madness of Corbynomics. You may even delay Brexit. But at what cost?
There is a more constructive way: in the aftermath of the referendum, most of you accepted the result. If that worked then, why not now? Focus on planning for what needs to happen once we’ve left, and helping whoever emerges as prime minister to forge the closest possible relationship to the EU that respects the referendum result.
Yes, it would be better to leave the EU with a good deal already signed; but the next best outcome is to agree one or a series of smaller agreements as quickly as possible after we are out. Unless the Remainers see sense, and pull back from the brink, all bets are off, for the Tories and the country.