If we want progress, Mrs May must go
Theresa May is now the chief roadblock to Brexit, and so long as she is Prime Minister no progress can be made. The country is trapped in a bubble of Mayite logic. She will resign, she said, if the House of Commons passes the Withdrawal Agreement, but if she softens the EU deal to win over Remainers, the Tories and DUP will turn against it – so there is a good chance that it will never pass, and thus she will never have to resign. The madness has no end in sight.
Up until now there has been a lot of sympathy in the country for the Prime Minister, a sense that she was doing her best in the name of duty. But this week destroyed any benefit of the doubt. First, she said that she would talk with Labour, a move that – right or wrong – could have been made years ago and looks to be dishonest theatre. Labour’s demand for a customs union is already contained in the agreement (the backstop is arguably superior to what Labour imagines it wants) and Mrs May will not rewrite it.
But even if she makes no compromises, just by talking to Labour – begging for parliamentary votes – Mrs May has elevated Jeremy Corbyn to the status of an equal. Tory activists are furious: the one argument many felt they had left was “Vote Conservative to stop Corbyn”, and yet the Prime Minister has invited him to the top table. Is there nothing she won’t do to try to save her sainted agreement?
It has become Mrs May’s poll tax, the policy she stands by beyond the point of reason. On Tuesday night, the Prime Minister declared in yet another speech that she has always believed Britain could flourish without a deal. So why did she fail to prepare for no deal or make it central to the EU negotiations? Because she did not mean what she said.
In any case, the question is suddenly irrelevant. On Wednesday, MPS rushed a Bill through the Commons that will effectively take no deal off the table for good. Throughout this drama, some Leavers have insisted that Britain should and will leave on March 29, or April 12, or May 22. Their argument was rooted in law and logic, but what they misunderstood is that the political establishment is so determined to reverse Brexit that it will do whatever is necessary to extend the leaving date – and next week Mrs May will travel to yet another summit to discuss a delay that threatens to become a flextension. It is as politically compromising as the name suggests.
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Brexit exists: the executive is bungling it, the legislature conspires to kill it. At the heart of this crisis is the Withdrawal Agreement – and it will stay in place, carved in stone, so long as Mrs May is in No 10. Brexiteers must be asking themselves how much longer they can offer moral endorsement to this strategy by sitting in Cabinet. If they have ambitions of ever replacing the Prime Minister, they must realise that they are tarnishing their own reputations among the grassroots.
Even if the present leadership has no concern for the views of Conservative Party activists, they are the men and women who will some day vote for a new prime minister, and who are they more likely to support? An MP who stuck to their conscience and stood up for Brexit? Or someone who, for what they no doubt believe to be the best of reasons, stuck by Mrs May even as she broke bread with Mr Corbyn?
One must always put the national interest over personal ambition, but all signs point towards a general election disaster. If even loyal Conservatives are tearing up their membership cards, how many ex-labour, ex-ukip or floating voters are going to give the Tories another shot at the ballot box?
Mrs May is thought to care very much about her legacy, in which case her friends and colleagues need to tell her that clinging to office to fight for an agreement that few want will determine history’s judgment. If the Conservatives don’t change course soon, Mrs May will leave us with a neutered Brexit, no Brexit or even the catastrophe of a Labour government.
If they don’t change course, Mrs May will leave us with a neutered Brexit, no Brexit or a Labour government