Lords Vote for Parliament to have a Say on Brexit Deal has made a Snap General Election More Likely

The House of Lords tonight voted by a majority of 98 for Parliament to have a final veto over whatever deal the government agrees with the EU, for the country’s post Brexit relationship with Europe.

MPs in the House of Commons will now vote on this amendment, and the one the Lords passed last week to unilaterally allow resident EU citizens the right to stay in the UK. Tonight’s vote in the Lords causes potentially more problems for the government, in that it strikes at the heart of the government’s Brexit strategy.

This strategy, if we can call it that, is to demand everything from the EU and if we don’t get it, to make no deal at tall. If this amendment is passed by the House of Commons, MPs will effectively be able to send the government back to the negotiating table, to try and get something better.

Of course, whether the House of Commons will vote for the amendment is another matter, as it will require perhaps 20 or 30 of the pro-EU Tory MPs to vote for it. It could be that the government makes some kind of compromise offer, if they fear losing the vote, but this government has shown no signs on compromising over its Brexit stance.

If the vote is passed in the House of Commons, I suspect the government will be amenable to calling a snap general election. If the Tories won the election, which looks highly likely at this stage, it would give it an extra authority over Parliament in terms of a mandate for its Brexit position. Risky maybe, but it would give the government the opportunity to get its way, if it won.

The 2011 Fixed Parliament Act, would have to be got around, but the potential rewards of a snap election for the government are huge. The 2011 Act allows for two ways an election can be called, other than the 5 year fixed term.

The first is for a vote for an election by two thirds of MPs in Parliament, so opposition parties, particularly Labour, would largely need to vote for it. The other way is that a no confidence vote is passed against the government, and after 14 days, another government that did command the confidence of a majority of MPs, could not be formed.

The first option is probably easier, although Labour may block it, despite what its leader Jeremy Corbyn has said about wanting an early election, not all Labour MPs may want this. There are two other possibilities, the 2011 Act could be repealed by a majority in the House of Commons, or it could be bypassed as an exception to the Act, as a one off. Again a simple majority of MPs is required for this.

The former Tory leader Lord Hague has thrown his weight behind the government calling an early election, by one of the means available, as he thinks the government would win easily and so increase its authority over Parliament on Brexit.

The Prime Minister, Theresa May, has said all along that she is not in favour of an early election, as there is no need for it, and no desire from the public for it, but if her Brexit plan is knocked sideways by the Lords vote tonight, and if enough Tory MP rebels can be found to support the Lords, she may have little choice.

It would be a major humiliation for May, if her whole strategy was rejected in this way, and it would leave her vulnerable at the next scheduled general election in 2020, if she made it as far as still being Prime Minister in 2020, which is doubtful. The Tories are ruthless at ditching leaders, and she would be a sitting duck.

It is time her enemies in the Tory put down a marker, Nicky Morgan, George Osborne et al, that they start the process of getting revenge on May for the way she treated them when she became Prime Minister. Will they do it? The odds are still against, but maybe, just maybe.

Blair Seeks Redemption with call for Anti-Brexit Uprising

Photo credit: The Guardian

In a speech in London today to the pro-European Union (EU) campaign Open Britain, former Labour Prime Minister, Tony Blair, urged the British people to ‘rise up’ against leaving the EU.

Pressed on whether he thought there should be a second referendum, he said: "All I'm saying is a very, very simple thing, that this is the beginning of the debate - that if a significant part of that 52% show real change of mind, however you measure it, we should have the opportunity to reconsider this decision.”

Blair, who was Prime Minister between 1997 and 2007, has never really regained his political credibility since his fateful decision to join the US led invasion of Iraq in 2003. The dodgy dossier, spin and downright lies employed by Blair to persuade Parliament of the necessity of the invasion, was laid bare by the subsequent failure to find  any weapons of mass destruction in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

He struggled on as Prime Minister until 2007, but Iraq was the beginning of the end of Blair’s premiership. He was damaged goods and it was only a matter of time before the Labour Party moved to oust him.

In the intervening years, apart from regularly defending his decision to go to war on a false prospectus, Blair has always given me the impression that he craves to be back in the political limelight, but Iraq has hung like a millstone around his neck.

But it looks as though Blair has spotted an opportunity at redeeming his reputation by advocating that Britain should not leave the EU, despite last summer’s referendum in which a majority of the British people voted to leave. Brexit is of course the biggest political issue of the day, and so Blair is likely to get a hearing in the media, unlike perhaps his thoughts on the middle-east peace process, for example.

Blair is right to point out that the decision made on 23 June last year was a snapshot of the views of the British public, which doesn’t necessarily mean that this view can’t change, especially as the implications of leaving become clearer. We should remember too, that at 52%-48% for leave, this was hardly an overwhelming mandate anyway. Views can change, and do, one narrow decision on one day in 2016, cannot be set in stone forever.

The Lib Dems political revival is being built on a pro-EU platform, with some success, and it has surely not been lost on Blair that if they can be forgiven their broken promises when in coalition with the Tories, then why can’t he be absolved from past mistakes, when championing such a noble issue as the future good of the country?

Well, I’m not sure Blair has been forgiven, particularly by many leave voters who blame him, with some justification, for allowing the sharp increase in immigration from eastern Europe, when his government failed to apply a ten year ‘emergency brake’ on immigration, which was allowed under EU rules.

I listened to a political radio phone in show on the BBC last night, just as the news of Blair’s speech was breaking, and it was met with scorn by many of the callers. Even some callers who want to remain in the EU, although agreeing with Blair’s arguments, didn’t think it helpful that he personally is the messenger. That credibility thing again.

As one caller put it, ‘you can’t believe anything he says after Iraq.’

I’m no fan of Blair’s, he is one of the main reasons why I stopped voting Labour and joined the Green Party, but he may be onto something here.

At least he is issuing a rallying call to the 16 million British people who voted to remain in the EU, which may begin to lift the gloom that has enveloped many remainers. Particularly since Corbyn led Labour’s abject capitulation to the Tory agenda on Brexit.

Let us argue the case against the government’s reckless interpretation of this great political and cultural matter, whoever the messenger happens to be.

Labour Returns to Focus Group Politics over Brexit

The Article 50 Bill which paves the way for the UK to exit the European Union (EU) was, as expected, passed through the House of Commons tonight, without amendment. The Bill will now head to the House of Lords. The government did say though that Parliament will be able to reject the settlement when finalised.

The Labour Party took a rather confusing position yesterday, as its spokesperson on exiting the EU, Sir Keir Starmer, hailed it as a great concession by the government that MPs will be allowed a take it or leave it vote on the deal. Then the vast majority of its MPs voted for its own amendment giving MPs a veto over the deal.

The concession is nothing of the sort, as Alex Salmond, the SNP MP commented, ‘Hobson’s choice, is no choice at all.’

By this morning Starmer was still claiming it as victory for Labour, saying that the Prime Minister would not leave the EU with no deal other than World Trade Organisation terms, but this is probably just wishful thinking at best. At worst a piece of political spin Alistair Campbell would have been proud of.

In reality, opposition MPs will have to accept whatever Theresa May can get from the EU, or they will get the blame for forcing the hardest of Brexits on the country.

Caroline Lucas, the Green Party MP wrote on her website:

‘With the Government’s own spokesperson confirming that nothing of substance has been newly offered today, it’s clear that the earlier celebrations from the Labour benches were excruciatingly premature.’

‘This defeat cements the Tories extreme Brexit plans and provides ample evidence to wavering MPs that they should vote against this Bill at a third reading if they want to protect the UK from falling off a Brexit cliff edge.’

Game, set and match to the government, with Labour just looking impotent. Labour only have themselves to blame, by making it clear that the party would vote for the Article 50 Bill, whether or not its amendments were accepted, which gave the government no reason to concede anything. This concession is what has already been promised by the government months ago.

We know this has been a tricky issue for Labour, with most of its voters voting to remain in the EU, but most of their Parliamentary seats in the north of England and in Wales voting to leave. Even so, I have been puzzled by their approach, since the party as whole was pro-remain and having elected a leader on the basis of principled politics, rather than chasing the whims of a few voters in swing constituencies.

Well, all that appears to have changed. An interesting piece in yesterday’s Guardian sheds some light on Labour’s approach to Brexit. Written by Anthony Wells who works for the opinion pollster YouGov, he reports on a study of Labour leave and remain voters, in which they were offered four different scenarios of how Labour should react to Brexit.  

The least unpopular option with both sets of voters, although not necessarily the most popular with either side, is of a soft Brexit, that is, leaving the EU but staying in the single market. In other words, the lowest common denominator. This stance is of course the same one that the government has taken, although not a single EU leader thinks this is realistic.

We were promised that with Jeremy Corbyn as leader, Labour would abandon triangulation and the obsession with focus groups of the new Labour years, but this looks uncannily similar to the tactics of the Blair/Brown government.

The trouble with this approach now, is if the government makes a pig’s ear out of the negotiations with the EU, which is probable, Labour will be unable to do anything about it, other than effectively choose an even worse option. And when they had the chance to gain some real influence over the negotiation, Labour waved it through, for fear of upsetting some of its supporters.

They will hardly be able say that they looked after the best interests of the country during the Brexit process, when in fact they meekly accepted the government’s agenda. Labour is now irrelevant on the biggest political issue in the UK for decades and will deserve the heavy defeat they will almost certainly get at the next general election, whatever spin they are trying to put on the situation now.