Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

May, unfortunately for those who want to get rid of her, is at her best when she has her back to the wall, as her stamina and  confidence over the day has displayed to the surprise of many. All bets are off as to what happens next, but a showdown with the ultra Brexiteers is surely not far off. She has withstood so many setbacks in her premiership, including losing her majority, which would have sunk most political leaders, but she is still there. So a string of ministerial resignations, not enough votes in the Commons to to pass her Brexit deal and a threatened no confidence vote in her leadership are just grist to her mill.

But anything can happen.

Good.   Remember all the trouble over Universal Credit?

The man who did not know that Dover was the gateway to the EU and likely to grind to a halt if there are customs controls for which it has no infrastructure has resigned from his job. Good. He was clueless and should never have been given it.

As Thatcher said. Rejoice! Rejoice!

Yesterday’s two hour Cabinet meeting was a game changer. The hard line Brexiteers within it, urged to mutiny by the clownish Boris Johnson, who were widely expected to frustrate May’s plan by blocking it or resigning, fell into line. This was because the alternative is a No Deal Brexit. And contrary to everything everybody sang in that well known refrain ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’, when the facts were examined, no deal would be a catastrophe from which it would take at least a generation to recover. Anyone who had put their name to that would be politically ruined. And these people are politicians. With ambition. So they gave the plan their ‘collective backing’ and stole silently into the night.

Leaving a triumphant May to appear beaming on the steps of Downing Street to announce that the children had done as they were told and gone quietly to bed. And just to rub it in she added a new and terrifying threat. Any more nonsense and there will be no Brexit at all.

Things are now beginning to get really interesting……..

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It could be, because there does not seem any way forward. She is caught between the Irish Border, a split cabinet, a fractured party and no real plan that has any chance of getting past the EU or the Commons, either or both. But whether you like her or not, May is a fighter and she does not give in, so no predictions.The mess is now so great that there are three options only over Brexit.

The first is to agree a deal which leaves the country at large undamaged by staying in the single market and the customs union, making the contributions and sticking to the rules, enjoying free movement and if not full, associated citizenship of the EU. This would leave the country undamaged and the politicians punished for what has been described as a shocking failure of statecraft, for they would be excluded from everything. As soon as the millennials get themselves into parliament, we would go back into the EU as full members.

The second is to call the whole thing off and ask for the Article 50 letter back, citing more time to focus as the excuse. In the end the flawed and false vision of’Global Britain’ would fade and be forgotten.

The third is to hold another referendum with all the known options and costs in jobs and living standards spelled out. That will settle the matter.

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If you are in despair about Trump’s America read this brilliant article by Will Hutton in the Guardian.  Click the link.

READ WILL HUTTON IN THE GUARDIAN

I am from and Anglo-German family so in both world wars cousins fought each other on both sides. Today as we remember the staggering losses of  the First World War, we reflect upon the courage, endurance and sacrifice that our forbears set as an example to shine down the ages, the first centenary of which we now celebrate.

But in doing so we must not fudge the reality of history neither must we ignore the lesson. I was brought up and educated by people who had survived the carnage of WWI and whose vivid recollections were a part of almost daily conversation. Not in all cases. Some could barely speak of it. My father, due to an eyesight defect and fluency in three languages, was throughout the war in the Army Intelligence Corps, mostly at Haig’s HQ. His younger brother, my uncle, was eighteen years old when as a young lieutenant in the Royal Scots, he was killed on the Somme. Much of what I learned from my father is not for today, but it does not support the notion that World War One was justified or could not have been avoided.

Unlike World War II, which was a direct outcome of the ill judged and punitive Treaty of Versailles, World War One was not waged against a rampaging Fascist juggernaut bent on conquest, genocide and repression, but rather a quarrel among rivals enjoying the highest standards of prosperity in their history, with much in common and nothing between them to justify the slaughter of millions.

We need to remember that too.