Skip to main content

Brexit: the End Game?

The UK government is to ask the Queen to prorogue parliament. It is another move in the game of chess that is Brexit. The stakes are high. Yesterday opposition leaders in parliament agreed to find ways to take hold of the parliamentary agenda so that they could pass legislation to halt a no-deal Brexit.

No deal is the default position. All Boris Johnson needs to do is to sit tight and prevent parliament from voting and there will be a no-deal Brexit on 31 October. There is a lot of shouting about parliamentary coups and constitutional crisis. No doubt there will be a legal challenge in the courts. But the sad truth is No-Dealers have the upper hand.

That is why Boris Johnson is in No 10 as Prime Minister. Meanwhile, the opposition scurries around and, frankly, can't get their act together. They are still too busy moving their pawns around and ignoring the possibility of CheckMate. What Johnson is doing by proroguing parliament is castling to defend his position. That is all he needs to do.

 Remain and deal MPs seem utterly devoid of tactics. It is obvious that the way to stop a government in parliament is to bring it down with a confidence motion. In fact, it is the only way. Scrabbling around finding ways to take over the legislative agenda risks not working and taking valuable effort and time. It is unlikely to succeed.

Sadly, a confidence motion is also unlikely to work because some remain MPs and those who want a deal won't back it. Why? Because it might put Jeremy Corbyn in No 10! If they dropped this red line, then it would work. So, what is their priority? It is time MPs who do not want a Brexit without a deal got behind the most obvious way forward. It is also the most constitutional way in our parliamentary democracy.

I have little sympathy with those MPs who say under no circumstances would they support a Corbyn led caretaker government. It seems to me that it is the only constitutional way forward for them, else they get a no-deal Brexit.

 I have also to say that ardent Remainers have to take some share of the responsibility for the current impasse. They helped turn this into an in/out division with little room for compromise. They need now to unite behind a sensible end game. It beggars belief they would rather have Boris Johnson in Downing Street, rather than back a caretaker government under the current Leader of the Opposition.

In the last general election, all the major parties campaigned on manifestos for a negotiated Brexit. Had they been able to unite behind a deal, then this could have been put back to the people in a second referendum. That option is fading fast. The only way there can be a new people's vote is for there to be a sensible deal to vote on.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Ian Duncan-Smith says he wants to make those on benefits 'better people'!

By any account, the government's austerity strategy is utilitarian. It justifies its approach by the presumed potential ends. It's objective is to cut the deficit, but it has also adopted another objective which is specifically targeted. It seeks to drive people off benefits and 'back to work'.  The two together are toxic to the poorest in society. Those least able to cope are the most affected by the cuts in benefits and the loss of services. It is the coupling of these two strategic aims that make their policies ethically questionable. For, by combining the two, slashing the value of benefits to make budget savings while also changing the benefits system, the highest burden falls on a specific group, those dependent on benefits. For the greater good of the majority, a minority group, those on benefits, are being sacrificed; sacrificed on the altar of austerity. And they are being sacrificed in part so that others may be spared. Utilitarian ethics considers the ba...

Ethical considerations of a National DNA database.

Plans for a national DNA database   will be revealed by the Prime Minister this week. This is the same proposal the Tories and Liberal Democrats opposed when presented by the Blair government because they argued it posed  a threat to civil liberties. This time it is expected to offer an 'opt-out' clause for those who do not wish their data to be stored; exactly how this would operate isn't yet clear. But does it matter and does it really pose a threat to civil liberties? When it comes to biology and ethics we tend to have a distorted view of DNA and genetics. This is for two reasons. The first is that it is thought that our genome somehow represents the individual as a code that then gets translated. This is biologically speaking wrong. DNA is a template and part of the machinery for making proteins. It isn't a code in anything like the sense of being a 'blueprint' or 'book of life'.  Although these metaphors are used often they are just that, metapho...

In praise of social housing and the welfare state

I will declare an interest. I grew up in a one-parent family on a council estate. I occasionally attended my local comprehensive school. I say occasionally because for the most part I played truant. I spent much of my time skipping school but walking and reading on the local common. It had a windmill which I loved. It later had Wombles but that is another story. I contemplated life under the sun. Like many others, I left school at 15 with no qualifications. My penultimate school report said they  'could see no reason why public money should be wasted on the attempted education of this boy'. So I declare this interest of a privileged upbringing. Social housing kept a roof over our heads at a rent mum could (barely) afford; and oh how I recall the days  when she couldn't. She worked all hours to keep that roof over our heads. In those early days of Rock-and-Roll, Bill Haley and the Comets, Adam Faith, Billy Fury, Cliff Richard (yes I was/am a fan), the estate had three c...