British Politics Guide

[chris_notts]

OK, do I have this straight?

- there's been a bunch of heat and noise but
- May is still PM, but
- no one likes the agreement, but
- the agreement is still on

Apparently the EU has a summit to approve the agreement in November, and Parliament gets a vote in December.

We don't know if the agreement is on or not. Before it gets signed it need to be approved by a majority the British Parliament, the EU states, and the European Parliament. There are rumblings in at least two of those three groups.

The indications are that (a) it probably won't get through Parliament on the first attempt, and (b) the EU isn't in the mood for further negotiations. There are so many objectionable things in it that every MP can find something they won't vore for in it 500 pages. What isn't clear is whether a second attempt might succeed close to the cliff-edge.

As for May being in office, that's primarily because she will refuse to leave until absolutely required to by law. There will probably be a formal vote of no confidence within her party, which she will probably win. However, she's enraged the DUP so much that it's doubtful she still has a majority in Parliament for anything Brexit related and maybe anything full-stop. Under the current law she can limp on, in office but not in power, until either Parliament as a whole votes in someone else, or until Parliament as a whole expresses no confidence in the Government and triggers a General election.

What's clear is that the best case for her is getting to Brexit day before the knives come out. She has no future in politics beyond this deal.

[Salmoneus]

Indeed. It's fair to say the deal is "still on", in the sense that it's still the government's official policy.

However, as things stand, right now, the deal doesn't have a hope in hell of being agreed by parliament. May's hope is that if she can push the vote on the deal as close to the deadline as possible, so there's no hope at all of finding another option and so everyone's really concentrating on the catastrophe of No Deal, MPs will just be so terrified that they give in and accept it. But at the moment, there doesn't seem to be any sign of that - even lots of the people who you'd expect to support any deal over no deal have been scathing about this deal. Some of them will certainly give in before the vote, but I'd say there's more than a 50% chance that it won't be enough, given just how deep in the hole she is on the arithmetic here. She needs 320 votes, and currently she can probably be confident of at least 210, but probably no more than 245. Even if she wins back half of her rebels, and then also wins a couple of dozen Labour and Lib Dem people who'll feel obliged to back the deal for fear of worse, she's still coming up short. And the language used against her, and against the deal, feels as though it's gone from skepticism to opposition - I don't think it's all rock-solid opposition yet, I'm sure some are just posturing before capitulation, but it's not just going to be a matter of a media campaign and some reshuffles to get them on board.

And that's assuming she remains both Leader and Prime Minister... she's also going to need to do some more reshuffles first, because the vote is formally put to parliament by the Leader of the House, who has said off the record that she will refuse to do so and would resign before doing so.



To boil down the current sticking points... well, they're the same sticking point that they've always been, the irish border question. But now they've become more stark and clear. Everyone now agrees that they want a solution to the IBQ - but that solution, whether technological or political, will not be found before March 2019, and probably not before December 2020 (when the transition period will end under this deal). So, there needs to be a backstop option of where to put the border, if it somehow occurs that magic doesn't happen and we don't find a solution to the 'invisible border' problem under a rug somewhere. This leaves us precisely three options:

a) a border between Ireland and the UK. This is forbidden by the EU, and probably wouldn't be politically possible in the UK either - Northern Ireland would hate it and we'd all be afraid of a return to violence. So that's off the table - nobody's suggesting this option now. Leaving only two viable options...

1: a border between Northern Ireland and the UK. This is impossible because the DUP won't allow it, and lots of Tories won't allow it either because it weakens the union and puts northern ireland permanently under undemocratic rule by a foreign state.

2: no border, we all just stay under the EU rules forever.


Now, May has tried to split the difference: NI will stay in the single market, while the rest of the Union leaves, but we'll all stay in the customs union. This will minimise the practical visibility of the NI/GB border. But the DUP don't feel that this is enough. And the rest of the Tories feel it's too much, because they don't want to stay under EU rules.

Specifically, the problem here is that in order to be a reliable 'backstop' that ensures that the UK can't leave until the IBQ has been solved, it has to prohibit the UK from leaving unilaterally. Staying in the customs union means we can't negotiate our own trade deals outside the EU,which was what most Tories wanted from this anyway. And since part of the UK will stay in the single market too, there's be a huge political and economic pressure for the rest of the UK to at least informally abide by single market rules as well, so we'll still be following manufacturing regulations and so on (particularly because we'll have free trade with the EU but nowhere else, so we'll be dependent on them accepting our products).

And we won't be able to leave. Unless the EU says we can. So, say Tory skeptics, basically what we're doing is following the same rules as before, only before we had a say in making those rules AND we had a process to unilaterally decide to leave, and NOW we won't have a say AND we'll have given up the right to leave! How, they say, can "leaving the EU" be the same as "giving up our right to leave the EU"!? And they kind of have a point...

Now, the public as a whole may be ameliorated by the end to free movement - migration controlled! - but if it means giving up sovereignty? And do people really trust the government not to replace those migrants with migrants from non-EU countries? PLUS, at some point people will notice that we've agreed not to conduct passport checks on people travelling from Ireland (due to the CTA, which predates the EU), and Ireland won't conduct passport checks on people travelling from the EU, so we're basically creating an entirely unmonitored border with a big sign saying "illegal immigrants welcome!", and while the government says it'll prevent illegal immigration through randomised workplace inspections, nobody will believe them... so Leavers are left wondering exactly what they're meant to be getting out of this deal. Except a LOSS of sovereignty, a partial internal border with northern ireland, and a bunch of infuriated scots who want to have another go at independence.


------------


How can we get out of this? Well, assuming the "stonewall until everyone gets panicked by the deadline" option MIGHT not work, there's only two options....

i) screw the DUP. Take Great Britain out of the EU altogether, abandon northern ireland, build a wall in the irish sea. This is probably the easiest option in theory, but it's probably impossible with the current arithmetic: best case scenario is that after losing the DUP and a bunch of unionist rebel tories, May's able to persuade enough Labour and Lib Dem MPs to vote for the interests of the country that she's able to get the deal through. But then the next day, the Tories are left without a majority once the DUP tells them to go screw themselves for all eternity, and we'll have fresh elections.

ii) beg Labour. This is probably the most achievable available option under the current arithmetic: if May keeps the UK as completely in the EU as possible, it's possible that she'll be able to persuade enough Labour (and Lib Dem) MPs to vote for her that she can withstand mass defections from her own ranks. Maybe if we promise to do what the EU tell us forever, we'll be allowed to not include that perpetual-servitude clause in the deal itself? But then May will absolutely fave a challenge as Leader and will surely be replaced as Prime Minister*.

Since May's priority is to avoid any sort of vote that might remove her from power, she didn't dare take either option. So... we're stuck in limbo still.



*to add to the nightmare solutions chris and I were exchanging: what if May loses the leadership election to, say, Johnson, but the MPs rally around May anyway because they hate Johnson? You could have May as Prime Minister, without being the official leader of any party!

[chris_notts]

Realistically, I think the EU may have made a big mistake with the "perpetual servitude clause". Of course, the deal still may go through, but it's at best 50 - 50 I think. Leaving with no deal will almost certainly be far worse for the UK than the EU, but if there is no deal then the EU doesn't achieve any of its negotiating objectives at all.

Now they've insisted on the backstop so much, how can they say it's not necessary even if the UK were to go for some other no border deal, like EFTA + customs union? So what they've successfully done is established that the UK must accept permanent limits on its sovereignty within its own territory in order to get anything from the EU, not just for this deal but for any future arrangement. Would even rejoining the EU be allowed without a special NI treaty?

Assuming that the backstop is now a permanent requirement for any comprehensive deal with the EU, they've basically ruled out any vaguely sane relationship with the UK ever again. There is a strong strain of insular nationalism in parts of the UK electorate, and even if no deal is bad enough for us to go back begging for the same deal, those people will never forgive the EU for forcing the break up of the UK (as they see it), especially if Scotland leaves and joins the EU. They also, I think, won't really respect any deal which is arrived at, because they'll think that we were forced to sign the deal during an EU manufactured crisis. So the EU will be forced to enforce any deal extracted under such a situation, likely via economic penalties for attempts to break it (I can't see them invading the UK any time soon!). The same thing happened with Switzerland recently, afterall, when they pushed back against an aspect of their arrangement with the EU and were threatened with loss of single market access. The difference is that Switzerland isn't still living under the delusion that it's a great power the way the UK is, and when people's delusions are challenged they don't rethink, they get angry.

I'm not saying that this is the fault of the EU. It's completely true that it's hard to see how the GFA survives a hardish Brexit (and I don't think the EU solution completely respects it either), and that the UK voluntarily signed the GFA. It's also true that the UK's idea of getting all the benefits of the single market without accepting its regulatory infrastructure or any contribution towards maintaining that infrastructure was always completely unreasonable. But the problem is that we've gone beyond economic interests here to issues of national identity and nationalism. You can negotiate about economic interests, but you can't negotiate away someone's sense of who they are.

[Salmoneus]

Just for a bit of fun: how do British governments die? Let's start with Walpole...

Walpole (Orford): unofficial VONC (on excluding some MPs), resignation; party kept power
Compton (Wilmington): death
Pelham: death
Pelham-Holles (Newcastle): government collapse and internal coup (the PM was in serious threat of execution) due to the Seven Years War
Cavendish (Devonshire): internal coup aided by king, due to the Seven Years War and decision to execute someone to save Pelham-Holles
Pelham-Holles again: removed by the king because he liked someone else better
Stuart (Bute): resigned due to incredible unpopularity and being the victim of satire
Grenville: removed by the king because he hated him (and no-one else liked him either)
Watson-Wentworth (Rockingham): internal coup
Pitt the Elder (Chatham): resigned due to physical and mental illness
FitzRoy (Grafton): resigned due to criticism and being undermined by his own party
North: VONC! due to his mishandling of the American rebellion. First time a VONC forced an entire government from office.
Watson-Wentworth again: death
Petty (Shelbourne): appears to have lacked a majority after many of his government deserted him, but I'm not sure if there was a formal VONC?
Cavendish-Bentinck (Portland): unofficial VONC on reforming the EIC, after the king vowed personal enmity to anyone who voted in support of the government
Pitt the Younger: resigned due to the king's opposition to catholic emancipation in ireland (but resignation had to be delayed because the king was too insane to accept it that week). More interestingly, he had earlier been VONCed, but refused to resign, calling an election instead, which he won.


Addington (Sidmouth): resigned due to lacking a majority
Pitt the Younger again: death
Grenville (a different one): government collapsed over catholic emancipation
Cavendish-Bentinck again: resigned from ill health
Perceval: assassinated
Jenkinson (Liverpool): retired to avoid having to support catholic emancipation
Canning: death
Robinson (Goderich): removed by the king after the instability of his government became clear (after only 140-odd days)
Wellesley (Wellington): VONC! officially over the civil list, but actually in response to catholic emancipation
Grey: resigned when his government fell out over Ireland
Lamb (Melbourne): removed by king for being from the party the king didn't like
Wellesley again: only a caretaker until Peel could travel back to the UK
Peel: VONC! (church of ireland)
Lamb again: survived a sex scandal, tried to resign but the opposition refused to take power, then VONC! then lost an election but stayed in power then VONC! again
Peel again: VONC! (Ireland)
Russell: VONC! (electoral reform), but no other government could be formed, but then VONC! again (on the issue of whether the word 'local' should be included in the title of an act about local militias or only in the body of the text - a VONC called by one of his own ex-ministers, Palmerston)
Smith-Stanley (Derby): VONC! (budget)
Hamilton-Gordon (Aberdeen): VONC! (Crimea)
Temple (Palmerston): VONC! (making conspiracy to murder people abroad illegal)
Smith-Stanley again: pure VONC! for not having a majority (on the first day of the new parliament)
Temple: death
Russell again: VONC! (parliamentary reform)
Smith-Stanley again again: retired for ill health
Disraeli (Beaconsfield): LOST AN ELECTION!
Gladstone: VONC, but the opposition refused to replace him; then lost an election
Disraeli again: election
Gladstone again: VONC on budget (but really Khartoum)
Gascoyne-Cecil (Salisbury): VONC on three-acres-and-a-mule (but really Ireland)
Gladstone again again: VONC on Ireland
Gascoyne-Cecil again: lost an election, refused to stop being Prime Minister, but then directly VONCed
Gladstone again again again: resigned, being at odds with his cabinet on many issues
Primrose (Roseberry): VONC (army supply)
Gascoyne-Cecil again again: retired due to ill-health and bereavement



Balfour: party unity collapsed, resigned to put the opposition in difficulty
Campbell-Bannerman: retired due to ill-health (he died very shortly after)
Asquith: internal coup in coalition war government, but remained as party leader
Lloyd George: resigned following collapse of coalition
Law: retired for ill health (died soon after)
Baldwin: lost election, ousted by VONC
MacDonald: VONC (red scare)
Baldwin: lost election
MacDonald again: government resigned due to cabinet schism on the great depression, but MacDonald remained PM
MacDonald again again (as 'National Government'): resigned for physical and mental ill-health
Baldwin again (as National): retired
Chamberlain: internal coup forced by coalition allies
Churchill: lost election
Attlee: lost election
Churchill again: retired
Eden: resigned due to ill-health (but really Suez)
Macmillan: retired due to ill-health (but really unpopularity and Profumo)
Douglas-Home: lost election
Wilson: lost election
Heath: lost election
Wilson: resigned for mysterious reasons (probably ill health)
Callaghan: VONC! forcing an election, which he lost
Thatcher: internal coup
Major: lost election
Blair: resigned due to unpopularity and internal opposition


Brown: lost election
Cameron: resigned due to embarrasment
May: ...?

[Salmoneus]

Realistically, I think the EU may have made a big mistake with the "perpetual servitude clause". Of course, the deal still may go through, but it's at best 50 - 50 I think. Leaving with no deal will almost certainly be far worse for the UK than the EU, but if there is no deal then the EU doesn't achieve any of its negotiating objectives at all.

True, but it has no choice. They can't get any deal agreed without Ireland agreeing. No Irish Taoiseach will ever voluntarily agree to a hard border with northern ireland (especially because we've promised there won't really be a hard border even with No Deal). Therefore, the EU couldn't agree to anything with a hard border.

Now they've insisted on the backstop so much, how can they say it's not necessary even if the UK were to go for some other no border deal, like EFTA + customs union? So what they've successfully done is established that the UK must accept permanent limits on its sovereignty within its own territory in order to get anything from the EU, not just for this deal but for any future arrangement. Would even rejoining the EU be allowed without a special NI treaty?

Sure - if we rejoin the EU, there's no Irish Border Question anymore! Likewise, if we agree to any permanent deal, the IBQ will be included in that, as well, because if we agree it's permanent then the question of what happens after doesn't arise. The problem only really arises because we've explicitly said the new union will only be temporary, so they have to ask: so what happens when it ends? Of course, technically there is still the problem that we might be lying or might change our mind, but I think that's far enough in the future that the EU would be happy to deal with it when it arises. At the moment, though, we're threatening to enter a hard border situation within just a couple of years!

Also, it's two-sided. In this deal, the EU is promising NOT to penalise Britain for its actions, in return for us promising not to screw up ireland. If we entered an open-ended new arrangement, the EU could leave the IBQ open, because it could always threaten No Deal at the end of THAT arrangement. So at the end of EU-lite, we'd be back in the current situation. But at the moment, the EU can't do that, because we're asking IT to promise to sort out its end of the bargain, in a legally-binding way, while at the same time demanding that WE are free to renegotiate our side of the bargain whenever we want. They can't accept that - either we're both bound or neither of us are. And the latter means No Deal - the hotel california clause is just the EU saying that they'll take No Deal off the table permanently, so long as we do too.

[chris_notts]

Sure - if we rejoin the EU, there's no Irish Border Question anymore!

But as we're currently demonstrating, being in the EU is not a permanent guarantee, and neither is being in the EFTA. Both allow you to give notice and leave. By the logic the EU has expressed for the all weather backstop, there is no long term deal possible that doesn't have to say what happens if we withdraw from it. That was my point - the backstop question has now tainted every single possible relationship we could negotiate, including negotiating staying in.

Also, it's two-sided. In this deal, the EU is promising NOT to penalise Britain for its actions, in return for us promising not to screw up ireland. If we entered an open-ended new arrangement, the EU could leave the IBQ open, because it could always threaten No Deal at the end of THAT arrangement.

Are the long term promises we're getting really that valuable? They are not detailed enough to really bind the EU that much regarding what the final arrangement looks like. They'd still easily have the most power in any negotiation. It's not obvious to me we've extracted much of value apart from a stay of execution, which may or may not survive negotiating the final arrangements.

Personally, as I said... I would never call myself a nationalist, my wife is an EU national, and I don't blame the EU for pursuing its interests, but if I were an MP I couldn't vote for this deal. There are some things you can't trade away for economic advantage, and the idea of signing such a horrible deal with no exit clause is unacceptable.

If we were allowed to revert back to something like our previous membership terms that would be preferrable, but if it's this deal or economic chaos then I'd pick chaos.

[zompist]

If we were allowed to revert back to something like our previous membership terms that would be preferrable, but if it's this deal or economic chaos then I'd pick chaos.

If you were May and could renegotiate, what would you do about Ireland?

As Sal says, this is the crux of the matter— once you accept that you want no border, you basically get the agreement May got.

[chris_notts]

If we were allowed to revert back to something like our previous membership terms that would be preferrable, but if it's this deal or economic chaos then I'd pick chaos.

If you were May and could renegotiate, what would you do about Ireland?

As Sal says, this is the crux of the matter— once you accept that you want no border, you basically get the agreement May got.

I think I already answered the question? Where May went wrong was in ruling out "normal" membership of the single market. Norway and other EFTA countries are in the single market (although not the customs union) and don't have to adopt the majority of EU laws, only those relating to the market itself. If May wanted to, she could have "taken back control" of a lot of our laws while still staying in economically. Of course, this wouldn't have stopped free movement, but given the narrowness of the leave victory it probably would have commanded the support of a majority of the voters. Her current plan, on the other hand, is unloved by anybody.

The EFTA option, together with a customs union, completely solves the Irish border issue, because the markets would be identical so no border would be needed. Note also that the EFTA nations have the right to leave, just as we have the right to leave the EU via article 50. This is crucial for me, because even the EFTA nations give up a lot of sovereignty for economic reasons. For me, this is tolerable under two circumstances:

1. You have a role in setting the rules
2. OR you have the right to leave if the rules turn against you

The big, unacceptable problem with May's deal is that it denies the UK both a role setting the rules and an easy way to leave. It does effectively subjugate the UK, in whole or in part, to a foreign power in perpetuity. Didn't you Americans have a revolution over a lack of representation?

The cause of this mess, and the reason we tried to build a whole new status for the UK instead of picking from one of the pre-existing options, is May's redlines:

1. To limit the jurisdiction of the ECJ as much as possible
2. To limit payments as much as possible
3. To not have free movement of people

She's succeeded in (3) and (2), at the expense of an unacceptable, permanent subjugation to a foreign power with no influence over the decisions made which affect us and no way to object or leave. Note that May also made a terrible strategic mistake in triggering article 50 and then wasting most of the 2 years negotiating with her own side. She was under no legal obligation to start the process until she was well prepared to go through it.

So the answer to your questions is that, if I'd need negotiating, my order of preference to respect the referendum result would have been:

1. EFTA equivalent option + customs union, i.e. Norway+ -> take back control of all areas unrelated to the core single market, probably reduction in financial contribution. Since this would either be re-joining an existing treaty structure or duplicating the structure, it would have been easier to make progress than May's attempt to build a sui generis status.

My position on NI would be that, if the EU required a backstop even in the case where we remain full single market members, then it could only be in the form of a choice for the people of NI, i.e. that if the UK ever left the EFTA they had the right to decide which border they wanted, in the same way they have the right to vote to reunite with Ireland under the GFA. And further, that if they chose to be on the SM side, there must be some way for the people of NI to be represented, either by being grouped with Ireland in elections for the EP or in some other way.

Anything else is, again, inflicting arrangements on people and giving them no say. Otherwise the people of NI would be subject to rules of the single market without the ability to vote for MEPs, or for the government of an EU member, or to vote for their country to leave the single market and take them with it.

2. If that was no possible, then (a) I would not try to broaden the backstop to the whole UK the way May did, but would instead leave it at the level of NI subject to the consent and representation conditions outlined above, and (b) try to find the least bad other model for the rest of the UK.

3. If all of the above failed, then the only acceptable options for me would be either attempt to stay in or leave without a deal, probably decided by a referendum. As described above, what's completely unacceptable about this deal is it denies the whole of the UK both any say, and any easy way out.

Does this make sense?

[zompist]

Does this make sense?

Well, kind of. The thing is, you can't have full sovereignty PLUS full access to the EU market PLUS no NI border. So you have to give up something.

If you want a say in the rules for the market— well, you had that, it was called EU membership. It was a good deal, in fact, because you didn't have to join the disastrous Euro. If you still want access to the market (and "Norway + customs union" is that), then you're losing quite a bit of economic sovereignty.

As I understand it, the Norway model is a pretty good second-best to actual membership. But it includes free movement, and as you point out, that was a non-starter for May, because she couldn't get it past her party. (And as the article points out, the other EFTA/EEA members are not enthusiastic about Britain joining temporarily.)

If I understand it, the backstop is not supposed to actually happen— what should happen is that within the transition period, the UK and EU negotiate yet another agreement that solves all the problems. (Cue derisive laughter.)

NI is still the crux. Staying in the customs union is the only way to avoid a hard border. Putting in an opt-out mechanism is basically saying that NI will be definitively thrown under the bus at a future date. And that would almost certainly make both Ireland and the DUP scuttle the deal. (Of course, the DUP doesn't support the current deal anyway...)

(For your own plan for NI, choosing "which border they wanted" is the nice way of saying "they can leave the UK", isn't it? I mean, sure, they could, but for like a hundred years, the whole issue is that a bunch of them don't want to do that, right? And in particular, May's coalition partner doesn't want to do that.)

[mèþru]

So many problems could be solved if NI was a separate state from both Ireland and the UK.

[chris_notts]

(For your own plan for NI, choosing "which border they wanted" is the nice way of saying "they can leave the UK", isn't it? I mean, sure, they could, but for like a hundred years, the whole issue is that a bunch of them don't want to do that, right? And in particular, May's coalition partner doesn't want to do that.)

No, it isn't. Even if NI were part of the single market, it could still be governed as part of the UK. Whether there's a customs and market standards border in the sea says nothing about who governs everything outside the EU's competence. All 3 models are imaginable:

Part of UK + no SM
Part of UK + SM
Part of Ireland (+ CM)

The EU's original backstop proposal was the second item on the list.

[chris_notts]

As I understand it, the Norway model is a pretty good second-best to actual membership. But it includes free movement, and as you point out, that was a non-starter for May, because she couldn't get it past her party. (And as the article points out, the other EFTA/EEA members are not enthusiastic about Britain joining temporarily.)

Who said anything about temporarily? I'm not saying we should set a time limit on it or plan to leave. What I'm saying is that, if we are locked into a deal with no say, then leaving must be an option. Otherwise we're committing to following rules that could be anything. The EU could make tea illegal and we'd have to follow, for God's sake.

I completely admit that the "Norway for Now" people are crazy.

[Raphael]

What's the chance that someone introduces a motion of no confidence at some time in the near future? I mean in the Commons, not in the Parliamentary Conservative Party.

[Salmoneus]

What's the chance that someone introduces a motion of no confidence at some time in the near future? I mean in the Commons, not in the Parliamentary Conservative Party.

Depends on 'near future', I think. Immediately? Minimal. Longer term, could happen.

Right now, nobody's going to want to be the ones who tore down the government on the eve of Brexit with no plan of their own. Could Labour do it? Yes - but I think if Labour did it every Tory would rally behind their leader, which means they'd need the DUP, and the DUP absolutely despise Corbyn. Could a Tory do it out of desperation? I guess, and if a bunch of ERGers do it and the other parties join in, they wouldn't need the DUP. But the ERGers also despise Corbyn - it's conceivable that they might decide they hate May's deal more and will do anything to stop it, but it's unlikely, particularly because the deal won't take much stopping...

So, if there is going to unrest in Parliament, the first step is getting this deal out of the way. Either it's accepted, in which case May has no problem, or its rejected, in which case she might have a problem.

I think there are three scenarios where a parliamentary VONC could happen:

1) May can't get her deal passed, but absolutely refuses to consider doing anything else. Internal challenges against May fail, and a small number of Tories side with the opposition out of a desparation to get SOME deal passed and avoid No Deal. They agree to bring down the government, have fresh elections, and have the new government bosh together an emergency brexit deal that can pass the new house. This is unlikely, but possible - but the problem is, few people sane enough to see the need to avoid No Deal are also naive enough to think that a new parliament and a new government could actually agree a new deal before B-Day.

2) May can't get her deal passed, and completely and utterly pisses off the DUP in the process, who vote to end the government. Possibly, but requires the DUP effectively voting for Corbyn, who is the closest thing to a Sinn Féinn MP sitting in Westminster, and that's unlikely.

3) May can't get her deal passed, pisses off the DUP, but the DUP don't VONC her. Instead, they simply refuse to deal with her in future. Perhaps they support a budget here, or an increased-spending-on-Northern-Ireland there, but basically the government cannot get anything passed. At this point, the Tories would probably have to try to replace May eventually. If they can't, or if the replacement doesn't do any better at appeasing the DUP, then a bunch of Tories will eventually decide that their party will be less damaged by a bad election than by humiliating and useless stasis, and will vote to put themselves out of their misery.

I think this last scenario is actually quite plausible, but it'll take... well, certainly after Brexit and probably a while after that too.


The big external pressure point is the 2nd of May, when we have local elections in most of the country, including all of northern ireland. About a month after Brexit, these will be seen as effectively a giant referendum on how well the various parties have dealt with the crisis. It's an election that's not important enough to worry about in advance - nobody's going to say 'we need to replace May in order to win the local elections!', but it's big enough that people analyse the results a lot. Governing parties usually lose ground. If there's a landslide against the Tories, a lot of them will start saying they NEED to get May out of the way, if she's still there then. If UKIP do well at Tory expense, that'll strengthen the brexiteers, although what exactly the brexiteer issues will be after brexit, I don't know. [Europe having been the main divisive issue for the Tories for forty years]. On the other hand, a big success for the Tories would make May very hard to get rid of. NI results will also be important - gains or losses for the DUP could lead them to reconsider their current strategy. [although it's hard for the DUP to lose votes, as they effectively have no opposition*]


*there used to be two protestant parties in NI, and two catholic parties. But the UUP and the SDLP have been gradually driven to the margins ever since they agreed to consider peace back in the 90s, which means the DUP and Sinn Féin basically have no competition, since neither can appeal to the voter-base of the other. The alternative parties have only around 1/3rd the votes of the two main ones, and no seats in westminster. (there's also a fifth party, who support not hating each other and resolving issues on policy grounds rather than by bloodlines, but needless to say they're in fifth place...) That said, while the UUP isn't going to replace the DUP, it's possible they could make notable strides forward if the DUP completely misunderstand their electorate.

[dewrad]

Now, I'm an old-fashioned socialist who likes "Corbynista" policies, but find the man utterly frustrating: today's admission during that Sophy Ridge interview that he doesn't see the point in a second referendum and doesn't know how he would vote even were it to happen just seem utterly tone-deaf to the mood within his party. I'm aware of his reasons, but my god I find it maddening. The Labour party is 3 points ahead in the polls. Given the current omnishambles that is the Tory government, they should be 15+ points ahead, ffs, and I blame Corbyn.

Therefore, my question is: what do you reckon the likelihood of Corbyn being ousted is, and what impact on the entire shitshow would it have?

[Moose-tache]

...they should be 15+ points ahead...

This can basically be said at any time about any center-left opposition party. It's obvious that the reasonable people should be winning, and it's just as obvious that elections will never work that way.

[alice]

3) May can't get her deal passed, pisses off the DUP, but the DUP don't VONC her. Instead, they simply refuse to deal with her in future. Perhaps they support a budget here, or an increased-spending-on-Northern-Ireland there, but basically the government cannot get anything passed. At this point, the Tories would probably have to try to replace May eventually. If they can't, or if the replacement doesn't do any better at appeasing the DUP, then a bunch of Tories will eventually decide that their party will be less damaged by a bad election than by humiliating and useless stasis, and will vote to put themselves out of their misery.

If UKIP do well at Tory expense, that'll strengthen the brexiteers, although what exactly the brexiteer issues will be after brexit, I don't know. [Europe having been the main divisive issue for the Tories for forty years].

What is the likelihood of brexiteer Tories jumping ship and joining UKIP, if electoral conditions are favourable? (This is part of what I asked earlier about existing party organisations becoming untenable.)

"brexiteer issues after brexit" would probably consist of making sure the Government has little to do with the EU as possible, whatever that may entail.

[mèþru]

...they should be 15+ points ahead...

This can basically be said at any time about any center-left opposition party. It's obvious that the reasonable people should be winning, and it's just as obvious that elections will never work that way.

I think this thinking is why it doesn't happen; leftists assume too many people are like them when there are actually lots of people who actually think things like defunding the NHS work. Also, if elections in Britain were reformed to match voting, it would lead to the decline of Labour, the Conservatives and the SNP. All governments would have to be coalitions or minority governments, and the competition between Labour and the resurgent Lib Dems mean that Conservatives would always have the most seats for forming a minority government.

[Salmoneus]

A fun bit of polling from Youtube: what should we do now?

28% think we should abandon Brexit and remain in the EU
19% think we should abandon the deal and just leave the EU with no deal at all
16% think we should accept Theresa May's deal
11% think we should just negotiate a different deal
8% think we should have a referendum on whether to accept the offered deal
2% think we should do 'something else'
16% admit that they aren't sure what we should do.

So: people are very opinionated, but no possible action could have the support of public as a whole.

-------------------

In completely unrelated polling news: 40% of people find playing with lego relaxing (22% don't, and 23% pretend they've never played with lego), and 7% believe people have a right to identify as whatever age they wish and to have the government legally recognise that age-identity. (none of the main parties are campaigning on that yet, though)

----------------

Now, I'm an old-fashioned socialist who likes "Corbynista" policies, but find the man utterly frustrating: today's admission during that Sophy Ridge interview that he doesn't see the point in a second referendum and doesn't know how he would vote even were it to happen just seem utterly tone-deaf to the mood within his party. I'm aware of his reasons, but my god I find it maddening. The Labour party is 3 points ahead in the polls. Given the current omnishambles that is the Tory government, they should be 15+ points ahead, ffs, and I blame Corbyn.

Therefore, my question is: what do you reckon the likelihood of Corbyn being ousted is, and what impact on the entire shitshow would it have?

The big question here is whether the Labour party actually exists or not. Most of the parliamentary party won't support their leader, and the semblance of an opposition he's managed to cobbled together from the far left, the party loyalists, and the willing to do anything for a job, is shambolic. They are astonishing ineffectual, and that might be what's allowed them to survive. I have a suspicion that they're in a sort of schroedinger's collapse: inside the briefcase, they've either they've fallen apart or they've banded together and overcome their crisis, but nobody has any interest in opening that briefcase. Corbyn's electoral strategy seems just to be "you can't see me! you can't see me! you can't tell if I'm a credible leader or not because you can't see me!"

What will happen once, as eventually it must do, the spotlight turns back toward them? I wouldn't rule out immediate collapse. I wouldn't rule out success. But I think the more likely option is that the rebels wait him out, and hope that the party base gradually loses their fondness for him in a haze of disappointment. And he's doing his best to help that, particularly if the Labour base may be shifting more toward Remain.

But of course, if he does go, then Labour are really in trouble, because then they'll have an ideological fight that can't be phrased just in personality differences. In fact, they've got two fights: are they a moderate party that wants to be in power, or are they an extremist party that wants to be a pressure group?; and are they a liberal, internationalist and cosmopolitan party, or are they a party of the working class and economic justice?

It would be nice if they could be both. But strategically, pushing hard on the socialist side of their policies while still competing for power will mean having to appeal to core 'Old Labour' voters, particularly in places like Newcastle. And that means they can't be liberal, internationalist and cosmopolitan, because Old Labour Up North is socially conservative, Leaver, parochial, and bigoted. Whereas aiming for the cosmopolitan Remainer vote will lose them a lot of votes up north, but would open up other opportunities in areas like London and the southeast, where there a scads of moderate Tories alienated by the hard-brexit direction their party's headed.

Given a choice between Labour and Tory, a lot of both types of potential labour voter feel they need to vote Labour. But if and when Labour has an open and public debate about its ideological future, that's going to alienate a lot of people on either one side or the other.


And how will this affect things? In the short term, it won't - the Tories occupy all the public's attention right now. Assuming there's no snap election, May's council elections could be a trigger for action: if Labour make sweeping gains, the media will briefly note it and move back to pressurising Theresa May, but if Labour fail to make ground, particularly if third parties do make ground, Labour rebels will agitate against Corbyn in some way, and that might move attention back to them.

The worst case scenario for Labour might be winning a general election - I don't know what happens then. I don't think Corbyn has anything like the votes within his own party that he'd need to actually push most of his agenda through, particularly if there's (as is likely) a very small majority. We could be looking at a scenario in which the leader of the party with a majority has the solid backing of his grassroots so can't be removed internally, and yet can't actually personally command a majority in Parliament, which would be a constitutional crisis.

[Raphael]

What's the chance that someone introduces a motion of no confidence at some time in the near future? I mean in the Commons, not in the Parliamentary Conservative Party.

Depends on 'near future', I think. Immediately? Minimal. Longer term, could happen.


[...]

Ah, thank you, Sal!