It’s
November and the UK’s position with the European Union remains
unchanged. Despite all the promises we are still paying the EU vast
amounts so that they can spend our taxes on themselves and their pet
schemes in Europe and on aid around the world.
Now the mythical
leaving date has been moved to the end of January 2020. This gives the
politicians just thirteen weeks to complete their scrutiny and implement
some form of exit plan.
But
the first six of these weeks will be spent campaigning in a general
election. Then at least the next three will be spent getting the new
parliament in place and taking a Christmas-New Year break. Then no more
than four weeks will remain for the new balance of power to take control
and finalise a plan.
Of course the numbers are critical in determining how these four weeks progress – if at all. The so-called Liberal Democrats (George Orwell’s fictional NewSpeak
becomes fact!) intend to revoke our request to leave if they get the
chance. And there are constituencies that voted to remain in 2016 where
today’s voters think that this is acceptable practice. With a number of
MPs switching their allegiance the party could gain seats – but perhaps
not enough to have another female Prime Minister just yet [sorry Jo]
Meanwhile
the Marx Brothers – and Sisters – say they will delay leaving yet again
so that they can negotiate a better leaving deal and then campaign to
remain through a second referendum. One that excludes the option to
leave as a free agent under world trade terms. Considering that many Grandads
from outside of Greater London who voted to leave in 2016 are also
traditional Labour voters this approach seems doomed from day one. The
only question is how many seats will Labour loose?
At the Shrine of the Dead Donkey the Conservative position is let’s back the May-Robbins-Johnson deal and move on. This policy could be good enough to convince enough voters and so add enough seats for a new government to have a working majority. Its major weakness is that it leaves the country shackled to our friends in Europe. And that man Barnier is already lined-up to extract the maximum punishment in the trade talks still to come. Given the time and effort spent to get to the current position – and what has happened with other trade deals – we could be suffering at the hands of the EU for many more years.
Finally
we have the party that highlighted the problems created when widely
divergent nations are tied to a common bureaucracy. In this election the
Brexit Party will suffer from being seen as a one issue party – and
from the Conservatives reluctance to spell out what their deal really
means. The voting public are smart enough to treat Euro elections
differently to domestic ones. So the TBP will not gain as many seats as
they did earlier this year. However they have the possibility of gaining
some and these could be critical in influencing the outcome of those
four weeks in January.
It
all depends on how well the implications – and shortcomings – of the
current deal can be explained. And if the new parliament reverses the
no-deal block that was imposed by political scaremongers in the last
session.
Time to book some holidays away from all of this …