Labour's Brexit Stance Disintegrates Again

Labour's position on Brexit appeared to be hardening, under pressure of having seen its support haemorrhage to the Liberals, Greens and others. Even 60% of Labour members voted Liberal in the EU Parliament elections. Labour appeared to have learned the lesson, and to be emphasising that it was an anti-Brexit Party, committed to stopping a No Deal Brexit, and supporting another referendum in which it would back Remain. In the last couple of days, that position seems to have disintegrated once more, and, at the same time, Labour's position over a General Election also seems to have disintegrated into Byzantine farce, as it gets drawn into a web of parliamentary cretinism. 

On Brexit, Labour now again seems to be saying that although its immediate concern is to stop a No Deal Brexit, it is no longer demanding a General Election as the means of ensuring that. Indeed, Labour's current position is that it now does not want a General Election, immediately, because that might thwart its opposition to a No Deal Brexit, either because Johnson would manoeuvre and call the election for after October 31st, or alternatively, and more bizarrely, because Johnson might actually win the election, having fought it on the basis of No Deal, and would then be able to implement it! But, whenever an election is held, if Johnson wins it, on the basis of fighting on a No Deal Programme, he will be able to implement it, before or after October 31st! 

Worse, Labour is now once again emphasising that, in any such election, they will go into it arguing that they would resume Brexit negotiations with the EU, to reach a Brexit deal. In other words we are back into the land of fantasy Brexit Deals, that allow cake to be had and simultaneously eaten, of unicorn Jobs First Brexits, and so on. Yet, its clear that Labour itself does not now believe that any such fantasy Brexit is possible, because it argues that whatever deal it then negotiated, it would put to the electorate along with the option to Remain, and that it would then campaign for that latter Remain option, rather than the deal it had just painstakingly, and presumably time-wastingly negotiated!!! Its as though they don't want to win an election. Once again, they are giving absolutely no reason for Labour voters, who by a margin of 4:1 back Remain, to vote Labour, rather than for a clear anti-Brexit party like the Liberals, Greens, Plaid or the SNP. Even less are they giving the supporters of any of those parties any reason to switch to Labour, tactically, simply to stop Brexit. 

All the time that is happening Cummings/Johnson are proceeding full steam ahead with their Bonapartist military strategy, and forming the Tory Party up as a hard, disciplined, counter-revolutionary force, expelling any waverers, with their replacements already lined up, showing that this has been a long planned operation, with their outriders in the Brexit Company shepherding in any waverers, and with the extra-parliamentary forces of the EDL et al, available should they become required as the continuum between politics and war, becomes more skewed towards the latter. The liberal luvvies complain that Rees-Mogg shows contempt for parliament, by lounging on its benches, that Johnson's performances show contempt, and of course, Cummings was found in contempt of parliament. They do not seem to understand that that is precisely the narrative that Cummings/Johnson are cultivating, just as it has been the narrative that Trump has told in the US, of “contempt” for the establishment, for the elite, and, thereby, to present themselves as the tribunes of the people in opposition to that elite, even though, to a man, they are the most rabid examples of that elite themselves. 

Its reported that the Tory rebels who were expelled on Tuesday, received text messages, soon after, containing pro formas, from their local associations, telling them that they would not be entitled to stand as Tory candidates, and that three prospective candidates for their seat had already been lined up. That shows that the expulsions were no accident or mistake. They have been planned long in advance, and all those other wavery Tories, who did not rebel, will not have saved themselves either; they simply haven't offered up themselves up for such deselection, but its coming to them anyway. That is why, as I wrote the other day, Johnson's threat, before the vote to expel the rebel MP's was an empty threat. It invited Tory MP's who knew their days were numbered to still go ahead. Why would Johnson invite them to do that, and thereby ensure his defeat in that vote? Why would he then sack 21 Tory MP's, putting himself at the head of a government that is now in a minority of 45? Precisely because he needed to lose those votes, he needed to put himself in a minority government, and in the process to clear out the non-core Tories. The defeats in parliament for Johnson over the last couple of days are only defeats if you are imbued entirely with the spirit of parliamentary cretinism, of seeing everything purely through the prism of parliamentary votes. 

The Cummings/Johnson narrative is simple. The people voted for Brexit, we intend to carry it out, but we are being frustrated by the elite, and its parliamentary representatives, including those from the Tory Party. Those MP's have shown contempt for the electorate, and so now we are showing contempt for those MP's, and for their parliament. It is only a matter of when, like Cromwell, they say in clear terms “You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately... Depart, I say; and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!” In essence, that is what Johnson did by proroguing parliament for five weeks, which was a preliminary coup. But, it is only a warning shot, in the unfolding war. All of the liberal luvvies, who fret about having their feelings hurt, by harsh language, will be of absolutely no use as this real politics plays out. Unfortunately, I fear that, given its current leadership that has vacillated, backtracked and cavilled over the last three years, and whose strategy has been disastrous, the Labour Party itself is in no position to deal with the political storm that is coming on. Less still if it tries to herd the cats of the other opposition parties will it be able to present any hard, disciplined opposition. 

In fact, last night, the lack of discipline and failure to rein in the Labour Right was manifest when right-wingers like Stephen Kinnock and Caroline Flint were able to undermine Labour's strategy by putting forward an amendment demanding that Theresa May's terrible Withdrawal Agreement be put forward once again, having been rightly rejected by parliament three times already. Showing just how much the British Constitution is actually broken and not fit for purpose, the government was able to show how it can even beat the opposition at these parliamentary games, even from a minority position, by just failing to put up tellers, which meant the amendment was carried. In a war between a hardened disciplined force, and a rabble, the former will always win. 

Labour's parliamentary strategy is to refuse to agree a General Election until Boris Johnson has been forced to go to Brussels to demand an extension of Article 50, having failed to negotiate a new deal. Everyone knows that Johnson is not negotiating any new deal, and has no intention of negotiating a new deal. Labour thinks that, if he can be forced to ask for an extension, it will destroy the Tory Party, give a boost to the Brexit Party, which will then divide the Brexit vote, allowing Labour to win the election, or at least for the Tories to lose it. They have miscalculated. 

Johnson has made it clear that “he” will not ask for an extension. Essentially parliament has now ruled out a General Election before October 31st. As I wrote the other day, Johnson will now sit out the five weeks' suspension of parliament, pumping out rash spending and other promises, free from any consideration of whether he will have to implement them, free from any parliamentary scrutiny, just as he did with the EU referendum campaign. He knows there are a large number of gullible voters who do not bother too much with questioning those promises, or the other “facts” he presents to them, so long as they confirm their own biases and bigotries. Trump found the same thing, and the same is true of the other right-wing populists and Bonapartists, be it Putin, Orban, Netanyahu, Erdogan, Duterte et al. He will have an eager gutter press willing to spread those lies, just as the Daily Mail did in supporting Hitler, Mussolini and Mosely in the 1920's, and 1930's, and they will have the BBC, keen for ratings, to continue to invite on to their screens the Suzanne Evans's, the unrepresentatives of Spiked Online and so on, to spread that garbage. 

He will use the time to emphasise the betrayal narrative that he wanted to carry out the people's Brexit, but parliament had prevented him doing so. He will appeal above parliament's head to “the mass”, as every Bonapartist does. He will ,at every stage, emphasise that parliament holds the people in contempt and so the strong state, acting in the interest of that people, must hold parliament equally in contempt. Come October 17th, rather than complying with parliament's demand that he asks for an extension, he will refuse. But, rather than breaking the law by not implementing the legislation, he will instead simply go to the palace and tender his resignation as Prime Minister, in the same way that Theresa May did just a few weeks ago, and as many other Prime Ministers have done in the past, which then does not require a General Election. He will challenge the rabble that now comprises the forces of the opposition to come together to agree on their own Prime Minister, in the two weeks left before Britain crashes out of the EU on October 31st. 

If they do so, he will again have won, and reinforced his narrative. Shortly after October 31st any such government of national unity would have to call a General Election, or else fall apart. Johnson, having held to his principled position of insisting on carrying out the People's Will would fight the election from that narrative, painting the fractious opposition parties as treasonous, chaotic and untrustworthy. On the current basis of positions, Johnson's Tory Party, refreshed with new hardline parliamentary candidates for the election, and having pulled the Brexit company back within its ranks, could expect to rise to around 40% in the polls, whilst the opposition, split between a dithering, Labour Party with an uncertain and unsustainable Brexit Policy, and the Liberals, Greens, and others with a clearer policy, but no chance of forming a government would be thrown to the wayside. 

There will be much wailing and screaming, not least by all of those liberals that created the conditions that are now unfolding to begin with. Once again, it comes down to the need for the labour movement rank and file, and for revolutionary socialists to fight this battle where it needs to be fought, and by the tools with which it needs to be fought; that is not by parliamentary manoeuvre and TV interviews, but on the streets, in the workplaces, by a General Strike, and the organisation of hard acts of resistance.