Returning officers have been told to start preparing for a ‘snap’ general election, as the reality of Commons arithmetic sinks into Theresa May’s thinking.
There is no realistic prospect of May’s deal passing the Commons, but neither is there a viable majority for either a no-deal Brexit or an appetite for a new referendum with ‘remain’ as an option.
This means that the only means of breaking the deadlock – which the so-called “people’s vote” could never provide – is a general election, forcing May’s hand and, in view of her promise to her party not to lead the Tories into the next election, spelling the end of her career.
SKWAWKBOX comment:
Corbyn’s strategy of refusing to give May an ‘out’ by taking sides against leavers and instead continuing to fight for the best compromise result for both leavers and remainers looks to be about to bear fruit.
If things progress as expected this week as the Commons debates and prepares to vote on May’s dismal excuse for a deal, then Corbyn will – yet again – be shown to have not only chosen a wise course but to have played it skilfully.
Not that you’ll hear that in the Establishment media, of course.
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he is superb.playing a blinder not a peky one neither, he is wanting to sort this farce out. with him all the way
Can you smell the Fear in the Establishment at the proximity of a General Election?
Can you smell the Establishment Fear at the mere prospect of a Democratic General Election look at the panic in their posts!
Skwarky, no appeyite for a new referendum with ‘remain’ as an option.😊
A typical case of a denial of reality.
Most people want reconciliation. They recognise that leave won, they know we were always on the edge of Europe, they understand that we will never countenance joining the Euro, a federation or a European army, but they don’t want to break all ties with our neighbours. Therefore, Corbyn’s policy is not only right, it is the only genuine option people are able to support. “The people’s vote, second referendum is anti-Corbyn centrist, neoliberal alliance based on lies and propaganda. It has nothing to do with the people, their wishes or political reality.
“Most …. recognise that leave won”
Chanting fantasy doesn’t make it real. As yo say, Jack T – total relity denial from the Leftory camp.
Of course returning officers will e told to prepare for the possibility of a general election. That’s just doing what the Brexiteers can’t grasp – engaging with possibilities.
Were there to be (1) a GE and (b) a Labour victory – none of the current conflicts will be resolved. The Labour Party will still be faced with a dissociation between the Party and the leadership on the subject of Brexit. Have no delusions. No Labour Remainer will vote for the Tories – but that fact will resolve nothing in terms of the EU issue.
So the fundamental choice will remain ‘Remain’. (Although the Leftoryists will still argue for Tory policies).
P.S. : There is no ‘compromise’ as naively suggested in this article. Dichotomous choices don’t have that luxury. That’s basic mathematics.
lundiel 02/01/2019 at 6:21 pm
“The people’s vote, second referendum is anti-Corbyn centrist, neoliberal alliance based on lies and propaganda. It has nothing to do with the people, their wishes or political reality.”
….. but if we can’t secure a GE, or even if we can, the vast majority of Labour members and voters support a second referendum and it is also happens to be Labour Party policy.
“The vast majority” turns out to be 29% (see Skwawky’s next post. I bet you fanatics will make that out to be a minority as well.
Your comment really doesn’t make sense. The 29% you quote refers to those that oppose Labour’s approach Labour’s agreed policy is to campaign for a second referendum if we can’t secure a GE
Those, like SteveH, claiming that a second referendum “is Labour Policy” are simply lying. September 2018 Conference merely left all options (including a new referendum of course) on the table If Labour fails to secure its core objective of a General Election. The Mandelson Trolls constantly promoting Remain and PV on here, who , strangely enough, never ever attempt to explain just what is so great about the neoliberalism enforcing EU, won’t give up their , probably paid, trolling, but the rest of us back Jeremy and Labour’s actual , politically acute, policy.
jpenney 02/01/2019 at 8:26 pm · ·
Well I suggest you actually acquaint yourself with Labour’s actual, politically [astute] policy as agreed at the 2018 conference. You can read the complete policy here (part of an earlier comment) https://skwawkbox.org/2019/01/01/pv-proposition-exposed-as-libdems-poll-lowest-in-11-months/#comment-91035
I support the Labour Party’s policy that was agreed at the 2018 conference, do you?
Unlike SteveH apparently, I was AT Conference, and understand the fudge arising from the 5 hour Compositing meeting that produced the Part-unity-saving composite Brexit Motion, and understand the plain English meaning of the section on OTHER OPTIONS STILL ON THE TABLE for FUTURE CONSIDERATION, IF, and only IF, our current policy to force a General Election fails, ie: on a second referendum OPTION this says only :
“If we cannot get a general election Labour must support all options remaining on the table, including campaigning for a public vote….”
Read it SteveH – it’s just one of a number of FUTURE options , NOT current Party policy. Stop lying about our current Party policy Steve.
Did you vote for or against the motion?
‘Returning officers have been told to start preparing for a ‘snap’ general election,…’
Is it possible Skwaky, under the current FTPA? From my understanding of FTPA, there can be only 2 scenarios which can make it possible: 1) A successful vote of no-confidence or 2) two-thirds of MPs voting for an early GE.
‘…as the reality of Commons arithmetic sinks into Theresa May’s thinking.’
One can guess that here you mean the ‘arithmetic’ of winning/losing Brexit deal vote. Government can lose the vote and still continue in office under FTPA rules. Unless IF such a Brexit Withdrawal Bill has a specific provision that it’s rejection will mean a vote of no-confidence. A big ‘IF’.
Actually, this might be government’s strategy to force its MPs to support the Bill. Obviously, Tory/DUP backbench MPs will try to force an amendment as they are not confident of winning a GE. But their numbers will fall short because Labour MPs (True Labour, that is, rather than our Blairite Faction who are under threat of deselection) will not vote for the amendment. Having failed to amend the Bill, the Tory/DUP backbenchers (+ the Blairites) will be left with no choice but to join the Tory front bench in supporting the Bill out of self-preservation. Regrettably, Labour MPs numbers (+ the LibDems + the SNP +? +? +?) voting against the bill will come short. And May will survive.
Hmm – the propaganda by middle class liberals, niaive poorly read and uncritical labour members continues and today we are told a survey of Labour members says 72% want another Peoples Vote?
1,000 members were surveyed and whilst we weren’t told the range of questions asked this sample is less than 0.2% of the total Labour membership.
But I accept that I am probably in a minority but whilst I voted Remain (as a last chance to EC wide collectively try to break the Neo-Liberal Chain) I accept the original People’s Vote (as Brecht would probably suggest – they were not the Wrong People!) and we must go for Brexit, but one for working people that takes back control of water, rail, mail, utitilies etc. but fundamentally mainly takes back control from Right Wing EC Neo-Liberalism!
We could be amongst the first countries to break the Neo-Liberal Chain in Europd as an example to working people internationally which could herald in the End of Neo-Liberalism in Europe (as it already faces structural crisis in the US according to the excellent New Left Review) and hopefully we can then bring in an Age of Left Wing Democratic Socialism.
I have always argued Neo-Liberalism’s greatest victory was to stop many (but not all of us) from dreaming and as it captured the EC (after the Tories then Blair in England and Wales then Scotland) it also perhaps stopped many of you being simply unable to imagine internationalism outside of a Neo-Liberal EC framework.
I believe Left wing democratic socialists should tell people not what they want to hear but what they perhaps need to hear.
Time to blow away the EC Neo-Liberal cobwebs and to start dreaming again!
Just have faith in JC!
They aren’t bona fide Labour party members Bazza, they’re YouGov members who claim to be Labour members. Theresa May could join YouGov and claim to be a Labour member.
Indeed, A handful of supposed “Labour Members, in a constant “weaponised” polling campaign (funded by whom ? Lord Mandelson ? ) was a key feature in creating the pre 2017 General Election certainty amongst the commentariat that the Tories would win with a 100 majority at least . Also the “focus groups” con trick has been a constant weapon of the bogus anti Corbyn narrative beloved of The Guardian and others . I recall some sweeping statements about the supposed widely perceived upper middle class eating habits of Labour members recited in the Guardian – to feed the “Lefty metropolitan elite” Guardian narrative against Corbyn – which turned out to relate to a single comment by ONE person in one tiny focus group of eight people !
As this poll was commissioned as part of a long running academic research project into political party membership I think the results are likely to have much more integrity than you claim.
JPenny, are you blind to the reality that more members are for Remain than not? Yes EU not perfect, so work is needed to change that.
In respect of members lying about Labour Policy:
the motion re brexit was passed at conference and is therefore policy. Also please refer to Keir’s speech on the topic.
I take affront of your accusations that members who do not agree with your views are deemed paid trolls and similar. How dare you?
Not all of us like wintersports with icepicks……
” Sabine Ebert-Forbes” eh ? – Bit of a giveaway in itself – just the sort of name sooooo common amongst the manual working class ! ” The EU “is not perfect ” you generously say ? No it isn’t, Sabine , and it ain’t reformable either – it’s root and branch now a vicious capitalist neoliberalism enforcement machine which has already destroyed the Greek economy and pillaged its national assets , and , via the Euro, is destroying the less competitive economies of the rest of Southern Europe too – to the benefit mainly of German Capital.
Try to stop lying about our current Labour policy on Brexit you middle class privilege-saturated People’s Voters. Our 2018 Conference decided our policy is to work to achieve a General Election . OTHER OPTIONS, like a second Referendum are merely “on the table” for consideration, should this fail. Read the relevant part of the Brexit composite motion:
“If we cannot get a general election Labour must support all options remaining on the table, including campaigning for a public vote. ”
Geddit, Sabine Ebert-Forbes ? It’s plain English. Not all avid PV-ers are paid trolls, some are just naïve stooges of Mandelson and Blair, or so isolated in their middle class privileged lives, that the rational concerns of the manual working class Labour voter bedrock about the EU’s deregulatory neoliberalism and unlimited labour supply requirement, is simply ungraspable .
jpenney 03/01/2019 at 11:37 am
Woolfie Smith is alive and well
Did you vote for or against the Brexit Composite Motion?
” you middle class privilege-saturated People’s Voters.”
That’s the real give-away. Bollocks masquerading as ‘working class’ virtue. Not a great compliment to the working class.
The NEC should get all Labour MPs to declare if they intend to stand again now to get any re-selection processes out of the way immediately. Last thing we need to be going on in a GE.
I agree , it’s to some extent the “elephant in the room ” there are about 30-50 Blairite wreckers who need to be kicked out ASAP by the membership , if we are to stand a chance of avoiding an ongoing guerilla war with them over implementing our left-wing polices .
I actually participated in that YouGov poll and the one question that appears to be taken out of context “would you prefer a vote on Theresa May’s DEAL”
No mention of a referendum or PV.
So… May promised there would be no General Election before 2020. And she’s now poised to call her SECOND and it’s only just turned 2019.
She promised before Xmas she would step down as Tory leader prior the next Election. And she’s now poised to call the Election while still Tory leader.
How can anyone believe a word she says?