The Election: Where Next?

Dave Barnby

Taking a calm look at the result as a Brexit supporter, I have the following observations:

Yes, Teresa May has lost a lot of authority, but she should with the support of the DUP have a bit of a majority. Her main problem, assuming she doesn’t resign or get ousted, will be keeping recalcitrant Conservative Remainer MPs on side. She is the only parliamentarian with the stature and experience to lead the country on our serious security situation (after all she’s run the Home Office for 6 years) and Brexit talks and she needs to stick to a clean Brexit and not water things down. If we remain in the single currency, customs union and accept ECJ then we have not left the EU and uncontrolled immigration and all the rest will continue. The only change is that we will still be effective tied but have little or no say (less than we had before) over anything the EU proposes or does (much like Norway).

Furthermore, we are facing serious security threats which have arisen largely because of the EU and it’s free movement of people ideology and Angela Merckel’s invitation to for all and sundry to come and enjoy the benefits of Europe’s prosperity.

But it’s not a good situation for anyone, the Conservative Party and those who want to leave the EU, the only winners are those intent on frustrating Brexit.

On the bright side we have:

– SNP being half neutered with loss of seats of Alex Salmon and Party leader on H of Cs which will put a stop to Nicola Sturgeon’s disrupting demands for a second referendum on Scottish independence – not something you need when you’re trying to get out of the EU.

– Lib/dems have not won back losses in last election by any significant amount and have lost their most effective voice in parliament – Nick Clegg.

– Jeremy Corbyn and his party supported the triggering of Article 50 and he has committed to the end of ‘free movement of people’. With this result he has cemented himself as leader of the Labour Party and will be able to do deals with Teresa May if he wants, which in my opinion is not necessarily a bad thing, see below.

Assuming May continues as PM she should start talking to Corbyn immediately. She should engage with Corbyn on renationalisation of water, electricity, the Royal Mail and possibly rail in exchange for supporting a clean Brexit. There may be other carrots she can offer.

These privatisations came about, remember, because of the EU’s privatisation directives, driven by corporate lobbying even controlling influence of that body (there are excellent on-line videos showing this and read my book: ‘The EU: A Corporatist Racket’).

To me there is no sense in these organisations remaining in private hands. These bodies are not subject to serious competion and receive taxpayer or consumer subsidies; electricity through subsidising dubious renewable energy technology; rail receives subsidies to any extent necessary to keep them operating. Royal Mail postage rates have gone up astronomically since privatisation as has water.

Of course Corbyn realises these industries can’t be re-nationalised whilst we are a member of the EU, so he should be keen to make this deal and leave.

Couple of other thoughts:

I wonder how many seats the Conservatives lost due to Ukip putting up candidates in more than half the constituencies. It would be ironical if Ukip’s intervention, whose raison d’etre was leaving the EU, caused Brexit not to happen.

During the election campaign the polls showed Labour closing the polling gap from a Conservative lead of some 20% (which was why May was tempted to hold the election in the first place) to a lead of as little as 4% according to some polls. One wonder how this happened. Two thoughts come to mind:

– was the 20% figure false and rigged to get May to call an election in the first place, and

– I get a sense that huge amounts of corporate money was thrown into the campaign to get the Labour vote out, how else could Dianne Abbot get a 35,000 vote majority.

What can we do?

I would suggest that Brexiteers in Conservative constituencies get their MP to encourage Teresa May to not be pig-headed about this and get talking urgently to Jeremy Corbyn, yes, his demands may be costly, but at this dangerous time in our history, we must remember that ‘money does actually grown on trees’ (several £100 billions of QE proves that – for explanation of how this works get in touch with me) and money does need to be spent to get NHS and other some services back to a proper working level.

I’m sure Corbyn would be delighted to achieve some of his goals and the resulting credibility in exchange for supporting a clean Brexit which I’m sure he really wants.

Think about talking to your MP.