Theresa May
framed the calling of the general election in terms of Brexit, but what is truly
remarkable is in how little it is actually being discussed. You have to take a
step back to see just how peculiar this is. Whatever side you were on in the
referendum, leaving the EU is the biggest national event since the Second World
War – far bigger than the decision to join – and it’s also possibly the most
unusual political event in any developed democracy in living memory. When else
has such a country decided unilaterally to re-write almost all its foreign and
economic policy, and to seek to simultaneously detach and re-attach itself on
unknown terms to the global trade system?
In those
circumstances, one might expect an intense debate about the ins and outs of
what Brexit will mean and how it will be pursued. It is no good saying that
this was settled by last year’s referendum. That vote, whatever else can be
said about it, only opened up new issues. It was a vote to leave the EU,
certainly, but it was not a vote for
anything else in particular. The way it is now taken forward will affect every
single area of daily life, from air travel through to nuclear waste disposal,
and every industry from fishing to computer game design. And the very existence
of the country as a United Kingdom will be called into question.
So where is
the detailed discussion of different options and their consequences? What
exactly does the government’s White Paper Brexit plan, endorsed in the Tory
manifesto, mean? Is ‘no deal better than a bad deal’? How would a ‘bad deal’ be
defined? What does a ‘no deal’ scenario look like? Most extraordinary of all,
where is the discussion of the costs of the Brexit plan? Every single other
policy, from whatever party, is relentlessly scrutinised for affordability. How
will this or that spending pledge be paid for? Yet no questions at all are
asked about the cost of Brexit, even though in any realistic scenario it will
be in the high billions of pounds, with reductions
of GDP/capita in the range of 6.3% to 9.5% according to an authoritative study
by MIT. Even halve the lowest estimate, and that is an economic disaster in
prospect; at the higher end, which might by the same token be an
under-estimate, it will be a catastrophe.
What will
the effect on employment be? How will the tax take be affected? What is the
impact on that totemic issue of recent years, the fiscal deficit? What about
the balance of payments? Will the UK’s credit rating be affected? Will
sterling’s status as a reserve currency be affected? And what about the value
of sterling, anyway? Brexit has seen a huge currency depreciation which at any
other time would have been a massive election issue. So why isn’t it being
talked about except, sporadically, in muted terms of rising inflation?
Beyond the
economics, where is the discussion of what foreign policy looks like post-Brexit?
Trump’s election, itself one of the biggest issues of recent times, even were
Brexit not happening, in combination with Brexit means that Britain’s place in
the world and its core alliances are all in flux. But this has barely been
mentioned by any party. For that matter, one might think that the fate of the
over one million Britons living in the EU and who are directly affected by
Brexit would merit some significant debate – not least since at least some of them
have a vote in this election. But they are hardly discussed.
That this bizarre
situation is being allowed to exist is partly a matter of the failure of
journalists to ask any of these questions. It is also the responsibility of the
two main political parties themselves (the LibDems are certainly making Brexit
central, but focus mainly on the case for a second referendum). The Tories are
content to let the only Brexit-related issue be which of May or Corbyn will be
able to negotiate ‘the best deal’ – with no sense whatsoever of what that deal
would be. Instead, the Tory manifesto re-iterates the White Paper commitments
to a form of Brexit that was neither voted for in the Referendum nor advocated
by many leading leavers. That is, to leave the single market and customs union,
prioritising immigration control. But there is no explanation of why this is
the preferred approach, how it will work in practice even if achieved, nor what
costs – financial or otherwise – it will entail, and no one bothers to ask. So,
for example, the news of Tory manifesto launch was dominated by discussion of
social care funding. Yet the very viability
of the care system, which is heavily dependent on EU workers, is in peril
because of Brexit.
Labour are
simply in a mess on Brexit, without a policy position that makes any sense at
all. Their manifesto statement about wanting to retain the “benefits” of the
single market and customs union but without being members of either is
meaningless and in consequence so are the rest of their pieties about the kind
of deal they would seek if in government or even support if in opposition. Nor
are they asking any significant questions of the Tories about their policy in a
misguided attempt to assert that the election is not, in fact, anything much to
do with Brexit. Yet all of the issues that they are mainlining on will
inevitably be hugely affected by Brexit, the NHS being just one obvious example.
They are not even making the point that the outgoing Tory
administration has foisted the greatest instability in living memory on the UK
and yet are now insisting that only the Tory party can provide ‘strong and
stable’ leadership. Nor do they mention how by calling this election Theresa
May has blown two out of the already tiny twenty-four month time frame for the
Article 50 negotiations.
The most
extraordinary things about all this is that the only half-way intellectually
respectable justification put forward for Brexit was that it would mean that
the British electorate could choose and dispose of its political direction of
travel via the general election ballot box. But what is now in prospect is the
use of that ballot box to endorse a scarcely specified, barely discussed and
yet central, historic policy. Although commentators are saying that this is the
first election in recent times where there has been a very clear distinction between
the main parties, on the core issue of Brexit they are both committed to a virtually
identical hard Brexit.
This matters
hugely, because on the basis of the result – presumably, a large win for the
Tories - a mandate will be claimed to enact Brexit pretty much as they
want. Included in the Tory manifesto is, again, the phrase that ‘no deal is
better than a bad deal’ – giving cover for an outcome absolutely at odds with what
voters were led to expect during the referendum campaign. Yet in her manifesto
launch speech the PM said that the consequences of not getting the right deal
would be “dire”. So what are voters endorsing if they vote to allow ‘no deal’
to be an option?
And it is certainly
not just remainers who should worry about this. It is perfectly conceivable,
and consistent with the manifesto, for Brexit to entail, possibly in backdoor
form, many of the regulatory and legal institutions of the EU. In fact, if that
does not happen then the stated preferred aim of creating a ‘deep and special partnership’
with the EU is unachievable. It’s noteworthy that the manifesto is not even
explicit about leaving the ECJ (which isn’t mentioned directly). So what are
voters endorsing if they vote to allow this ‘deep and special partnership’ to be an
option?
So we have
an election ostensibly about, and in the middle of, the biggest strategic and
economic change that this country has made in the lifetime of most voters, and
with consequences which will last for decades, but the actual nature of that
change is barely being talked about, certainly not at any level of detail. With
this farcical election on top of a farcical referendum we drift every more
rapidly not, in fact, to the jolly, trouser-dropping British farce with which
this all started, but to the theatre of the absurd: nihilistic,
incomprehensible, dark and slightly mad.
Addenda (19 May 2017):
1. Comments now disabled on this blog due to volumes of spam
2. My briefing, 'The Business of Brexit: What happens next?' is now available.
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