Corbyn in crisis. Credit: STEFAN ROUSSEAU/AFP/Getty Images
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Any political party that aspires to run the country must be able to demonstrate to voters that it is fit and competent to hold high office. And when the outcome of a general election is, for right or wrong, likely to centre on a single definitive issue, it is vital that the party’s stance on that issue is credible and coherent.
Having been a Labour party member for the best part of a quarter of a century, I want my party to win the next election. So I take no pleasure in saying that Labour’s current strategy (such as it is) around Brexit is a half-baked, shambolic mess.
The party’s plan, should it win power, is to return to Brussels and secure a better withdrawal agreement than the one negotiated by Theresa May. But, having achieved this, it may then decide that remaining in the EU is the preferable option after all, and thus campaign to reject its own deal in a second referendum.
Of course the strategy is a complete dog’s breakfast which doesn’t stand up to the slightest scrutiny. You don’t have to be a genius to recognise that the EU – which remains desperate to prevent Brexit – would be under no pressure whatsoever to deliver any further concessions in talks with a Labour government. It would know, first, that that government had already ruled out no-deal and, second, that the worse the deal on offer, the greater the chance of its being chucked out by the British public – and thus of there being no Brexit at all.
Labour frontbenchers brave enough to defend the party line are being mauled and spat out – Richard Burgon and Emily Thornberry the latest victims. This is not the consequence of any unique personal failing on their part; instead it’s because the Party’s ridiculous policy has rendered them helpless in the face of any serious inquiry.
The approach of putting your name to a deal which you then campaign to reject is novel in the extreme. It is certainly not something I have ever witnessed in many years of activity in the trade union movement. Surely the leaders of Labour-affiliated unions – who know a thing or two about how negotiations work – ought to intervene and warn party leaders of the absurdity of their position. Regardless of individual views on Brexit itself, the current incoherence does nobody any favours.
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