Sir John Chilcot’s long-awaited inquiry into the Iraq war highlighted the complete absence of an exit strategy. And while simply crossing a box in the European Union referendum may not have been as demanding a task, the government’s negligence in not devising a contingency plan has kickstarted its own period of instability.
The political landscape is in flux, and will continue to be for the foreseeable years. The UK arrives at a crossroads fraught with dangers. Both sides of the chamber have been engulfed with heavy scrutiny in the Brexit post-mortem; the government is pre-occupied with trying to heal itself following a divisive referendum campaign and the opposition is conspicuous in its absence.
It was imperative that David Cameron’s successor was the right person for the job. And I believe that, even though it was by default, Theresa May is the correct replacement.
The 59 year-old has a reputation as a skilled negotiator and as an unflappable political operator. She did not presume the consequences of Brexit during the EU referendum and instead positioned herself as an ambivalent Remainer. Viewed as the obvious option due to her character references as a ‘safe pair of hands’, she seems to be, at least viscerally, the logical choice that will help calm the financial markets. While she faces the most testing period in the UK’s history since WWII, it may prove beneficial that she embodies the ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ mentality.
Nevertheless, it has been left to the former Home Secretary to steer what had become a rudderless ship over the last few weeks.
Much was made as to whether the next PM had to be a Brexiter, as well as whether he or she should hail from a working-class background in order to reflect a large portion of the Leave vote. So, in straying from the monotony of maintaining Etonian privilege, there is already a little progress.
Social reform, a subject mentioned by all candidates, was central to May’s speech outside 10 Downing Street, which seems to suggest a shift to the centre of the political spectrum will happen. Britain needs a more egalitarian society where the wealth is shared across classes rather than confined to those born rich.
For those that voted Leave in the hope of a brighter future, let’s hope May’s words weren’t simply a repeat of those hollow phrases uttered by her predecessors.
We will make Britain a country that works not for a privileged few but for every one of us.https://t.co/4pEvp4Ga9h
— Theresa May (@theresa_may) July 13, 2016
Her voting record suggests that maybe she isn’t all that different from Osborne and co after all, since she voted in favour of the bedroom tax, reducing welfare spending and increasing tuition fees to £9,000, whilst being against the NHS having the ability to limit privatisation, against a tax rise for those earning over £150,000, against a tax on bankers’ bonuses and against a mansion tax.
The Cabinet reshuffle she presided over last night saw her place prominent Leave campaigners such as Boris Johnson, Liam Fox and David Davis in leading roles, showing that May is attempting to unite the party by entrusting them with the responsibility of converting their campaign slogans into reality, however challenging that may be.
Judging by their voting records in parliament, the choice between the five candidates – May, Andrea Leadsom, Michael Gove, Stephen Crabb and Liam Fox – were as appetising as having to choose the method of your own execution. Every one of them voted in favour of airstrikes in Syria, against accepting Syrian child refugees and May, for all her qualities, has always taken a hard-line stance when it comes to immigration. Constrained by the EU in her attempts to curb numbers, this is the area where she will likely be intransigent, but to what detriment of trade?
May’s failure to properly indicate whether or not EU migrants already settled in Britain will be guaranteed their right to continue living here rightly drew widespread condemnation for toying with people’s futures. The argument is that she needs to secure the future of UK nationals residing abroad too, but one would hope that principles of decency kick-in when dealing with subjects like this, rather keeping her cards close to her chest as if she is trying to read Juncker’s hand.
Her rival, Leadsom, dropped out of the race after the carping she suffered off the back of some gratuitously cruel comments regarding motherhood. Her star was elevated as a result of the TV debates where she put the case across for Brexit eloquently but it soon became clear she was unfit for the job.
Leadsom was a relative novice having only been a junior Energy minister for a few years, and it appears that she had delusions of her own grandeur after being likened to the Second Coming of Thatcher whilst receiving backing from UKIP donor, Arron Banks.
So grateful for all the support – I do believe my decision is in the best interests of the country and our economy & I wish Theresa success!
— Andrea Leadsom MP (@andrealeadsom) July 11, 2016
She does possess knowledge of the financial markets – even if her CV was prone to considerable hyperbole – but facing the task of two years of protracted talks with the EU while simultaneously having to broker tens of bilateral trade deals is a demanding job and certainly no place to be learning on the job.
If May constitutes the safe option then Michael Gove was the antithesis of this. His public debagging of BoJo, a political suicide mission which has remarkably only deemed one of their careers irremediable – his – was unbelievably ruthless.
In saying that, it was logically illiterate how he ever thought the opprobrium in the wake of his Machiavellian-like back-stabbing wouldn’t be to such an extent that he could launch a successful leadership event.
A duplicitous man he might be, he is probably the most erudite and socially liberal of the group – which is a frightening prospect – judging by his radical overhaul of schooling and prisons.
In such uncertain times, what is needed is a calm head, and a loose-cannon like Gove could have been disastrous, even given his ability to think big. Ken Clark joked, but with a hint of trepidation, that Gove would “almost certainly start a war with three countries at once” such was his hard-line approach to foreign policy. This was echoed on the Andrew Marr Show where he reiterated his belief that the Good Friday agreement could have been handled better, insinuating that he would have continued with the military conflict in Northern Ireland rather than negotiate with the Provisional IRA whatsoever.
Crabb, coming from a position of obscurity much like Cameron did in 2005, decided to withdraw from the contest after the first round along with Liam Fox, from the right of the party. Crabb prides himself on being a family-man, a devout Christian who has come from a blue-collar, single-parent family all the way to Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
If the Tory buzzword of aspiration was a real person, it would be Stephen Crabb. He could have carried on the good work done by Cameron in detoxifying the Tory brand, but then his opposition to gay marriage was honed in on and the revelation that he has been sexting another woman behind his wife’s back came along and pillaged his reputation.
All along, people have suspected that Boris was so fixated with becoming PM that he would mould his beliefs in any shape or form, providing it helped his cause. Securing the Premiership was the Alpha and Omega of Boris Johnson’s political ambition; expediency was never a problem in his mind. He had been PM in-waiting until Gove transformed into a Shakespearian villain and wrecked his plan, but it’s hard to sympathise with him after what seemed like a Bullingdon Boys power struggle, and even more difficult now that he has managed to secure himself a job as Foreign Secretary.
Universally viewed as a maverick sort of character, it is dangerous to describe him in such flippant terms given he spent years as a journalist creating a false impression of the EU to be some kind of parody organisation that forces ridiculous laws on countries. Let’s hope he handles Putin and Merkel with gracious hospitality.
Personally I don’t believe Theresa May will attempt to appease those who opted to stay in the EU by striking something close to a halfway house deal, similar to what Norway has.
The divisions in our society whether they be geographical, socio-economical or age related have not been created in the last 3 weeks, they have only been exposed in greater detail. Remainers have exaggerated the volume of those who are displaying signs of Bregret and those on the Brexit side that expect Remainers to abandon their views need a dose of reality.
The Conservative’s natural nemesis, Labour, is sadly in no position to steer the country through such a pivotal time with Jeremy Corbyn being unelectable. Aside from the election of Sadiq Khan, it is a regrettable state of affairs as, if ever the UK needed a Labour government in power, it is now. Unlike the Tories, Labour’s historic predisposition as a centre-left party has been to protect workers’ rights.
Leaving the EU has its opportunities but, paradoxically, the aforementioned working-class towns that formed a large part of the Brexit vote after becoming disillusioned and in desperate need of an alternative to austerity, are in danger of inflicting harm on themselves by handing the right-wing unbridled power. Brexit offers a blank canvas in which to build on, and thus, the onus is on the government as a whole and the rest of the country to relieve the UK of an uncertain future and carve out a different future for ourselves.
Theresa May has been sworn in, and Article 50 will be invoked in the near future. The process by which the conscious uncoupling of the UK from European political union will begin in earnest. Let’s just hope that most of this political drama is behind us.
Words: Jordan Campbell
Photo: Asian Awards/Flickr
