If only there was a plan

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I have been remiss. I have written about Labour. What about another party seriously impacted by the referendum? I mean, of course, the Conservatives. It would be all too easy to think they are under control as their leadership contest is already underway, but that would be a serious mistake.

I am well aware that not long ago I suggested that the sole aim of the Conservative Party is power, and many agreed. But let's be clear, when divided they have failed in that objective.

I also know that I predicted before Brexit that whatever happened Theresa May would be leader shortly after the result. Right now it looks like I also got that right.

But I could not have anticipated the fall out would be quite so severe. The careers of Cameron and Osborne have ended in worse than typical failure. Their crime was incompetence.

Johnson's failure is worse: he's been exposed as a coward and liar who delivered Brexit for vanity and without real conviction.

As for Gove, he can't beat May, and is hated by her so resoundingly that the back benches beckon, where his own multi-faceted treachery will earn him few friends as the whiff of power fades away.

What that means is that four of the most influential politicians of their generation have wrecked each other's careers and will leave a party with divisions so fierce and a legacy so torrid that Theresa May's prospects look dire.

She cannot deliver the balanced budget her party always promised. Mark Carney has already made that clear. Osborne has already signalled that the attempt has been abandoned. So their grand project has failed, because of a policy initiative the Tories delivered.

And it is likely that Theresa May will have to deliver Brexit, which if she succeeded would add her name to the Cameron, Osborne, Gove and Johnson hall of ignominy on this issue.

Mind you it would be quite something if she managed to do anything: she will have a majority of 12, some of whom will be very uninclined to turn up too often whilst others have developed a very strong habit of not only disagreeing with each other, but doing so, very loudly, in public.

What is more, without a manifesto the Lords can tear most things she offers to them to shreds.

Whilst that is going on migration will continue, the NHS will have no new money and not a single regulation will disappear from view.

If that is not a poisoned chalice, what is ?

What that means is that if a coalition of the sort I called for only a fortnight ago were to be created now the Conservatives might be consigned to an electoral wilderness for many years to come.

All it requires is opposition leaders who are trusted, willing to work together, with the support of their MPs and a sufficient membership and then British politics and its constitutional structures could be pulled into the twenty first century.

If.

The Conservative crisis is likely.

It's all down to the combined opposition as to what happens next.

But they have to hatch that most hated of things right now.

It's called a plan.


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