I wish I could be excited by what Theresa May has to say today, but I am not sure I am. We know she is going to say we will have a hard Brexit: that's been obvious for a while. We know the speech will put migration centre stage. A fight over the European Court of Justice will pass most people by. And the consequence of being out of the single market will be ambiguous when May's ambition for the customs union will remain unclear.
What is more significant about today is what Theresa May cannot say is whether she can deliver against her promises. Any negotiation with the EU member states requires their consent: May can say what she likes about our relationship with the EU but they don't have to agree to anything. They really do hold most of the cards, and all the good ones.
May can again say what she wants about the economy but the reality is that a falling pound, caused by Brexit, whilst there is rising consumption, fuelled by debt, means we will have a growing trade deficit and the Bank of England will respond by raising interest rates soon, which are going to hit many in the UK hard. There are a lot of people who do not even known what a mortgage rate increase feels like. They are going to be horribly uncomfortable when they arrive and she is going to have no control over that.
But most of all May might be trying to look all prime ministerial as she seeks to promote 'Global Britain' but Donald Trump and Michael Gove destroyed her chance of that (did he do it deliberately?). As Trump trashes Europe, supports Brexit and threatens peace May will look like she is carrying his bag by providing, yet again, the outpost for unacceptable US foreign policy in Europe. We already look about as global as an aircraft carrier, except we're permanently moored off Europe.
Add to this the very clear signals given that trading relationships will be sacrificed to tax war, tariffs and admin on unprecedented scales plus the fact that no-one has a clue as yet how to control most migration, simply because we have not done so in the case of non-EU migrants, and what we really get is the clearest indication that all this is still being done for no positive reasons whatsoever.
If May believes in free-trade she won't be getting it.
If she believes in fair competition tax wars destroy any chance of it.
If she wants to control migration then she must know why: increasing wages and enforcing labour rights can be the only reason for it.
If May wants political autonomy she'd better stop pretending there is a special relationship with the US quite soon.
But the truth is she does not know what she really wants bar one thing. She was dealt an awful card but wanted to be prime minister anyway, and accepted it: that is all she knows. Knowing how to actually play the card she's been given seems to be beyond her ability. We could leave the EU to cut trade to reduce emissions, to bolster local business, reduce trade deficits, close down tax haven activity, cut the tax gap by imposing capital controls, increase wages by favouring UK employment and leading the way in how to make the global economy local. That might (I say might, note) make this grief justifiable because there would be a plan, a belief and a goal in mind. Instead there is nothing to justify what will be said today.
And that's why I am not just unexcited by May's likely speech. I am really worried by it. That and her inability to deliver on whatever she might say.
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I think her ‘red, white and blue Brexit’ remark unintentionally signalled the only scenario under her control: a purple Brexit, specifically a Ukip Brexit (with a withered pound sign).
Demanding anything more than precisely nothing risks getting less.
Looking forward to what she has to say to all those UK passport holders living abroad.
Their status is precarious. If they leave their adopted countries they will need visas to get back in,to visit their properties and extended families. Without a visa their legal rights will be attenuated overnight, their property rights weakened.
Having said that there seems to be no barrier to non EU passport holders buying property in the UK. How is it that Russian / Chinese passport holders can buy up huge parts of London?
Is there a distinction between a corporate body and a human body as regards the right to enter a foreign country and buy up its assets?
Lean forwards in your seat, place your hands behind your head, lock your fingers and brace for impact.
Disengagement with fellowship, whether this be the EU or any other working together activity that will make the world a better place for our kids, is being overlooked, the pilot is asleep, worse, the pilot thinks she has already landed.
Is there no-one left to pull back the stick?
It’s worse than that. It feels like being in a plane that’s been hijacked and no one can get into the cockpit.
The UK is a US aircraft carrier, moored off Europe. The UK is useful to the US for this.
The special relationship is a specious relationship.
We allow ourselves to be misled by the sharing of a more-or-less common language and the sharing of some traditions. Lazy thinking.
The UK is a speck on the horizon for the US. The US will only agree a deal with the UK on terms favourable to itself – it doesn’t need the UK that much.
Immaterial indeed, but it’s a nailed on certainty that it’ll be given a fairer hearing than that which Corbyn’s was given last week.
I’m sorry to say this Richard, but I wasn’t hugely impressed with the way you handled that one – reporting on the Guardian’s (typically skewed) piece on his R4 interview rather than, at least as far as I could see, the content of the speech itself.
The wage cap was just one of a number of options he raised and even in the R4 interview his comments were bookended by statements about corporation taxes.
I spoke on one issue alone
And his suggestions on a pay cap were ridiculous
I was not asked to comment on anything else
Last night was a weird night on TV.
Channel 4 decided to ask a celebrity chef about what might happen with BREXIT. His answer – whilst saying that he expected lots of restaurants to go out of business in 2017 – was that we should believe in Britain. Wow! Nothing self-contradictory there then! Very clear! Thanks Channel 4!
Then I watched Newsnight as May’s intentions were made known enthusiastically by some reporter I’d never seen before. I have to say I was really worried by the end if it and went to bed with a heavy heart. It seems the Leave folk have won. The bit about getting away from the European Court was particularly galling – I can already see a bonfire of worker and citizen rights on the horizon.
Fair enough – we are going to leave. I can accept BREXIT – it has been done. We did not need to do it – but we did.
The big worry now is what replaces the EU. My concern is that our new partners will be rapacious and sly and we can expect more expansion of the USA into our economy and maybe the Russians too (how will our relationship with China go I wonder given the new nuclear plant they will be building)? America has to keep expanding as it continues to suck its own middle class dry – it needs others to feed on beyond its own borders.
I do not think the result will be a BREXIT that works for everyone. The big players now will be the big players then and us little folk may well suffer.
Expect to see one or two headline policies to buck up the voter because these new ultra right wingers are more savvy than the wilfully blind ones we previously dealt with. We may got one or two things to make us feel happier.
I remain interested in who the replacement hate figure(s) will be once we have left the EU trading and legal systems and they can no longer be blamed.
Hate – when left idle – is something to be very wary of.
Agreed
If Theresa May’s main objective is to reduce immigration then she is pursuing a mythical objective. There have been a series of immigration laws passed from well before Enoch Powell’s imfamous “rivers of blood” speech in the sixties. None of these measures have been enough to keep the right wing at bay because it is impossible even if the border Agency doubled in size.