I once tried to make a living as a salesman. Sharp suit,
company car and all the spiel... it was disastrous and cost me a great deal of
dignity and self-esteem. I hated it so intensely that my weekends were spent dreading
Monday. My problem? I just didn’t believe in what I was selling and knew that a
large part of the price was because of the advertising and the fleet of
gab-gifted salesmen needed to try and part businesses from hard-earned profits
in return for products which, in all honesty, they could get much cheaper
elsewhere.
So I really feel for the embarrassing parade of Maybots
appearing in the media, backing the atrocious sell-out of a deal. Theresa’s Travesty
as it may become known, or The Dog’s Brexit. Now, by all accounts the Prime
Minister is to travel the country to try to get the electorate on board with
her 'deal'. I can’t think of anything more likely to turn hearts and minds
against Theresa May than Theresa May herself. If only she could channel Margaret
Thatcher and embark on a tub-thumping, peasant-rousing, anti-EU tour to stir up
as much antipathy to the whole project as she can.
But that’s not the plan, is it? It seems clear now that
the direction of travel is to preach against no-deal (the actual leaving of the
EU, which was voted for) and to frame the choice as her deal or another option.
That other option either being remain, which could result in riots, or a second
referendum which, whatever the outcome, could result in riots. It could have
all been so much simpler had successive governments heeded the concerns of
those who voted them into power. When Parliament no longer represents the
people, what is the point of representative democracy?
The political classes are of one voice when it comes to
their calling out of ‘the rise of the far right’, or when they are being slightly
more generous, decrying the spectre of populism. But what is populism if not a
cry for help? Voting to leave the EU was intended to remove an excuse, to deny
our treacherous ‘leaders’ the option of blaming it on a supranational power.
The next step must be to remove from office all those who appear to be unwilling
to take responsibility. If you are voted in to represent your constituents
concerns but you then hide behind party unity, then we must attack the party
system.
Next election what say we refuse to vote for all sitting
MPs and vote on a non-party basis for new candidates, based entirely on what
they, not their party are selling. It will make little difference that we will end
up with a ramshackle coalition of some kind because the Uncivil Service will
maintain continuity anyway; Belgium managed without a government for the best
part of two years recently and Italy spent decades with revolving door
administrations and both are still here. But it might be a start. I say ‘might’...
For the last twenty years at least I've felt as if I were
watching a dystopian post-apocalyptic movie about a society whose rulers
genuinely lived on another planet, out of touch, out of reach, but with all the
power. The extra-terrestrial, May, has brokered a deal which is even worse than
many of her critics think because although no-deal means we start with a clean
slate we begin from a position of total regulatory alignment for trade; accepting
this deal binds our hands forever and makes all future trade dependent on
politics, first and foremost.
If you can't define it, can't explain it and
need to sell it, it's not worth saving.
Where is our Churchill? And don’t say Boris – his
rebuttal of May’s deal was self-congratulatory, waffly and full of piffle –
even Churchill would say it was overwrought. Right now, whatever you think of
him, Tommy Robinson probably has more credibility than most MPs. We need to
elect not just the ballot stuffers for discredited parties but genuine,
patriotic, energetic agents for change. Let’s look beyond the sales pitch see
what a whole new Parliament can achieve – it can hardly be worse than what we have
now.
