Page 18 QQQ Daily Mail, Thursday, August 29, 2019
COMMENT
Brexit rebels force PM
to f ight f ire with f ire
IF aliens had suffered the cruel misfortune
of landing their spaceship in Westminster
yesterday, they might have been forgiven
for concluding Britain was in the grip of a
corrupt and merciless tyrant.
Listening to the hysterics of the Remain
irreconcilables, the bemused extra-
terrestrials would infer Boris Johnson was
a ‘tin pot dictator’ and ‘revolutionary’
casually ‘silencing opposition’ by throwing
our cherished democracy under a bus.
The Prime Minister’s crime? He had
sought, and been granted, permission to
suspend Parliament before holding a
Queen’s Speech on October 14.
With priceless irony, Shadow Chancellor
John McDonnell denounced the move as a
‘coup’ (though how intriguing that the
unrepentant Marxist agitator never gripes
when hard-Left fellow travellers actually
overthrow elected governments). Maybe he
should swap his copy of Mao’s Little Red
Book for an Oxford English Dictionary. This
defines a coup as: ‘A sudden, violent, and
illegal seizure of power.’
By contrast, proroguing Parliament is an
entirely normal procedure – especially for a
new government on taking power – which is
signed off by the head of state.
Indeed, a Queen’s Speech will be the
perfect opportunity for Mr Johnson to
refresh voters’ memories about his
impressive domestic policy agenda ahead
of a potential general election – on policing,
infrastructure, schools and the NHS.
At the same time, he can illuminate the
dangers of Jeremy Corbyn entering No10 to
conduct an economically destructive
experiment in socialism – possibly in
diabolical alliance with the SNP.
Of course, no one should be so naïve as to
think Boris’s timing wasn’t, simultaneously,
a deliberate tactic to limit the room for
manoeuvre of MPs intent on sticking two
fingers up to more than half the population
by sabotaging Brexit.
No, the Mail is not glorying in this sobering,
significant step. Leave campaigners always
insisted quitting the EU meant regaining
Parliamentary sovereignty – not
circumventing it.
But in truth, what choice has he got?
Only 24 hours earlier, a tawdry alliance of
anti-Brexit MPs boasted of seizing control
of Commons legislation to stop No Deal.
Yet maintaining the threat of walking away
gives No10 huge clout in negotiations.
It’s no surprise the EU has now signalled
it may offer concessions – particularly on
the deeply unpopular Irish backstop. But
the undemocratic Remain ‘ultras’ have no
real interest in a deal. Their barely-hidden
goal is to overturn the referendum result.
No wonder the PM is fighting fire with fire.
In an unedifying spectacle, biased Speaker
John Bercow threw a tantrum from his
holiday sun lounger and condemned the
‘constitutional outrage’. Can this be the
same preening popinjay who egregiously
tore up centuries of Commons procedure to
undermine Theresa May’s determined
efforts to leave the EU? It certainly can.
Remain-supporting MPs accuse Mr
Johnson of breaking convention. But when
they collude with the Speaker (whose car
displays a ‘B**s to Brexit’ sticker),
that’s fine and dandy. And aren’t those
moaning at the ‘constitutional outrage’ the
very same people who only a few days ago
were trying to install Ken Clarke as PM?
Has Mr Johnson wrong-footed his
opponents with his high-risk strategy?
They now have just days to pass a law
demanding the PM asks Brussels for an
extension. With the connivance of the
Speaker, this is not impossible.
Another danger is that suspending
Parliament may have swayed Tory rebels to
join a no confidence vote. Nevertheless, Mr
Johnson has certainly sent another message
that he is deadly serious about leaving –
come hell or high water.
Nonetheless, with only 63 days until Brexit,
our Parliamentary democracy is entering
dark, uncharted territory.
Yes, he’s a chancer
and a showman.
But if Boris pulls
off this gamble,
he’ll be a man
who made history
by Sir Anthony
Seldon
YESTERDAY’S
announcement
that Parliament
will be suspend-
ed is the biggest
gamble that any British
prime minister has taken
in 80 years.
If it pays off, Boris Johnson
will be a hero to millions.
If it fails, he will be out of
No 10 before you can say
‘Jeremy Corbyn’.
Many people have scoffed
at the notion that Johnson’s
name can ever be mentioned
in the same breath as that of
Winston Churchill.
Johnson has hardly been
subtle in trying to help this
idea take root, not least by
writing a book five years ago
about our national hero —
The Churchill Factor: How
One Man Made History.
Of course, Churchill had gifts
of oratory, intellect and states-
manship far beyond anything
we’ve seen yet from Johnson.
But one of Churchill’s most
obvious traits was his risk-
taking. And risk-taking is just
what Johnson is doing by
suspending Parliament.Daring
We saw it in Churchill’s
advocacy in 1915 of the daring
Dardanelles campaign to
knock Turkey out of the war
and threaten the Germans’
southern flank. But, pinned
down by ferocious Turkish
resistance, the British, French,
Australian and New Zealand
troops suffered a quarter of a
million casualties, and Lord
Kitchener was forced to order
a humiliating evacuation.
Churchill’s grand plan to
bring a speedy end to the war
was a disaster and cost him
his Cabinet post.
During World War II, Church-
ill was oblivious to personal
risk. George VI had to talk
him out of heading to France
to witness the D-Day landings.
Since becoming PM, John-
son’s own physical risks on
the other side of the English
Channel have so far been
restricted to swimming several
yards out to sea when he took
a dip during the G7 summit in
Biarritz last weekend.
But he is entering muchdeeper waters by proroguing
Parliament, involving the
Queen in such a fraught and
politically divisive decision.
For Her Majesty had to approve
the advice of the PM for
Parliament to be suspended.
Johnson’s aim is brutally
clear. He feels he has been
ambushed by a coalition of
Labour, Lib Dems, Greens,
Scottish Nationalists and
Plaid Cymru determined to
stop a No Deal Brexit. And so
he wants to limit parliament-
ary time that would allow MPs
to achieve this.
His move is unquestionably
an extreme measure. But it
must be seen in the context
that his predecessor, Theresa
May, took a much milder
Brexit deal to MPs and three
times they rejected it.
Boris Johnson is crystal
clear in his own mind that
procrastination must cease.
He worries that Britain will
become a laughing stock if it
does not leave the EU. He fears
for the health of democracy if
the 2016 referendum result is
not honoured.
Also, all Tory and Labour
MPs were elected at the 2017
General Election on party
manifestos that vowed they
would implement Brexit.
Nonetheless, Johnson faces
the threat of losing control of
events. No prime minister can
afford to do that, least of all
one who has been in office for
barely a month and whose
entire strategy is geared to
demonstrating that, unlike his
predecessor, he is in control.
But all this fits Boris John-
son’s temperament perfectly.
How he would love to be seen
as the great risk-taker,
wriggling free of Brussels like
a modern-day Houdini. Maybe
a repeat performance of when
he managed — finally — to
escape from getting stuck on
that zipwire while celebrating
Team GB’s first Olympic gold
at London 2012.
When he became PM onJuly 24, one of his biggest
hurdles was the lack of time
to negotiate a new deal with
Brussels. Mrs May had three
years and failed; he has been
given just three months.
On the face of it, Johnson
has very few options.
His Commons majority is
just one, with DUP support.
He could lose that any time.
Not only has he Corbyn’s
new anti-No Deal coalition to
contend with, he has powerful
figures in his own party trying
to wreck his strategy, too.
He faces legal challenges and
a Commons Speaker in John
Bercow who seems intent on
doing all in his power — and
more — to make life difficult
for him and Brexit.
But, like all leaders must,
Johnson has to turn these
negatives to his advantage.
For a start, yesterday’s
move has deprived his
opponents room for parlia-
mentary manoeuvre.
He is also calculating on
the fact that, as much as
they want to bring down the
Government, Labour must be
wary of its poor opinion poll
showing and less confident
than it was of winning a
General Election.Gambit
What’s more, if he fails in
his gambit, he must surely be
counting on the public’s sense
of fair play.
If Tory MPs such as Dominic
Grieve and Philip Hammond
conspire with Corbyn, the
Lib Dems and the Scottish
and Welsh Nationalists to
evict him from No 10, Johnson
has probably sketched out
his subsequent speech in his
head already.
It would go along these
lines: ‘When I was privileged
to be asked to become Prime
Minister, I promised to strain
every sinew to honour the
decision taken by the people
of this great nation: to honourthe result of the 2016
referendum to withdraw
from the EU. We cannot
carry on as supplicant to
Brussels. We have put off
the date of departure twice
already and we just cannot
carry on like this.
‘Now, a rag-bag of parlia-
mentarians is wilfully trying
to block the wishes of
the people.
‘My message to them is that
I will not allow them to do so.
‘If there is a choice about
whether the fate of this great
nation is to be decided by a
remote and out-of-touch
political class or by the people
of Britain, I stand four square
behind the people.
‘That is why I am calling a
General Election to take place
on November 1, the day after
we leave the EU.
‘I ask you in all humility to
help me uphold democracy
and lead this country to
the golden future in store
for it when Brexit is done
and dusted.’Crisis
Inevitably, Johnson’s critics
say he is trampling on the
constitution and breaking
with every convention.
But the truth is that so
many of these have already
been flattened by the
political juggernaut that is
Brexit, which means he can
truthfully counter that the
normal rules no longer apply.
This is the biggest crisis
Britain has faced since World
War II — which brings us back
to Churchill.
Sir Winston was a great
gambler, and some even
pejoratively branded him as
a chancer, a showman and,
ultimately, a failure.
For his part, Boris Johnson
would be very happy indeed
to be compared with Britain’s
superlative wartime leader.
Yes, he’s a chancer and a
showman, too. But consider-
ing the title of the book
Johnson wrote about
Churchill, he has the
immutable self-confidence to
believe that he can also be a
man who ‘made history’.
n Sir Anthony Seldon
is vice-chancellor of The
University of Buckingham.