No. 51 - The End is Nigh for More than Mrs May.

Dear James, 

So this is it. Mrs May, after yet again trying to batter her way through, is about to be killed off by her own party as have so many of her predecessors. Two days ago the Daily Telegraph, referring to Mrs May, cried out ‘Desperate, Deluded, Doomed’. I am afraid however, that it could just as well have been referring to your party as a whole. The Tories have been split now for several decades and we are approaching the time when it will have to decide whether it is the Brexit Party or a One Nation Party. It cannot be both.

The Tory obsessions with Europe and Austerity have now come home to roost and, living in the confined, dark room of her mind, Theresa May’s last ‘bold’ step has managed to galvanise everyone against her. And to think she was within kissing distance of the Kyle-Wilson solution in which Labour would have voted for her WAB in return for her agreeing to a second confirmatory vote. But of course the ERG would never have accepted that because they know they could lose it.  So she offered the Commons a chance to vote on a second vote which was no choice at all. Again your leader lost the plot – even if she ever had a plot to lose. 

Your party is in turmoil James not just because of Brexit but because it is also being found out for things that it did long before David Cameron’s decision to hold a referendum. Two days ago the UN Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty delivered his report on the UK in which he concludes that the UK's social safety net has been "deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos", Professor Philip Alston said "ideological" cuts to public services since 2010 have led to "tragic consequences" and to the "systematic immiseration" of a significant part of the UK population. A nationwide network of food banks and rising levels of childhood poverty have created a situation, where people living in deprived areas are likely to have lives that are poor, nasty and short. The report cites independent experts saying that in the UK - a fifth of the UK population - 14 million people - live in poverty, according to a new measure that takes into account costs such as housing and childcare. And 60% of people in poverty are in families where someone works. This is the ‘”result of deliberate policy choices made when many other options were available." Your party’s only response has been to scream invective at its author and threaten to complain to the UN!  I think the party ‘doth protest too much’. 

So, until today, Mrs May seemed determined to spend even more of our precious time before October 31st to hammering through her ‘bold’ move. That would have meant more time wasting, more head banging about the Tory obsessions. We will now have to endure weeks of yet more Tory Party infighting while more businesses collapse and our reputation worldwide will slide even further into ridicule and disbelief. Our national nightmare, created by the Tory Party’s right wing, seems set to continue.

The fact is that the Tory Party is now on the cusp of moving towards the Populist Right. I have said it before James, but you are very soon going to have to make a decision. Will you too go that Populist right with your local Tory Party members or will you make a stand for a centre right of your party?

Of course, there is another way out of this mess. Escape from this Tory Party maelstrom, open up the argument, let some air into the foetid atmosphere of your party’s obsessions – and ask the British people what they think after three years up this national blind alley!

Your choice James! Have some courage. Vote for the nation and not just your party!

Kind regards, 

BH - Your Concerned Constituent