Doomed Appeal

Four former Cabinet Ministers, two of whom even many political obsessives would be hard pushed to identify, while the other two were never exactly noted for their popularity, have decided to play catchup with the current Shadow Chancellor on the subject of Brexit.

Meanwhile, two former Law Officers and the former Head of the Brexit Unit have told the Government to give up its doomed appeal to the Supreme Court, and to get on with tabling an Article 50 Bill in Parliament instead.

Over half of such opposition to that as there would be in the House of Commons would come from the SNP. But the House of Lords would be an entirely different matter.

Assuming, that is, that the Government had the slightest desire to invoke Article 50.

Theresa May is the Conservative Leader, and thus the Prime Minister, because she did not campaign to Leave the EU, because she has absolutely no programme for doing so, because she did not vote against same-sex marriage, and because she does not believe that women without children have no stake in society.

In short, Theresa May is the Prime Minister because she is not Andrea Leadsom.

Any one of having campaigned for Leave, having any programme for Brexit, having opposed same-sex marriage, or believing in her own lack of a stake in society, would have been an absolute disqualification from the Leadership of the Conservative Party.

Whereas the Leader of the Labour Party does have a programme for Brexit, worked out in great detail over 40 years.

He is surrounded by people who were working out those details when Margaret Thatcher was voting for the European Communities Act, campaigning for a Yes vote in the 1975 referendum, howling down Labour's plan for withdrawal in 1983 as "Loony Left", and signing the Single European Act.