Imperial Lighthouse Service?

Tony Abbott became an Australian citizen in order to become eligible for a Rhodes Scholarship, then he renounced his British citizenship in order to become eligible for election to the Australian Parliament. 

Notice that it is constitutionally necessary to renounce one's British citizenship in order to be be eligible for membership of the Australian Parliament. See also, for example, the fact that Conrad Black had to renounce his Canadian citizenship in order to take up a seat in the House of Lords. So much for the Commonwealth. So much for "CANZUK". So much for "the Anglosphere". 

The Government is preparing to appoint to the Board of Trade a person who has renounced his British citizenship. Welcome to the revitalised Commonwealth, apparently; following Enoch Powell, the likes of Simon Heffer and Andrew Roberts used to want Britain to leave the Commonwealth. Welcome to "CANZUK", apparently. Welcome to "the Anglosphere", apparently. And recall Powell again on that last. Is the Radical Right still either?

Welcome, in reality, to the absolute priority of The Project, of "the party". The party does not necessarily have a name, or if it does then formal membership does not necessarily or even ordinarily correspond to the kind of membership that really matters. Like Black, Abbott is well and truly a fully paid up, active and valued cadre. His mere nationality is irrelevant. His loyalty to The Project, as pursued across at least three continents, is unquestioned and unquestionable.

That is, however, more than can be said for the people who are poised to appoint him to the Board of Trade. They are busily trying to free Britain from the State Aid rules of Margaret Thatcher's European Single Market, effectively announcing their concession that she had been wrong while Tony Benn had been right. Boris Johnson's and Rishi Sunak's domestic programme is in many ways what a Peter Shore or a Bryan Gould Premiership would have looked like if Britain had ever enjoyed the benefit of such a thing.

Why, then, do they even want to appoint Abbott to the Board of Trade? Well, they have to keep certain people sweet, at least this side of the next General Election. But he will be only one member, and they have consciously chosen him to attract as much attention as possible. The really interesting and important appointments will be of the other, lower profile, members. Do keep an eye on those.

Meanwhile, although as a British citizen Abbott would have been ineligible to sit in the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia, as a Commonwealth citizen he is perfectly free to vote and stand in elections to the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The faction that his appointment is intended to placate is desperate to field a candidate in the next Conservative Leadership Election, perhaps as early as next year. This, too, is very much one to watch.