Brexit and a New Second Chamber

My latest for the Lanchester Forum.

The Finished Article

There ought to be an amendment insisting on that extra £350 million per week for the NHS.

But the people expressing even the mildest surprise at Jeremy Corbyn's approach to Article 50 know literally nothing about the Left.

Corbyn would have voted for Article 50 even if there had been a Labour three-line whip to vote against it.

Now, though, he is the Leader.

Wherever you are, Tony Benn, this one is for you.

Social Surrey

Good luck to Surrey County Council in seeking to make up the shortfall imposed on the social care of its residents by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for Health, both of whom sit for constituencies in Surrey.

But this ought not to be left to local authorities, some of which will of course always be far richer than others.

There would be obvious savings in a national system.

Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell and Jonathan Ashworth ought to present them to the affluent, yet increasingly hard-pressed, householders of Surrey.

Mistaken For Milne

Seumas Milne is now officially leaving The Guardian in order to work full time for Jeremy Corbyn.

I once spent at least 20 minutes entirely failing to explain to someone that I was not Seumas Milne.

On and on she went about how much she had enjoyed "your" book on the Miners' Strike.

I have never written a book on the Miners' Strike.

His is excellent. But it is not by me. 

There are several reasons for that. Not the least of them is that I am not Seumas Milne.

Definite Article

A three-line whip to vote in favour of Article 50 would not "force" Labour MPs to vote for it.

It would just be a three-line whip.

MPs would be within their rights to break it, as Jeremy Corbyn did often enough.

And to take the consequences, which should be understood in light of the fact that Corbyn is still alive, is still possessed of all four limbs and all five senses, is still a Member of Parliament, and is now the Leader of the Labour Party.

What would those bemoaning this whip have had instead? A free vote? A whip to overturn the referendum result? What, exactly?

Improving The State of The World, Indeed

Congratulations to Theresa May on having gone to Davos, delivered Jeremy Corbyn's act, and got out in one piece.

But that is more than she would manage if her party failed to win Copeland.

Forget the number of Conservative MPs who pretended to support Leave.

That is like the number that pretended to oppose same-sex marriage. How many would vote to repeal it?

Similarly, the true number in favour of Leave is at most the number that did not support Theresa May.

So many of them did support her that no election was deemed necessary.

The first big loss to the Lib Dems in the Remain heartlands of the South has already happened.

A failure to overturn a Labour majority of a mere 2,564 at Copeland would mean that in 2015 the Conservatives had won the most seats that they ever possibly could.

There would certainly be a hung Parliament in 2020.

In an attempt to avert that, Mrs May would be removed, after considerably less than one year as Prime Minster, and replaced with someone who had never undertaken to invoke Article 50 by an given date.

Or, indeed, at all.

Replaced, moreover, with someone who would not be going to Davos and delivering Jeremy Corbyn's act.

Those who wanted both Article 50 and that act, with or without any trip to Davos, or indeed who wanted so much as one of those things, would then have a very clear option.

In every Durham constituency except Grahame Morris's Easington, and in each constituency falling wholly or partly in Derby other than Derby North (assuming that Chris Williamson were the Labour candidate there), that option would be to vote for the candidate from within the Teaching Assistants' campaign, something that Grahame and Chris can also be said to be.

Everywhere else, that option would be to vote Labour.

Going On

"What's going on with the Teaching Assistants' strike action?"

This is.