It's hard to sympathise with Theresa May because her difficulties are almost all self created. Had she faced down the Brexiteers at the start of her premiership and followed a more conciliatory policy both with the 48% remainers and the EU, declaring that we would opt for membership of the EFTA/EEA in the single market, she wouldn't be in the sort of trouble she is now. The Telegraph report that the grassroots activists are warning her that if she "fudges" Brexit or frustrates "the will of the people", the party will not be trusted for a generation (HERE).
The problem is the party probably won't be trusted by one section of the community for a generation if she fails to deliver a diamond hard Brexit and by another section if she succeeds. The difficulty is in deciding which section to placate. So far it seems she has chosen the first, which I think is a falling number. But the second is growing and as things disappear down the tubes it will only get bigger.
James Forsyth at The Spectator thinks along the same lines and says Brexit is fast becoming a no-win situation for the Tories (HERE) as she struggles to unite the cabinet Brexit committee around the customs union arrangement of her choice.
Reuters quote someone (HERE) they describe as a senior source in Theresa May's Conservative party saying:
"We have to get to a position that represents what people voted for. And then deliver it. It's time now. Get on with it."
The problem is actually knowing what people voted for. The lack of a clear plan at the start, a practical offer or a detailed manifesto for Brexit is becoming disastrously clear. Brexiteers urged people to vote for "something", an unachievable fantasy and they got 17,410,742 people to do just that. Now, two years on as the EU wait for Britain to decide what Brexit actually means, the cabinet argue among themselves. They can't "get on with it" because they and we still don't know what "it" means.
The economy could actually rescue Mrs May. We grew by just 0.1% in the first quarter against a normal trend rate of around 0.5-0.6%. If this continues and/or some substantial companies announce plans to move to the EU it will be easier for her to use it a an excuse to go for a soft Brexit and a close partnership with the EU, inside the single market and the customs union. Noises and threats from the extreme right could safely be ignored and they may not protest too much anyway.
She does need to be careful to explain things because Simon Heffer - a man not noted for having much upstairs - and on the board of Leave means Leave (HERE), an organisation seemingly dedicated to the total elimination of British farming and industry, says May herself is responsible for the sluggish economy (HERE) by failing to "lead", I assume he means over the cliff that he has his lunatic mates have been pointing to for years.
See it wasn't Brexiteers fault at all. It wasn't Brexit, it was the way they did it, those remainers and civil servants. All their fault. May needs to guard against this and when the time comes push back against this sort of narrative. One that we'll increasingly find in the pages of The Daily Mail.
The economy could actually rescue Mrs May. We grew by just 0.1% in the first quarter against a normal trend rate of around 0.5-0.6%. If this continues and/or some substantial companies announce plans to move to the EU it will be easier for her to use it a an excuse to go for a soft Brexit and a close partnership with the EU, inside the single market and the customs union. Noises and threats from the extreme right could safely be ignored and they may not protest too much anyway.
She does need to be careful to explain things because Simon Heffer - a man not noted for having much upstairs - and on the board of Leave means Leave (HERE), an organisation seemingly dedicated to the total elimination of British farming and industry, says May herself is responsible for the sluggish economy (HERE) by failing to "lead", I assume he means over the cliff that he has his lunatic mates have been pointing to for years.
See it wasn't Brexiteers fault at all. It wasn't Brexit, it was the way they did it, those remainers and civil servants. All their fault. May needs to guard against this and when the time comes push back against this sort of narrative. One that we'll increasingly find in the pages of The Daily Mail.
