Charles Moore, as we know, is a dyed in the wool Euro sceptic, former editor of The Telegraph and biographer of Margaret Thatcher. Also a very stupid man. He has supported and encouraged Brexit from the very beginning although of late he has been highly critical of what the PM brought back from Brussels. For him Brexit doesn't mean Brexit anymore. He has now realised that Theresa May and him were not only singing from different hymn sheets, they were not even in the same church. He has taken to urging Brexiteers to vote against the deal whenever he can. Quite a turn round.
He is also a Conservative so must try and shield the party from blame.
A scapegoat is needed but where to find one with less than two weeks to go to disaster or humiliation? Don't worry Moore has the perfect solution, it's the civil service. They can't answer back and are quite an amorphous target and will certainly do as a handy Aunt Sally. The EU have run rings around us in Brussels so can hardly be blamed for incompetence in the way our own officials can. He writes an article (HERE) in The Spectator: "I’ve been surprised how useless the civil service have been during the negotiations" which begins:
"Obviously the Prime Minister herself bears chief responsibility for Brexit mistakes, but she must have been terribly badly advised throughout, not only by political staff — who always get it in the neck when things go wrong — but by the professional civil service, which tends to escape censure. I have been genuinely surprised by the bureaucrats’ uselessness in the negotiations".
He modestly plays down his own not insignificant role in the disaster using his weekly columns aimed at nut-jobs in middle England urging them to support Brexit. How many thousands of leave votes he was responsible for we can only guess at.
As for being badly advised, we know that Jeremy Heywood, the cabinet secretary when Mrs May entered Downing Street, asked her if she wanted the obvious post referendum policy, a 'big conversation' - but she said no. Sir Ivan Rogers advised her not to trigger Article 50 until she had a plan - but she said no, and sacked him. I don't believe she was badly advised at all.
It is the task that Moore and others set which is proving impossible to fulfil but he doesn't (yet) blame the task itself. No, he aims his criticism at those poor unfortunates who are having to fight their way through the contradictions and make sense of it. Moore is like a WWI general, send a division or two to capture an impregnable enemy stronghold with a hopeless plan and when they have all gone, blame them and get more troops to do the same.
However, in October 2016, his opinion was quite different, almost serene, when he penned another article for The Spectator (HERE) following Mrs May's party conference speech titled: Theresa May has helped Brexit seem doable. How easy it all looked back then. His piece is just a short one but here's an extract:
"Theresa May’s strong recognition of this in her speech here at the Conservative party conference last Sunday makes this one of the most extraordinary party conferences I have ever attended.
"This is not because of any high drama in the conference hall, where the debates have, if that is possible, been even duller than ever. It is because of the complete and almost calm reversal of a policy which the Tories had until now maintained since the end of the 1950s. Without a flaming row in her party, Mrs May has said unambiguously that the orthodoxy of Macmillan, Heath, Major and Cameron, the orthodoxy which vanquished even Mrs Thatcher, has been dethroned. We’re leaving, and the divorce, though intended to be friendly, will be absolute. The effect on those present is oddly reassuring. Even most Remainers seem keen to get on with leaving. The skill of the pro Europeans over more than half a century was to make people believe that the alternative to membership was unthinkable".
It will not be pro Europeans who will 'make people believe the alternative to membership was unthinkable' - it is Brexit, as Moore will eventually realise.
The 'calm reversal' of policy 'without a flaming row' he writes about now seems a long time ago doesn't it? Brexit has in fact brought the Conservative party to what looks like the brink of permanent fragmentation and the nation to levels of division, argument, rancour and antipathy that we haven't seen since Cromwell.
But don't look at Moore or the Tories, it's the civil service wot dun it.
"Theresa May’s strong recognition of this in her speech here at the Conservative party conference last Sunday makes this one of the most extraordinary party conferences I have ever attended.
"This is not because of any high drama in the conference hall, where the debates have, if that is possible, been even duller than ever. It is because of the complete and almost calm reversal of a policy which the Tories had until now maintained since the end of the 1950s. Without a flaming row in her party, Mrs May has said unambiguously that the orthodoxy of Macmillan, Heath, Major and Cameron, the orthodoxy which vanquished even Mrs Thatcher, has been dethroned. We’re leaving, and the divorce, though intended to be friendly, will be absolute. The effect on those present is oddly reassuring. Even most Remainers seem keen to get on with leaving. The skill of the pro Europeans over more than half a century was to make people believe that the alternative to membership was unthinkable".
The 'calm reversal' of policy 'without a flaming row' he writes about now seems a long time ago doesn't it? Brexit has in fact brought the Conservative party to what looks like the brink of permanent fragmentation and the nation to levels of division, argument, rancour and antipathy that we haven't seen since Cromwell.
But don't look at Moore or the Tories, it's the civil service wot dun it.
