Tuesday 6 September 2016

These Tory charlatans still have no plan


It's almost ten weeks since 37% of the public did what these three Tory toffs told them to and voted for Brexit, yet they still have absolutely nothing even remotely resembling a plan of action for how we go about this process.


I've never been pro-EU (because no major political institution is beyond criticism, and especially not the EU), but before the referendum I repeatedly warned that Brexit would likely end up as an absolute shambles because of two pretty much insurmountable problems.

The first problem is that the neither the Brexiteers nor the Tory government had an actual plan for what to do if the public did vote for Brexit. The fact that Cameron didn't even bother coming up with a contingency plan just in case his gamble failed just goes to show how utterly reckless the man is. Not only did he gamble the entire future of the UK to secure a bit of short-term party political advantage at the 2015 General Election, he also failed to even bother making a contingency plan in case his gamble backfired.

Brexiteers like Boris Johnson, David Davis and Liam Fox are even worse. The fact that ten weeks after the vote David Davis (the minister for Brexit) decided to present a load of waffle, platitudes and vague aspirations instead of a detailed plan of how the UK is actually going to proceed from here is a clear demonstration that they never had a plan of action, and that even ten weeks after the event they still haven't come up with one.

These smug Tory charlatans pleaded for the public to vote for Brexit, but they never had a clue what they were actually going to do if people did fall for their rhetoric, so now they're intent on just (slowly) making it up as they go along!


The second major problem stems from the first. Had the Brexiteers actually drawn up a plan of action beforehand, they wouldn't have been able to go around making a huge array of false promises. Within a day of the Brexit vote high profile Brexiters like Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage and Iain Duncan Smith queued up to jettison the £350 million for the NHS lie. A couple of months down the line it turns out that what the Tories actually had in store for the NHS wasn't £350 million extra spending, it was actually a secret programme of spending cuts, staff lay-offs and hospital closures). Theresa May has also ruled out a points based immigration system, and anyone who believed that Brexit was going to inspire the Tories to clamp down on tax-dodging or intervene to save the British steel industry is clearly living in some politically illiterate fantasy land.

Because there was no actual plan of action these cynical Brexiteers felt free to promise everyone the moon on a stick. The problem is of course that a lot of people who voted for Brexit are now expecting their moon on a stick.

A lot of Brexiters have bought into the tribalistic mentality. To them Brexit was like a football match, hence all of the "You lost, shut up and get over it" comments every time anyone tries to hold the Brexiteers to account for their pre-referendum lies and their dismal lack of anything even remotely resembling an actual strategy.

As far as a lot of Brexiters are concerned, the reckless liars are beyond criticism because they're on their side of the tribal division ("they may be liars but they're our liars"), therefore, when it turns out that their moon on a stick is never going to be delivered they're likely to turn their anger, resentment and hatred onto those of us who warned that Brexit without a plan of action to hold the government to would just be a green light to allow a bunch of savagely right-wing Tories to make it all up as they go along to suit the interests of their financial backers (bankers, private health corporations, landed gentry, tax-dodgers and corporate fatcats).

This is precisely what is transpiring, but rather than blame the charlatans who landed us in this shambolic situation, a significant proportion of the Brexit crowd are clearly going to end up blaming the people with the foresight to warn them that this was going to happen all along.


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