Almost exactly two years ago, this website suggested that it might not be the smartest idea for Labour to go along with Theresa May’s call for a snap election. (Under the Fixed Term Parliaments Act, it couldn’t have happened without Labour’s support.)
And it occurred to us today that if they hadn’t, the current government would only have a maximum of one year left to run.
The Conservatives’ disastrous handling of, and failure to deliver, Brexit seems to have finally begun to hurt them in the polls, with a clutch of recent stats showing Labour with a significant lead for the first time in many months.
Most seat projections on the numbers show Labour failing to reach a majority either on their own or with the Lib Dems, but being able to get Jeremy Corbyn in to Downing Street with the assistance of an increased number of SNP MPs.
But then what?
We’ve still got a few of the results from our last Panelbase poll (conducted last month) to round up, and this one seems pertinent this week:
As has been the case ever since we started asking this question about the nation’s twin constitutional dilemmas back in July 2015, the single most popular option in a four-way choice remains an independent Scotland inside the EU, which leads the impending reality (a UK Scotland outside the EU) by a clear 10 points.
Scotland isn’t merely about to get something it doesn’t want, it’s about to get the exact opposite of the thing it wants most. But oh boy, is it ever more complicated than that.
Firstly, our congratulations to Her Majesty’s Government (pictured below) on its setting last night of a new world record in incompetence.
We can’t see it being beaten in a long time. But Jesus, what now?
Billions of years from now, when the Sun finally dies and expands to swallow and burn up the Earth in a final cataclysmic explosion, the very last thing to turn to dust and atoms will be Scottish Labour’s brass neck.
Coming from The Eternal Abstainers themselves that’s already quite a breathtakingly hypocritical claim, but if you look at last night’s results closely it gets a lot worse.
The breakdown data from last week’s vote on Theresa May’s withdrawal agreement:
ENGLAND: 266 MPs for, 256 MPs against (51%-49%)
SCOTLAND: 13 for, 45 against (22%-78%)
WALES: 6 for, 33 against (15%-85%)
NORTHERN IRELAND: 1 for, 10 against (9%-91%)
Once again, readers, the solution to Brexit is clear.
Last night’s farce in the House Of Commons, where MPs rejected in turn every single possible Brexit option and variant thereof, perfectly encapsulated the ridiculous state of British politics and may well have scuppered any chance of avoiding a no-deal Brexit, because the EU’s terms for a longer Article 50 extension than April 12 were that the UK presented a clear and achievable plan.
But who ultimately sank the plans for either a softer Brexit or a second referendum?
Oh.
Wings Over Scotland is a thing that exists.
