Westministenders: The One Where We Finally Get A Leadership Challenge?

[RedToothBrush]

Tick tick tick.

What do we think?

Yes? No?

Another week of wtf-ing at British politics.

This from yesterday's sunday times hasn't got much attention.

Its about how May will take the Deal to parliament twice if she has to.

I love how May is being somehow blamed for deliberately crashing the market. The reality is, that where we are. If it doesn't happen then, it would happen at some other point.

Guardian lists seven possible challengers to May

Raab
B Johnson
Gove
Rudd
Hunt
Javid
Mordaunt

Raab's credibility is 'higher than David Davis's', apparently (not with geography teachers). Not convinced by that. Rudd's majority is too small. On the logic of 'it's never who you expect' that saw Major succeed Thatcher, maybe Javid? It's a depressing list though. I am sceptical / hopeful that they won't get to 48 letters.

I haven't read the whole thread yet, because I can't get past Nadine Dorries. It's like an episode of The Thick As Mince Of It.

JC really, really doesn’t have the capability or interest to negotiate a Brexit deal. He is in politics because he believes in his various causes, not because he cares about policy details. He would have to delegate everything to somebody else, presumably McDonnell?

I am sceptical / hopeful that they won't get to 48 letters.

Even if they don’t, according to Stephen Bush’s Monday briefing, assuming that the people who already have submitted letters won’t support the deal, she is now relying on Labour to get her desk through.

Deal through (although she may also need help with a desk - who knows?)

spudlet When you get to Owen Patterson and his trade deal with Oklahoma, you probably burst into tears. Well, I nearly did.

There is a set of slides explaining progress that has appeared on the gov.uk website this morning if anyone is interested.

Why are we still persisting with this farce when it becomes more and more obvious that the Referendum was compromised?

www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/new-evidence-emerges-of-steve-bannon-and-cambridge-analyticas-role-in-brexit

I am a memeber of the Labour Party . I joined at the time of the leadership contest and heard Corbyn speak at a hustings in my city.
Then I was impressed at his detailed knowledge on many subjects and wanted someone who knew their stuff and would fight against austerity , ideological privatisation and put money into the nhs and schools etc. As a higher paid earner, I welcomed the idea of higher taxes for these.
I never got the chance to ask about his European views at that hustings and neither did anyone else. I regret that a lot. It was a big deal for me and I thought he supported the EU ; certainly liked the benefits in our area. I know the issue of nationalisation is a buggy for him but other EU countries now seeem to have a sensible arrangement with their trains etc .

I know of one person who has left Labour over his Brexit stance and contemplating it myself. Seem to me he is as dilusional as the ERG .

Oh god, not him. He was Minister for a policy area I worked on and dear god.

I am so, so angry about it though. How dare these people do this. How dare they display not even the barest grasp of what they're doing and what they want? How many people have had their lives affected already, how many have died an hour, or a day, or a week sooner than they might have done if the economy was stronger, the NHS and emergency services better funded, and then that woman, part of the ruling party of this country, cannot even trouble herself to be even barely informed of what she's asking for and the practicalities thereof? How many more lives will have time shaved off because of this level of incompetence? Where is the opposition? Where are the fucking adults?!

I am so, so angry and I will never forget this, never. No matter how it ends, even if it turns out ok - my faith in this generation of politicians is gone. Damn them.

Your 10am Graham Brady watch update:

No sighting on twitter of whether Brady has had breakfast and left his house yet.

ERG: "it has become very very clear that not everyone does what they’ve said they’re going to do." 😂😂😂

Don't like it when politicians lie to you ?
Join the club !

Even if JRM was allowed to read ll the letters and hand them in himself - so he knows they aren't blank ! -
he can't know if any of those MPs immediately contacted the 1922 Chair to cancel them !

Ringleader Steve Baker blasted colleagues who had promised to send in a letter but had failed to do so.

is there anyway we can highlight this back to him - maybe on twitter - with the biggest HA-HA emoji you can buy ?

Tory MPs - found out to be liars. How is that even news ?

Raab
B Johnson
Gove
Rudd
Hunt
Javid
Mordaunt

😱

It's like a list of people you'd least like to be stuck in a lift with. I suppose at a push I'd choose Rudd as at least she was once an ardent remainer. I've never forgiven her for her awful party conference speech where she talked about companies having to register EU nationals though. And that's before we even mention Windrush. I suspect she was taking the flak for TM over that but nonetheless.... I also agree about her small majority in Hastings being a problem.

At least Moggy isn't on the list.

Looking at the chaos when they try to organise a leadership challenge in their own party,
why on earth do ERG MPs expect to magically sort out Brexit - or No Deal prep - remaining few months before B-Day?

If there is a contest, notmally a leader would resign if more than 100 MPs voted against her
However, these times are not remotely normal

They need 193 votes to topple May
So long as she wins by even 1 vote, imo she'll stay and plough on

This chaotic - and spiteful - ERG plotting is actually quite useful:

even for those who pay little attention to politics, it must be clear what a bunch of batshit incompetents those Brexiter MPs are

It might just provide the big swing to Remain that we absolutely need, both to justify a PV and to actually win it - until then, PV is just a dangerous fantasy -
or for May to do an emergency revoke in say February / March on her own, if the economy and Sterling crash

children I agree with what you say.
The thought of being led by Johnson, though. We’d be even more of an international laughing stock.
I think a problem is, that taken individually, each of them doesn’t command much support. Therefore wouldn’t the final round of voting end up with selecting the ‘lesser of two evils’?
Actually, surely May would be on the list too. I reckon she’d probably get it in the end, due to having experience.

They need 193 votes to topple May
So long as she wins by even 1 vote, imo she'll stay and plough on

Given that she's said that, I believe it.

It would depend on whether she could get enough MPs to stay and govern with her. And whether MPs would continue to vote with her on other issues.

Thats where it starts to beg the question of whether the Party would split or the government would fall as there would be a call for a formal no confidence vote in the government and possibly trigger a GE.

The contenders / Most Wanted:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/16/theresa-may-personifies-uk-lonely-exhausted-power-ebbing-away

Yet these are the men who were tasked with negotiating Brexit but spectacularly failed.

David Davis couldn’t be bothered to read the briefing notes.

Michael Gove the anti-expert Jack of all trades, master of slime.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, always in character as the fake languid patrician who wants the most extreme form of Brexit, yet has quietly moved his money to Irelandd*.

Boris Johnson, the lying narcissist who has disgraced himself too many times for any amount of Latinate waffle to convince us any more.

Other thugs lurk:
Steve Baker and Gavin Williamson both less trustworthy than the average estate agent.

and Raab our last Brexit negotiator who only just found out how our food reaches us

red Imo the one thing all Tory MPs - and even the DUP - can agree on:

Regardless of how they vote on the budget, the WA or any other bills,
they don't want to risk Corbyn as PM

They don't want to risk losing their seats, or a big chunk of their Tory colleagues losing
57 Tory MPs have a majority of under 4,000

So all Tory MPs will vote against any Labour No Confidence motion

The DUP will also vote against, at least if the WA has not yet been passed - according to their last statement
Even afterwards ....
They know that if Corbyn does nay negotiating, pre or post Brexit, NI will be the first thing chuccked over the side

So long as she wins by even 1 vote, imo she'll stay and plough on

It would be the equivalent of the referendum, wouldn't it. Clearly "the will of the people".

In fact, that might actually be worth seeing. I'm trying to imagine a Brexiteer complaining that May hanging on having won "only" 50.00000001% of the vote.

Theoretically, the UK can actually continue indefinitely / at least until a 2022 GE - without any bills being passed

afaik, things just stay the same:
same tax levels, same govt spending etc

It has worked well for e.g. Belgium in the past, when the govt doesn't actually do anything, but civil servants keep it all ticking along without any changes

It's not like the US, where the Federal govt needs approval from Congress for many essential functions.