Over the last few days there has been a considerable flare-up over leaving the EU, after the High Court ruled that Parliament must have a say on the triggering of Article 50.
The right-wing tabloids were outraged: the Daily Mail front page branded the three judges behind the verdict as "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE", making the Express's "Now your country really does need you: WE MUST GET OUT OF THE EU" and absurdly tacky Union Jack background seem moderate and restrained by comparison.
The right-wing tabloids were outraged: the Daily Mail front page branded the three judges behind the verdict as "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE", making the Express's "Now your country really does need you: WE MUST GET OUT OF THE EU" and absurdly tacky Union Jack background seem moderate and restrained by comparison.
The reason they are annoyed is because everyone knows that MPs, even Tory MPs, were mostly opposed to leaving the EU; and Leavers are probably not being unreasonable in fearing that Parliament could block it from happening. People, including the right-wing press, seem generally convinced that Theresa May is genuinely committed to 'delivering brexit', and there has been a public sense in recent weeks and months that she may be gearing towards a (relatively) 'hard' brexit. Whether this is in fact the case, when everything is going on behind closed doors, is pretty unknowable; but I think that the populist Right is keen to avoid a 'soft' brexit, which they do not consider to be truly leaving the EU at all. This, they fear, would be Parliament's choice, so they prefer May to have a free hand.
This is not how May wanted things to go; personally, I was concerned that she was gearing towards a 'hard' brexit all on her own without that ever having been voted for by anyone. Whatever some may have thought, the referendum was not about weighing control of immigration against single market membership; the Leave side did not have present a united view on whether we would remain in or leave the single market, with some memorably claiming we could both have our cake and eat it on the topic. EU figures, meanwhile, have insisted all along that the 'four freedoms' go together as a package, and will not wish Britain to have a better or more attractive arrangement with it than we had prior to leaving.
If the government goes ahead with its appeal to the Supreme Court, I suspect that it will be defeated again. I suspect that a general "please can we activate Article 50" bill would scrape through the Commons, because MPs will not wish to be seen as going against the will of the people; but I think that it would almost certainly be blocked in the Lords - because the Lords is still full of Lib Dems appointed last parliament and has little fear of democratic accountability.
Last October, the House of Lords blocked a 2015 Tory manifesto commitment on tax credits, resulting in threats to curb the power of the Lords. If the Lords did something similar in this matter and blocked a brexit bill, I dare say that the outcry would be far, far greater. I suspect that May would be forced to follow through with or at least repeat Cameron's threats last year; Article 50 would probably then be delayed while our constitutional obfuscations are fudged, but I believe that May's authority in her party is likely to hold up long enough to see it through, albeit not by March.
I remain of the belief that Leave will happen - not necessarily in the sense that Nigel Farage would like. In any event, there certainly should be democratic oversight of May's negotiation agenda: she may be Prime Minister, but no one except her own constituents and Tory MPs ever voted for her.
