Major is talking to an audience which no longer exists

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Ex-PM John Major’s speech this week seems to have gone down particularly badly in the party he used to lead. As a pro-EU figure, he’s been roundly trashed by the Brexitmaniacs who currently run both the party and the UK. It’s a pity, because there was a lot in the speech which was apparently nothing to do with Brexit. I say ‘apparently’ because there is actually a connection: the mindset which led to Brexit is the same one which led to many of the other things which he criticised. One passage in his speech struck me as a particularly powerful one, and certainly struck a chord with me. He asked:

“Can it really be a crime to be frightened; homeless; desperate; destitute; fleeing from persecution, or war, or famine, or hardship; and to cross half the world on foot and dangerous waters in an unsafe boat, in the hope of finding a better life?”

It’s a good question, and one to which the current cabinet, unfortunately, have already given a resounding ‘yes’ in response by promulgating a law to criminalise exactly that. By way of contrast to Major, we also had the hapless Culture Secretary this week telling us that the only thing that might make her lose faith in the current PM would be “if he went out and kicked a dog”. It’s only a ‘probably’ even then, mind. She’s fine with criminalising refugees, making the poor even poorer, law-breaking by government ministers, and repeated blatant lies, just as long as no dog is harmed in the process. It would be hard to find a better illustration of the gulf in values between Major and Johnson than the contrast between those two statements.

The problem for Major is that he doesn’t seem to understand that the people he thinks he’s trying to appeal to – the decent, honest members of the Conservative Party – no longer exist. They’ve either been driven out, or else gone over to the dark side in the belief that their own interests are better served by doing so. He’s wasting his breath.

The IDS petard

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Over the weekend, one ex-Tory leader (Iain Duncan Smith) laid into another (John Major) after the latter suggested that a second referendum could be held on Brexit once the details are clear.  IDS’ argument, as I understand it, is that a vote has been taken and that should be final.

The problem for IDS in taking that line is that there was a previous vote on membership of the EU back in 1975, but rather than accepting the result of that vote he has himself spent many years arguing that the decision should be reversed.  Votes are only ‘final’, it seems, when they produce the ‘right’ answer.

Now it might be argued that that isn’t a fair comparison, either because (a) it was a long time ago, or (b) things have changed since then.  And I would consider that the second of those, at least, is an entirely fair argument and a reasonable justification for seeking a new vote on the question.  I’m a lot less convinced that the mere passage of time justifies a new vote.  But even accepting only the second still opens up two more questions, on neither of which did IDS shed much light.  The first is ‘how much has to change before the situation is considered to be a new one?’ and the second is ‘who decides that anyway?’.

Clearly, the position he has taken over many years shows that he accepts that change in circumstances is a reasonable ground for re-opening a question, so the only argument he has left to deny a further opportunity is that the outcome of Brexit in reality will be little or no different from that which the electorate thought would be the case on 23^rd June.  Until the final terms are known, it is at least theoretically possible that he could be proven right on that, but it looks extremely unlikely at this point.  And a major part of that unlikelihood is the direct result of the untruths he and others told about the outcome of a leave vote…