Sunday, September 11, 2016

You appointed them, Theresa, so they're your responsibility...

When, as the newly appointed Prime Minister, Theresa May appointed Boris Johnson, Liam Fox and David Davis to lead on Brexit, there were those who suspected that this was a cunning ploy to deal with an inevitably unworkable outcome to the Referendum. And, perhaps, this will turn out to be correct one day. Frankly, I doubt it - one of the modern traits in British politics is the urge to selectively use information to support your preferred outcome regardless of the weight of evidence, and I don't think that Theresa May thinks like that.

Regardless of how you voted on 23 June, however, one must admit that putting the supposedly true believers (judge for yourself how faithful Boris is to anything) in charge made sense. If you want Brexit to work, enthusiasm and a philosophical belief in the necessary stance on sovereignty are surely a must.

So, having campaigned against our membership of the European Union for so long, and yes, Boris, you're excused from that (again), and having had all of that time to consider how our withdrawal might work, they're off and running. It isn't going terribly well so far.

Liam has accused British industry of being lazy, David has indicated that membership of the Single Market is unlikely, and on both occasions, their comments have been disowned as being merely a personal opinion. Well, I'm sorry, Theresa, but that simply isn't true. As a member of the Cabinet, speaking on a subject in their portfolio, their opinion must obviously be an indication as to what they want to do. You might not like it, but you gave them that responsibility.

Either they're lone wolves, in which case they aren't suited to collective Cabinet responsibility, or you do have a plan for Brexit which you don't want to tell us about. Admittedly, whatever plan materialises will upset virtually everybody - Remainers and Brexiteers alike - so silence may be a temporary virtue. But either way, you have a problem.

So, here's a new question for you, Theresa. How many times do you have to deny a Minister before they either quit in frustration or you have to let them go? At least Boris is behaving thus far... Probably...

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